The only way to describe this year’s fall retreat is "Amazing". When we first thought about hosting our own fall retreat 3 years ago it was with knowledge that it might not work. I thought charging $55 for a weekend at the beach was a good idea, but college students wouldn't want to travel several hours to hear about Jesus, especially freshmen or Would they? God would show us in big ways.
Several months ago our team said we wanted to trust the Lord to see about 125 students come to this year’s fall retreat. Two years ago we had about 50 and last year around 80 students show up. The numbers were increasing and we were excited and grateful, yet our hope was always to capture some of the momentum from our 6 week freshmen outreach efforts, and see more underclassmen attend.
Weeks before the fall retreat registration looked as if we probably would hit the 80 student mark. This was still great, but we really wanted to see God do exceedingly more. A week before the first registration deadline we got to see our Lord move in ways I haven't see him move in quite some time. Our sold out point for the retreat was 130 people and that week God had about 150 people sign up for our fall retreat. This posed issues for us logistically, but it amazed me to see how God was moving and increasing our faith to believe him. We ended up with 160 students showing up to the fall retreat and with about half of those students being freshmen. It helped us see that God is truly moving on college students lives. The other exciting element was that we had four historically black colleges and universities represented at the retreat.
Another highlight of the retreat was meeting Dylan. He saw I was wearing a medallion in the shape of Ohio. He shared he was from their and of coarse I let him know that I'm from there as well. As we began to talk about our hometown, I asked him what university he went to and he said North Carolina A&T. This made me super excited and the reason being is that we had been trying for the last 2 years to re-launch a chapter on their campus and every single time it fizzled out some how. It was great to connect with Dylan because he came at the last moment to the conference. He wasn't even supposed to come. After the conference I spoke with a volunteer at NC A&T and he mentioned there was a leader surfaced and he was going through the process of getting Impact recognized as a student organization. I asked him with a surprised tone who this student was and he said a kid named Dylan. I praised Jesus, because He again was faithful to raise up another leader who will understand their mission is to spread the gospel. — Moe
