Game Night

One of our strategies in reaching out to international students with the gospel is connecting them with believers. Last Tuesday night, we put together a game night at an American believer's house near UTA. We invited lots of our international friends and ended up with 4 Indian students, 3 Persian students, and one Japanese students. We also had 14 American believers. 

We taught the students Phase 10, and they really enjoyed the game! It was fun to see the cross-cultural competitiveness come out from everyone. 

The best part about the evening was the fact that relationships were formed between the believers and these international students. I am so excited to see the light shine among these lost friends through these relationships. 

"You are the light of the world. A town built on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let you light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven." (Matthew 5:14-16 NIV)

The Big Howdy

We are off to another rewarding semester. I have the privilege of working with all the other Christian organizations at UTA on a welcome party for international students called the Big Howdy. In addition to the welcome party. We meet the needs of the international students in several other ways. We begin with rides from the airport as the students arrive. We follow that with trips to Wal-Mart during the week before school starts for the students to get the essentials for their apartments. Our next event is a used item sale where we sell donated furniture to the students for rock-bottom prices (the money goes to buying food for the welcome party) and deliver it to their apartments.

Delivering furniture to these Indian students' apartment

Finally, we have the Big Howdy Party. We had over 700 people attend the welcome party this semester. At the Big Howdy Party, volunteers serve dinner and interact with all the international students, followed by a chance to learn a country line dance, and we finish the night off with a lot of Indian music, which the students absolutely love. They dance the night away.

Some volunteers from The Paradox Church learning some Indian dance moves

I meet many new students at orientation, and the Big Howdy Party is a great second point of connection for me to establish the relationships a little deeper. This semester, I met new students from Bangladesh, India, Iran, Lebanon, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and Turkey. I'm looking forward to the opportunities to share Jesus with these new friends from around the world.

For more information about the Big Howdy party, go to utabighowdy.com.