Cooking Group Recipes
Many of you have been intrigued by the Cooking Group that happened this semester.
Here are the recipes we used this semester:
2011 Annual Ministry Update
Hot off the presses!
Here’s my Annual Ministry Update; if you’d like to receive a paper copy, send me an email and I’ll pop one in the mail for you.
Join the Christmas Party
Our last event this semester was our annual Christmas Banquet. We hoped to incorporate the many things we had learned over the semester in our planning of this event. We planned to have a gingerbread house competition, carols, prizes and a potluck meal. We were in the Thomas Lounge, which is right off the main floor of the Oakham House and we left the door open to encourage people to pop in and join our party.
Answered Prayer:
To tie in our vision for the year, we put up posters saying “Join the Christmas Party”, that we had copied onto lime green paper, around the campus. After a semester of postering, and feeling unsure that posters were actually effective in inviting people to our events; many of my leaders approached the idea of postering with caution. After an exec meeting that ended early, a week before the party, I sent out my leaders to poster the campus. I went with Elizabeth to poster the Library building. While we postered, we wondered if they would draw people in. The day before the party, I walked through the Library building on my way to early Morning Prayer. I saw that many of the posters Elizabeth and I had put up had been postered over. I was sad (and angry as they had been postered over by unauthorized groups); and spent time in prayer asking God for our posters to be effective, despite being postered over.
Cut to: Our Christmas party, a student walks in, Vera*gets food and joins our table. In the course of conversation with her, I ask her how she’d found out about the party. She said she had seen the posters in the library building, and then made plans to attend; after the posters were covered she went in search of another one to get the pertinent details. She said she was excited as it was her first Christmas party of the year and was drawn in by our bright green posters. She left our party getting contact information for myself, Lauren and Elizabeth and giving us hers with a keen desire to keep in touch next semester. She is also of South-Asian descent, and when she gave me her contact information, it led us into a conversation where, thanks to my time at SALI I was able to identify and speak with knowledge and affirmation about her ethnic origin (she is from the same region as one of my SALI mentees). Earlier this semester, I had prayed for more South Asian students; including Vera, we now have 2 that are connected to our fellowship; another answered prayer, praise the Lord!
There was much laughter and merriment at our party, as everyone enjoyed the gingerbread house competition and the carol-off. By the end of the night, I counted and saw that over 30 people had eaten a meal with us (and many others had stopped by for a quick bite), and we had received contact information from 7 new people, eager to keep in touch next semester!
I look forward to seeing what God will do with our fellowship next semester!
*name changed
Ministries this Fall
This fall has given rise to many creative ministries, here’s what we’ve been up to this fall:
Running Small Group:
Jenna has been leading a group that exercises together and then does a small devotional on Monday mornings. This group takes place at the Ryerson Athletic Centre. In the winter, Jenna will be switching gears slightly, and will be pursuing Sports ministry, possibly involving intramurals.
Prayer:
I have been leading an early Morning Prayer time at 8 am on Wednesdays. I soon discovered that students aren’t as keen about prayer at that hour; as the time was spottily attended. Despite that, it was really wonderful to start the day with Jesus; and to find ways to creatively be communicating with our Creator. I plan on continuing the prayer group, but investigating new locations and timeslots.
John Manuscript Study:
We have been studying John’s gospel in manuscript-style study this semester. It has been an enriching experience for the leaders and students. I have been preparing the scripture with Jenna and Bethany who have been leading the Thursday evening studies. Over the course of the semester, the study has evolved and became more engaging as students dug into the text. We used media to help aid discussion and understand application of the text. We will be continuing with the gospel of John in the winter semester.
Cooking Group:
Every other Thursday, Lauren and I would lead a group that taught students how to cook using stories from the Bible. We used the website, www.cookingwiththebible.com for recipes, and would lead students in new culinary skills while explaining the significance of the meal we were preparing. We would also provide students with recipe cards of the dishes we prepared with a question that we would either discuss while tasting our dishes or leave students to think about. Lauren, my co-leader has this to say about her leadership role: I have loved being in leadership this year as it has allowed me to grow in my faith through putting me in situations where I have had to put my full trust in God. It has also allowed me to become much more intentional about putting God first in my life, and allowing his love to spill out into the lives of the people around me.
Movie Outreach
This year, Elizabeth was really excited about using movies as an aid to deeper discussions about faith and life. This semester, she lead a movie discussion about the movie Gattica. It went well, and has the potential to be a great tool for outreach. Elizabeth will pursue Movie ministry on a semi-regular basis in the winter semester.
Worship Coffeehouse
Bethany has a heart for creative worship. This semester, she lead a worship event; which incorporated music and visual arts. She put together a wonderful worship team, and made great connections to the gospel of John. Bethany will pursue Worship Coffeehouse events on a semi-regular basis in the winter semester.
GTA FallCon: Mark Our City
“We did an interactive flash mob…which included planking”
This year, we tried something new. Often, we have had out winter conference be something that was a GTA-wide event; but this year we decided to try having our fall conference be GTA-wide. It was September 23-24 and held in city at Stone Church.
We decided to do something simple, compelling and fun; that could help us launch ministries on our campuses. We invited students to see a play performance of the gospel of Mark. The play was divided into 2 acts. The first was performed on the Friday evening of the retreat and the second act was performed on the Saturday evening. During the day on Saturday, we received some teaching on parables, and then applied some of our teaching in the city. We started by re-enacting the parable of the sower in Queen’s park, by scattering grass seed. We then went and did an interactive flash mob inspired by the story of Jairus’ daughter which included planking; which the students loved and were very creative in their positioning (look for the student planking on a bench and garbage can). The planked students were then “woken up” and then would interact with the people who had assembled around them while they planked and offer them a package of water and granola bar, to represent bread and living water. After these live parables we debriefed the experience with the students, and then sent them out to lunch with their campus groups with a few questions to engage people they come across in the city on their way back to the church. These conversations proved very fruitful and life-giving for the students as we discovered during the debrief of the afternoon. Following the debrief, we went into our second act of the play; and ended the retreat shortly after the play’s end.
I had a vested interest in this conference, as I was on the planning committee. The committee consisted of me, my supervisor Jamie, and my friend Dan, staff at York University. We had been meeting and planning this conference since the spring. Dan and I took on roles of emcees of the conference, while Jamie did the teaching. Having already experienced co-emceeing at SALI, I was comfortable taking on this role, but still had some unresolved feelings from my last experience emceeing. I also lead the students in an interactive art piece that we did in response to the first act of the play on the Friday evening. It was exciting to see the themes that came up for the students, as they processed through the questions we asked them. Another role I had as part of this conference was that of “stager”, as I set up the space to create ambience for the play. I really enjoyed this role, and marvelled at how most of the items I was using were revamping pieces from various conferences: I set up a road in the gym out of fabric used at out National Staff Conference, emulating what I saw at Senior Girls’ camp this summer; I flooded the room with sounds before the performance that I’d used for our Kingdom People events; and I used incense to fill the room with smells that I originally purchased for this past Campus Gathering. It was fun re-using these elements and remembering how God moved in the midst of these other events.
We hope to perform the play again in the winter semester, to help us recruit for city/script.
Prom Gone Wrong
“Our aim was to throw a really fun party…as we celebrated good things about prom and poked fun at some of its tired traditions”
At #conferencewin, we spent time brainstorming themes. We had 1 minute to think of 3 different themes. One of our themes was Prom Gone Wrong. Something struck us about that theme, as we talked more we realized we had a wide range of experiences of formals and proms. Almost immediately we began to think of ways to throw a party called “Prom Gone Wrong”. Our aim was to throw a really fun party, with good food, games and merriment as we celebrated good things about prom and poked fun at some of its tired traditions.
We decided we would try this as our first outreach event. As we planned for this event, we thought about food, music, games and prizes. We also hired an RIVCF alumnus, Ainsley to set up a Prom Photo booth. We also offered to take interested students out shopping at local thrift stores to find their perfect prom outfit.
We encountered a few setbacks: too much food and too ambitious a meal that we set out to prepare ourselves took us out of some of the intentional inviting process; the room booked wasn’t entirely conducive to our vision for the party; and perhaps the most surprising setback was that the Ryerson Student Union had paired up with a course union and threw a Prom party on the same night as our event! But, despite the setbacks, we had a great time! Friends who hadn’t previously come to an IV event came and had a great time!
One of my highlights was when Serena* and her boyfriend came to our event. Serena is one of my childhood best friends, she is not a Christian nor is she a student at Ryerson; however, her boyfriend worked for the Oakham House (where the majority of our meetings and events are held). I ran into her boyfriend one day when I was on campus and invited him to come to our event, he said he had to work, but mentioned Serena might be available**. I asked Serena if she’d be interested in coming, and she was! She came and had a great time. And though her boyfriend was working he kept coming by and checking in on her and our event; suffice it to say, we received the best service from the Oakham House staff that evening! It was such an unexpected blessing to share my work with this good friend, and also to build connections with the staff of the Oakham House; two things I had really been praying for!
Another added blessing was that a couple of my intern housemates came, and were a great help in welcoming people and inviting them to participate in our activities for the evening!
We learned so much in the process of putting on this event. Though in some regards it didn’t go as planned, we were blessed and surprised abundantly throughout the all aspects of planning and putting on this event. Following the event, we had some time to debrief as a team; and also have some great follow-up conversations with our friends who came to the event.
*name changed
** A little sidenote: Serena and I had a wee falling out in high school when I first became a Christian. Since then, we have reconnected, and she’s asked questions but on the whole, she is baffled by my work with IV.
Vision for the Year: Join the Party
“…we have put on events that are fun and accessible to people wherever they are in their faith journey”
Our vision for the year was inspired by a talk given at #conferencewin. My students were struck by the words and imagery that our campuses are filled with people that are alive but spiritually dead. As they thought of their friends and classmates, they felt compelled to be more missional.
During our time visioning in June, we took account of the people who were not in the room, and accounted for ways we have not welcomed people well and brainstormed ways to be more invitational to these groups of people. As we reflected on this brainstorming at #conferencewin, we realized we wanted to be known as a fellowship that has joy and is invitational. One that is bold in their faith, and spends time studying and applying God’s Word, but also gathers people together and has great fellowship. We don’t aim to downplay the costliness of following Jesus, and put forth a misaligned understanding of the gospel; but we noticed our previous trend was to over-emphasize the costliness and suffering for the gospel and downplay the joy of life as God’s people in His Kingdom.
As part of this vision, we have put on events that are fun and accessible to people wherever they are in their faith journey. Our aim is that these events will help people gradually gain awareness of our fellowship and eventually help bridge them to some of our other weekly ministries.
We advertise for these events by making buttons with a logo we created at #conferencewin. We have used this logo on all our posters and flyers for events. We are now seeing people recognize our logo and that our fellowship has more campus-wide recognition than in previous years!
Intern House
[Our house] “…at any given time can be filled with students, friends and ministry”
I found out Toronto would be having an internship in December, and almost immediately began dreaming of the possibilities of living in community with interns. Officially, I was invited to live with the interns in February. I, along with my good friend Dave Stone, staff at OCAD University chose to live with the interns and welcomed them to Toronto in late August.
We live together in what was known as the downtown staff house or “McGill House”. In addition to this amazing experience of living in community, the house is less than 2 minutes away from Ryerson.
Our house has become a hub for parties, meetings, and at any given time can be filled with students, friends and ministry.
The interns are supervised on campus by the campus staff who primarily cares for their campus (York and U of T St. George); and the overall internship is supervised by my supervisor Jamie. My role with the interns is one where I walk alongside them as they navigate life in community and in Toronto. At home: we meet, have meals together, work out conflict and pray and care for each other and host one another’s students when they are over. This is done in addition to my responsibilities on campus, and as much as I enjoy the immersion of ministry; I have had some struggles being able to find good rest this semester.
The Toronto Interns: Kyle, Vanessa, Veronika, and Tate
#conferencewin
The anticipation was heavy in the air. The wait seemed endless. As they watched the countdown before the light turned green, they readied themselves for the big moment. Finally, the light turned green…
Imagine this: A group of 140 people consisting of staff and students from across Ontario, assembled in chevron formations at opposite corners of the Spadina and Bloor intersection on a Friday evening in late August, who once signalled, burst into a hokey-pokey flash mob and stop and disperse when the streetlight turns red.
This is how we kicked off #conferencewin. What is #conferencewin? It is a conference that serves to teach and practice innovation and creativity in our New Student Outreach to staff and students of Inter-Varsity fellowships across Ontario.
In addition to the hokey-pokey flash mob, students participated in a poetry slam and received teaching on innovation and outreach and had time to brainstorm new ideas for an outreach event to kick off the year. They also had the opportunity to present their ideas to the group gathered and a select few were able to then present their ideas and ask for funding from a special grouping of guests in our version of “Dragon’s Den”.
All of my student leaders were able to attend, and from their time at #conferencewin they came up with their vision of the year: Join the [King’s] Party; and also planned our first outreach event “Prom Gone Wrong”.
As we finish up this semester, we are still able to see the fruits from some of these events and their impact on our movement across Ontario.
SALI
“I feel re-energized about the mission of InterVarsity to reach South Asian students in North America. God really humbled me as I interacted with students and hearing them process calling, identity, and leadership.” – SALI attendee
SALI, the South Asian Leadership Institute happens every 3 years. This is a fairly new gathering, and only the second time it has occurred, also the first time with Canadian staff and students in attendance. I attended as staff with Stacy (staff at UTSC) and staff-candidate at the time Ashley, and 2 students Andrea and Renil.
As someone who has in the past struggled to see herself as a minister to South Asians, I was struck by the ways God was showing me otherwise. As part of SALI, each staff was asked to mentor 2-3 of the attending students before, during and after the Institute (roughly a time period of 6 months). At first I wasn’t sure what to think of this, as I was not sure I would have many things to offer my mentees, and often wondered if I would connect with them in a meaningful way and if they would want to continue relationship with me after the Institute. To make matters difficult, I had my first Skype conversations with each of my mentees during my summer road trip, when I was in Vancouver (all my mentees are from the east coast), but despite challenges crossing timezones and technology failures; God uniquely paired me with mentees who I was able to connect with fairly seamlessly. They are extraordinary female leaders that have walked similar paths to me and have faced similar struggles. I soon found our relationships to be quite reciprocal, as I learned and received from both their unique experiences and through the teaching they received through IV USA. During SALI, my bonds with my mentees were strengthened, and each of them were eager to continue connecting with me post-Institute. The times I spend talking with these women are amongst the most life-giving conversations I have had this fall.
In addition to mentoring students, another role I had at SALI was co-emcee of the Institute. I shared this role with a staff from Florida, whom I had met at Asian American Staff Conference. Being in this role was enriching and challenging for me. I found that in some ways my travels and particularly my time at camp helped prepare me well for this role. In others, I found places where small incidents brought out places of brokenness in how I saw myself and how I understood both of my cultures. In the end, I am glad I did it, and glad to have the experience of co-emceeing as I found myself in that role early in the fall. In addition, many of my observation and interpreting skills were used and honed and have proved extremely helpful while navigating work and life in our intern community house.
One of the added blessings of being part of this Institute was the opportunity to serve alongside my South Asian brothers and sisters of the IV-USA movement. It was comforting to partner with others who understood the calling to IV staff and its costliness; but also the joy and kingdom life that we can offer those in our care.
SALI group photo
More photos from SALI can be viewed here
The Arch 