We factor the vision of multiplication into everything we do.
All my life I have been haunted by my multiplication tables! When I was a kid, my mom spent hours testing me with those stupid flash cards. Now, I am haunted by my multiplication tables in a different way. I am overwhelmed by the amazing potential for spiritual multiplication within college ministry. That’s one reason why I do it!
Regardless of the size of your ministry—if you’re multiplying disciples it has the potential to impact thousands of people in a few years.
A great verse that illustrates the biblical vision for spiritual multiplication is 2 Timothy 2:2: “And what you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses entrust to faithful men who will be able to teach others also.”
Our goal as college ministers is to make disciples who will make disciples who will make disciples. As you lead your college ministry, make sure to build it in a way that you will multiply disciples with a vision to make a difference for the more than 4.5 billion lost people and 7,009 unreached people groups in the world.
It is my prayer that our ministry will not simply reach students on campus, but that God will use it as a launch pad to the nations. I am specifically burdened for launching new ministries on the campuses in California. There are over 280 college campuses in California and most campuses need new disciple-making ministries. My brother, David Worcester, has planted four new ministries in San Diego in four years and they are now employing a multi-site model with these ministries. They have the faith goal of planting one new ministry per year!
Campus Renewal Ministries recently discovered that, on average, five-percent of the student body is reached on campuses in the United States. This means there is plenty of room for new ministries on almost every campus.
I think of a campus as a city within a city. Missiologists and church leaders are passionately sharing about the need for hundreds of new church plants in our major cities. In a similar way I believe most college campuses need many new ministries and missional communities to fully reach each campus. The vision of our ministry is to raise up world-changers to go to new “people groups” on campus, new campuses, cities, nations, and unreached people groups of the world.
Everything we do, from sharing Christ to recruiting and training student leaders and staff, should fall in line with the vision of fulfilling the Great Commission in this generation.
Take a minute to read these great quotes to get you fired up for the potential of your college ministry for multiplication:
“The university is the clear-cut fulcrum with which to move the world. More potently than by any other means, change the university and you will change the world.” —Charles Malik, former secretary-general of the United Nations
“The fact is, no one thought up the strategy of fulfilling the Great Commission by reaching the college campus. Campus ministry is the result of the observation that God has chosen to use the university and college students as His primary vehicle in accelerating the evangelism of the world. To be involved in campus ministry is to be involved in God’s primary missions strategy.” —The Powerful Percent
“Almost all great revivals and missionary movements started on the college campus. Also, negative revolution movements have found their birth at the university. Movements such as Nazism, Marxism, and Communism. Every revolution good or bad had a great influence on students who were hungry for change and willing to lay down their lives for a cause.” —Jason Ma
“Never in history have so many college students been more ready to receive Christ as Savior and follow him as Lord. They are waiting to be challenged and led in the greatest revolution in history – the fulfillment of the Great Commission in this generation. If you win the university today, we will win the world tomorrow!”
—Bill Bright, founder of Campus Crusade for Christ
“One fourth of the world’s college students are in North America, and they represent the most reachable, recruitable, trainable, and sendable category of persons on the planet. You see college students are different. They will go where others won’t. They will believe it can be done when others doubt. They are waiting for someone like you to love them, serve them, look deep into their eyes and say “Would you join me in reaching the entire world for Jesus Christ?” —Steve Shadrach
“You have to have a leadership pipeline developing, and that usually happens through campus work.You have to have really dynamic college ministry…You have to have a campus leadership pipeline. Otherwise the church planting doesn’t continue.” —Tim Keller in an interview on essentials for movement in a city
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