FORT COLLINS, Colo. — Church groups on Colorado State University’s campus have always found clever ways to entice students into chatting with them. It should come as no surprise that one of the groups found a tasty way to get people together: milkshakes.
Milkshake Monday’s was created by seven girls that attend a Thursday night church group on campus called Cru. Cru is shortened for Campus Crusaders for Christ. Each of the girls is a part of the leadership team for the group.
Their purpose is very clear; give students a colloquial setting where they can learn about how to get involved with their student organization.
“We figured that people who love God and love milkshakes would love to hang out with others who love the same things!” said JoBeth Pilate, the head planner of Milkshake Monday’s.
The girls purchased all of the supplies for the frothy desserts, but did take donations towards funding for Cru. Whether or not they are raising a significant amount of money for their group, they are more concerned with spreading the word of God.
“Many people hear that a church group is putting on an event, and think it’s just a ploy to get people to commit,” Heather Peterson, roommate of Pilate, said as she described their goal of the event, “but we just wanted to give kids a setting where they can feel comfortable.”
“And a place that they can ask the tough questions that they never would get to ask in church” chimed in Pilate. “We just want everyone to feel accepted too.”
Their goals were definitely met. The house, located off of Prospect and Constitution, was wide open and expecting guests. Each girl gave a warm welcome to each student as they showed up, and went immediately to work on each person’s perfect milkshake.
The next goal was to give a place that every student was going to feel comfortable and able to ask any question they so desired. There weren’t many tough questions like Pilate suggested, but that didn’t stop the conversation.
To most people who aren’t involved in a group like this, the assumption is that the girls are probably preaching about joining their organization.
They would be wrong.
The talk circled from classes and which majors are the best, to the school’s struggling football team and how fun intramurals are going to be. For the most part it was typical student conversation.
The only evangelizing that was done by any of the girls in the house was to give information about their student group. The girls only wanted to give an idea of what Thursday nights are like at Cru.
Cru meets every Thursday night at 8 p.m. in the lecture hall of the plant science building, classroom C101. The primary goal of Cru is to give Christian students a place to get together in a large group, and tackle issues that college students face.
As for Pilate and Peterson, they could not wait to see everyone who attended their creamy event on Thursday night.
It was definitely a sweet way to bring people together, for God.
No comments:
Post a Comment