Gospel Zeal
Testimony at InterVarsity Staff Conference 08by James Chambers
When they asked me to do a testimony, I was kind of reluctant about it because I began to think, “I don’t have a chapter of 50. I don’t have a chapter of 30. I barely have a chapter of 20 students.” And God began to convict me and say, “That has nothing to do with the fact that students’ lives have been transformed and changed at your campus, and my work has been going forward.” So I don’t come to you with eloquent speech, and I don’t come to you with all these big bodacious numbers, I just come to you in the power of the Holy Spirit, testifying to this gospel of our Lord Jesus the Christ.
It is this same gospel that has brought salvation to Lake Forest College, a college that is so self-dependent in its wealth, that has great pride in its liberal ideologies and thoughts. It’s this same college that has been overtaken by a great tsunami of our Father’s love. What once seemed like the students’ hearts would slowly turn like a massive turning of the Titanic, now with just a rapid twitch of the handlebars, they are turning like Jet-Skis.
I came to Lake Forest with InterVarsity just after I graduated from sunny Los Angeles – 70-degree winters – to the bitter, bitter cold of Chicago and negative 30 degrees around Super Bowl time. I was not very happy about it at first, but it was only with this vision that I came.
I came with no money, no family, no resources to help me get the vision started. But just the vision from God that was given to myself and two other students, at three separate points in time, that all culminated in a fall retreat of prayer in 2003. I want to read this vision to you. One lady had the privilege of having a very specific tongue-interpretation of it, and I want to show you, this is the same vision that I myself saw in an open vision:
I saw the whole Quad filled with people, standing and kneeling on the ground, in the middle Quad of Lake Forest College. There were about 500 to 800 students in this Quad, all facing the chapel, but we saw no one speaking there. They had their hands lifted up in praise and repentance. We were able to see individual faces, and my one student cried because she didn’t see her roommate’s face.
But it wasn’t about the faces and the individuals who were there, it was that there was a spirit of repentance and praise covering Lake Forest College. Around this group of students, there were angels. The angels, she said, were nine feet tall, between one-half to one-third the size of the trees that were around the college campus. They were huge and had their wings expanded out, touching wing to wing, because there were demons that kept trying to get into the circle to prevent this state of repentance. However, the wings of the angels kept stopping the onslaught of the demons coming forward and they could not get in to any avail. However, they kept going forward with great desperation because they knew that these students in this circle had the potential to impact the world for the Kingdom of God.
Now, that’s a big vision, right? “How in the world, at Lake Forest College of all places, is this going to take place? How can anyone ever get saved?” is what we began to ask.
These demons, this onslaught and this attack have been the very things that have been happening at Lake Forest College. Last year, our large group coordinator passed away. In the last year and a half – I’m a very joyful person – I’ve experienced two deep depressions, and seasons of depression have never really hit me since I was 15 years old. This onslaught isn’t necessarily coming at them, but it is coming at the people of God trying to bring the vision to pass there. And so we began to say, “God, how are you going to do this?” And the answer is the power of the gospel.
He began to display his power in a young lady named Angie. Her freshman year, God placed her on my heart and I used to chase this girl all around campus trying to get her to Bible studies, trying to get her to church. She actually came to church a couple of times with some of the students in our fellowship. However, she did not commit to the gospel. It wasn’t until two years later that this young lady, at an NSO (New Student Outreach) tabling event – I saw her coming out of the corner of my eye – she pursued me, she chased me down.
“James! You know that God thing you told me about? Not only am I interested in it, but I need Him in my life right now.”
So I met with Angie outside of our little common area, and this young lady began to confess how she can’t live in her own power anymore; her life is in shambles and she can’t hold it together even though this young lady has the most potential to make an impact in the world in secular arenas – she couldn’t do it. And that night she gave her life to the Lord Jesus Christ.
That’s just the beginning of God’s power. This young lady became the greatest evangelist I’ve ever seen in the next three days. In the next three days at our first large group meeting – she’s the president of the United Black Association, with great influence in that community – and she began to bring all of her friends to our large group.
At that large group that night, nine students gave their lives to the Lord Jesus Christ. Two of those nine students are serving in our exec leadership team this year and we are truly multi-ethnic in our leadership team. Not only that but this young lady has been in Tanzania the last semester studying abroad, and you talk about world changers developed? Students from all over the world are in this exchange program and she’s leading Bible studies, testifying on FaceBook about how people are coming to know God. The power is indeed in the Gospel.
But that still does not stop the fact that we have been experiencing great turmoil, and questions of fundraising, questions of passion and questions of dissention amongst the body, all as why we should keep going forward even though we are seeing some fruit.
I submit to you this final testament of God’s power.
A young student named Micah – I’ll change his name and the country he’s from to protect him – he’s a young man from Kosovo, a freshman. This young man came to our Bible study, our first large group meeting, and we were teaching on Gideon and how God can take an insignificant person like us and change, not only change but bring the salvation and the turn-around of a whole nation. At the end of this Bible study, five students gave their lives to the Lord on this particular night.
But you know how the Christians are. They kind of get dull with salvation. Oh, more people, another altar call, more people giving their lives to the Lord. You should have seen the faces on these students when I was giving the altar call. It was sickening, a stifling of the Holy Spirit. Yet, you should see the reactions after this young man spoke. Because this young man was a Muslim. He raised his hand afterward and said, “Can I say something?” And I was shocked by what happened next. This young Muslim man had the audacity to come into my Bible study and start preaching!
This is what he said: “I’m from Kosovo. I am Muslim. I have never heard a Christian sermon. I have never been in a church. No one has ever come to my country to tell my people about Jesus. I now know why America is the best country in the world because you can preach Jesus here. This is the best thing I’ve ever heard. I don’t know what you all thought about tonight but this is the best news I’ve ever heard!” This Muslim began to preach to the Christians about the goodness of their God.
This is the power of the gospel! Can you imagine the impact?
The cool thing about Angie is that it wasn’t because I was a great evangelist. For two years the seed of the gospel had been germinating in her heart and came to bring the harvest that it was sent there for salvation.
Imagine Micah, his whole family – no one has ever come to his people to teach about Jesus. This young man will come to salvation. The seed will produce the harvest. It is the incorruptible seed of the Word of God; it will not fail. He will go to his family, preach to them, change the whole community, change the village, and bring a whole revival around Kosovo that has never been. And I say that with complete confidence in my God.
What is the vision that God has given you? Because it is the power in this vision that has helped me to sustain these last couple of years, through all hell. What is the vision that God has given you? It is in this vision that God has given you specifically – we are to return to our campuses in this power of this vision, in the power of this gospel, doing the works of Jesus, empowered by his Holy Spirit, expecting fruit that shall remain. What is the vision God has given you? Hold onto it for dear life. For the gospel is truly the power of God unto salvation.
James Chambers is an InterVarsity staff worker in the Great Lakes West.
Unless otherwise noted, all materials on the urbana.org web site are Copyright InterVarsity Christian Fellowship / USA. All rights reserved.
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