What is needed
Though I have worked with American
students in America and East Asian students abroad,
I have been learning this year what an international
student needs is not the same. While at West
Chester and abroad, I would focus my time ensuring
that the men I worked with loved the gospel and
had experience doing ministry. I felt that if I gave
students those two goals, they would be prepared
for a lifetime of ministry. My experiences this year
have shown me that international students need a
third. I need to show them how important it is to be
plugged into a local church.
While at West Chester, I would require that
students leaders were part of a church, but here I
need to model to international students to serve
and love their local church. This point has been
drilled home to me by Stuart, a fellow worker with
international students in Philadelphia. He is starting
work on his seminary doctoral thesis tracking the
spiritual well being of East Asian Christians who
return home after college. After seeing so much
data and anecdotal evidence, he longs to understand
why so many new Christians do not find a church
home when they return back to East Asia.
If is for this reason, I have decided to do
most of my work this year in conjunction with two
local Chinese churches. At one church, I teach
English and a Bible study a couple times every
month.
The English class, which for many people is
what brings them in the door, has been interesting.
Many students have a hard time with all the idioms
we constantly use. (Listen to yourself talk for the
next hour and see how many phrases you use that
aren’t in a dictionary; like sports metaphors). The
Bible study time is the highlight of my schedule.
Most of the dozen or so members are non-
Christians and I really enjoy hearing what they love
and are offended by as they hear the gospel.
At the other Chinese church, I recently
returned from a weekend retreat that taught what
the Bible says about marriage. For the Christian and
non-Christian students, this was new material for
many of them. After the retreat, the pastor
requested that we meet. He asked what my goals on
campus were and I shared how I would love to see
the Christian men of the church trained and
motivated to find ways to share the gospel on
campus. He then grabbed the church directory and
gave me some men who he thought would benefit
the most from this. He then asked if I would like to
come to his church some Sunday to lead evangelism
training during the Sunday school time.
At home Alex still has bad eczema and is an
awful napper. When the itching is not bothering him
too bad, he is pleasant and smiles a lot. Lilia loves
being a big sister and making her brother laugh. We
are ready for winter to be over so we can take the
kids outside and enjoy the city.
Dave and Katie Brindley
5005 Chestnut Street
Philadelphia, PA 19139
e: dave.brindley@uscm.org
c: 215-407-7182
giving online: give.ccci.org
Prayer Requests:
1)For Alex as he struggles with eczema, that he
would be healed. The poor guy is so itchy.
2)That many students would accept my challenge
to join me this summer in Boston for a two week
mission trip.
3)For the emails just sent out to new faculty at
Penn inviting them to the Christian faculty lunch.
Many of those receiving that email come from to
Penn from abroad.
