Sabbatical Reflections: From Strangers I could judge to Colleagues I could delight in

 "What is the question for your Sabbatical?" I was asked in one of my first conversations with someone connected to campus ministry in the Netherlands. I mostly knew the answer: I wanted to pay attention to how God works, and grow in the spiritual practice of actively waiting on God. But that wasn't what I wanted to focus on in this conversation: I had come wanting to know more about how this pastor’s particular church denomination approached campus ministry, so I could judge them against my own. Instead, I felt judged: I stumbled to express myself well in Dutch; I was pushed on why we haven't focused more on student well-being; and wasn't my understanding of God too small? 

The primary project of my Sabbatical was to visit different campus ministries to be inspired and gain new ideas. But I think I also went with the assumption that I would come back with wisdom (that I would be asked to share) and the reassurance that how we were doing things here is good (and even better than there). The preliminary research I did seemed to confirm my feelings of superiority. I discovered that almost all of the church denominations had decreased or limited the funds for campus ministry, and few of the current campus ministers had been there long enough to live through the changes that the pandemic brought to ministry. When I looked through the websites from ministries, few of them mentioned God or even Christianity, and many pastors were life-coaches or another generic term. 

And then I started sending out emails to different campus ministers, asking if I could stop by to meet them and hear more about their ministries. My emails were met with affirmation and curiosity. They welcomed my questions and were curious about my own ministry and what I was learning with this project. The gracious hospitality humbled me, and the conversations shifted from my completing an agenda that was based on knowledge and affirmation of what I had been doing, to being open to what the Spirit might teach me. How could I not shift perspective once I shared with others the joyous delight of recognizing a partner in ministry, something I treasured from my connections with other Christian (and) Reformed campus ministries and at my local campus?

Campus ministry is complex and exciting, and it was a joy to feel welcomed by and able to affirm others who share in this calling to serve God in this way. Who else but a campus minister could fully understand what it is like to need to constantly try new things, some of which will inevitably fail? Or who would recognize how hard it can be to trust in God working when many of our interactions with students are brief, mere stepping stones on a faith journey which we might never get to see?