greek iv stories » Indiana University

God-sized growth at Indiana University

Brandt Booram — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 19:05:56 +0000

Greek IV at Indiana University has had some rough seas. First of all, it isn’t exactly the easiest of Greek systems to start ministry in. 5,500 super Greeks who are consistently on the top of the party scene nationally. On top of its hostile climate, the IU Greek IV chapter has been recovering for about three years from doing community a little too well. At some point in its past IU Greek IV’s focus turned inwards to the core members rather than outwards to the masses of spiritually starved Greeks. Everyone had a great time and really made some great friends, but the balance between being in the world but not of it was partially lost. Three years ago staff began working on changing this focus back towards the need in the houses. These efforts produced minimal growth but good culture change. With this change came a consistent pleading to God for lost Greeks. The result was a spontaneous explosion.

IU’s weekly gathering commonly had between 10 and 20 students from six different houses. At the first meeting of this semester we were expecting about this many students. In fact we only set up about 20 chairs so the room would feel filled no matter what happened. In all honesty the Leadership Team and myself had done minimal extra recruitment for this event because we wanted it to be a gathering of our core members. We intended to present to them a vision that would compel them to take action in their houses thus multiplying my and the Leadership Teams impact. As the clock struck 8:30 I looked around the room and was stunned to see flocks of Greeks. I say flocks because we all know that Greeks travel in packs. We actually had to set up 20 more chairs to get everyone a seat and even then we were busting at the seams. When it was all said and done we had 43 Greeks come to our small call out meeting!

There were 11 houses represented! At the start of this year I wasn’t very sure whether our chapter was poised to grow or poised to stagnate. Clearly that question has been answered. In my limited experience in ministry I have found that God has a surprising way of moving. Often He acts unexpectedly allowing us to know what was clearly God breathed. I know that this growth may be an anomaly, but for now I rejoice that God has acted. I rejoice that He is far better at this work than I am, and I rejoice because the word is out, God wants to know Greeks.

Who Invited You? Ryan from Indiana University

rtaylor — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 16:29:33 +0000

I met Will on freshman move-in day at the Phi Gamma Delta fraternity at Indiana University (IU). We were both about to embark on a new phase of life…college. I didn’t know it at the time, but over the next four years the Lord would work through Will to reveal Himself and the precious news of His gospel to me. He’d also completely transform my life and its trajectory.
At the beginning of my freshman year if you would have asked me, “Are you a Christian?” I would have quickly responded, “Yeah, of course.” After all, I grew up attending church, believed in God, Jesus, and on top of that, I was a pretty stand-up guy when I compared myself to almost all of my peers. Looking back now though, it’s clear my earliest sentiments toward God and his Church were merely ones of duty and reluctance. My family attended church because my mother insisted it was the “right thing to do”.
Once I reached high school, where church attendance was optional, I opted not to attend. As my thoughts towards God continued to evolve they took the form of mere acknowledgment (i.e., I acknowledged that He existed) and superficial respect (i.e., I accepted that He was God and I was not). Although my thoughts of God weren’t marked with a particular aversion to Him, they lacked anything beyond a surface level interest. My view of God and my relationship to Him remained largely unchanged until my senior year of college.
During the time between freshman move-in and the beginning of my senior year at IU, Will had become one of my closest friends. We took the same classes, played intramurals together, launched potatoes at the fraternity across the street together (not an endorsement), and served on the fraternity leadership board together. In the midst of walking through college together, I’d come to cherish Will’s steadfast yet humble commitment as a friend. I knew that there was something very different about Will. Although we shared a similar academic load, extracurricular involvement, and intended career path, his life and his pursuits were very different than mine.
The uniqueness of Will’s pursuits became abundantly clear to me when he returned to IU after spending junior year studying abroad. When he left for London he was the Treasurer of our Fraternity, the VP of the honor society, on the Greek InterVarsity (GIV) leadership team, co-captain of the club soccer team, and held a hand full of other prominent positions on campus. When Will returned to IU to start senior year he didn’t reclaim all those positions of prominence; he chose to pass on them. Instead, he chose to devote himself to two things: academics and sharing the gospel with our fraternity through a weekly Bible study. Will invited me to join for the first study, and even though my schedule was filled with commitments, I accepted.
Now, I’d attended a few Bible studies in the past so it wasn’t monumental that I accepted that first invitation. What was monumental, however, was that I kept coming back…every week! This was the first time that anyone had ever taken the time to walk through the Bible with me. Soon, the weekly study wasn’t enough; I needed to be diving deeper into the Bible. So Will invited me to start meeting with him two mornings a week before class to study the book of Mark.
About the same time I started attending the Mark study, I was invited to join GIV for their fall “Greek Getaway.” We spent one of the first weekends of the fall semester at a lake house in Northern Indiana just, well, getting away. That weekend I was surprised by the warmth and hospitality extended to me, basically a stranger, by the GIV community. After that weekend, I became a regular attendee at GIV’s weekly large group gatherings and I found myself spending more and more time with that community. To my surprise, these Greek students who identified themselves with Jesus, before anything else, started to become my primary community. I started to develop relationships within GIV of a depth that I rarely experienced anywhere else.
The year-long period of Scripture study, Mark-centered discipleship with my dear friend Will, and life shared with the GIV community brought me to a distinct point on February 10, 2004 where I made a resolute decision to place my trust for salvation and life on the accomplished work of Jesus Christ, alone. The gospel had melted me. As I’d been informed, but would only later come to experience, my faith journey and dive into the depths of the gospel was just beginning.
Since that point of consciously responding to God’s effectual call my senior year at IU, my life has followed a path that I never expected. After graduation I accepted a finance position with a firm in New York City. Once in New York, I found myself surrounded by a fellowship of godly people at my church and at home, Will being one of them. As I came off the initial spiritual high of my conversion experience, I began to wrestle with the realities of living my faith daily in my new environment. However, as I continued attending and building relationships in my church, I began to experience community in a local church for the first time in my life. God began to plant in me the seed of a future in vocational ministry as opposed to the one in business for which I had spent my undergraduate years preparing
Currently God is preparing me to serve as a pastor. As I come to more deeply understand and experience God’s love for me through Jesus, this same Jesus I was introduced to at the Phi Gamma Delta Bible study, I’m further compelled to leverage every ounce of my life for His purposes and the praise of His glory.
It didn’t make much sense to me at the time why Will would give up all those prominent positions on campus just to lead a Bible study. God’s intent in it is astoundingly clear to me now. I’m overwhelmed with thanksgiving that Will answered God’s call to give up the temporal to devote himself to the eternal. My life has been forever changed as a result. Will, thanks for inviting me.

Who Invited You? Joey from Indiana University

Joey Elliott — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 20:10:37 +0000

For a pledge who was able to start a Bible study in a fraternity of 100 guys, it was certainly no problem to ask his roommate and pledge brother, me, whether I’d like to bring the Bible gathering dust in my room and come hang out with some guys on a Tuesday evening. So that’s what Bob Ravensberg did with me in 2001, and despite my initial hesitation and reluctance, I now look back with wonder at the earliest experience of my journey into a saving relationship with Jesus Christ. Being confirmed in the Episcopal Church and having given a Youth Sermon as an 18 year old kid at my church seemed to qualify me to be the hot shot of the Bible study. Surely I would know the most and have the most profound things to say. It wasn’t until I actually went that I realized I had a personal dilemma.
With the gentle encouragement and honesty from my pledge brother Bob, I encountered the reality of the holiness of God, the sinfulness of myself, and the perfect grace of Jesus Christ. So I was mostly quiet as a sophomore attending Bible study. But God was working, and Bob knew that and was by my side the whole time.

Junior year I had the unique opportunity to run for president of my fraternity, and with the coaxing and convincing of my pledge brothers and others in the house, I decided to go for it. I put my whole heart into the election. I had built it up so much in my mind and heart that only God knows the brokenness I felt when I realized I had lost by a single vote. Perhaps knowing what God was doing, Bob offered words of encouragement and support as I dealt with the disappointment of failure. He didn’t wait very long to invite me to the 2002 Greek Conference in Indianapolis, which was a couple months later, and which I would have had no opportunity or interest in going to had I been president. It was at this conference that Christ completed the work in my heart that he had been preparing me for the last several months. I was invited into a relationship with God and into a community of believers that was as authentic and lasting as the first invitation I received from a bold pledge brother about hanging out and studying the Bible.

ReDefining the Frat Guy

Erin Ravensberg — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 17:41:57 +0000

College students love to learn, right? This could be true, until you try to teach them something. IU’s Greek Community is described as ‘Uber- Greek’ meaning identities, loyalties and lifestyles are deeply tied to those letters on your Little Five shirt. IU Greek students live in their houses for at least three years, and if they choose to live out of the house its usually with pledge brothers or sisters to continue to the experience. They are always surrounded by other Greeks. They proudly display their letters, houses and stereotypes. IU Greek students have little awareness or regard for people unlike themselves; not because they don’t like other people, but because their world is so much fun it would be hard to imagine life apart from Greek Life. How can we possibly relate?

InterVarsity’s commitments and values are a little bigger and broader than living it up with people you love most who are just like you. It can be difficult to ever open a student’s eyes to the benefit of stepping outside the comfrat zone. I know this well because I was a student who couldn’t see beyond the end of my trendy ballet slippers a few years ago. My staff worker offered me opportunity after opportunity to step out and engage, learn even read about something other than my world. I wasn’t really interested.

This year at camp there were only a few options for Tracks. The Leadership Track, the Large Group Track, Small Group Leader Track and ReDefine Reality. ReDefine Reality dealt with some of these very issues- life outside the Greek Community. Two of our students were hoping for other tracks that week, but due to some administrative reorganizing were given the chance to ReDefine their Realities. The students were not only introduced to issues of gender, race, ethnicity, socio-economic status and what God has to do with them- but they had to process, discuss and actively participate in simulations with non Greek students!

A few reflections from our frat guys:
These two guys were majorly transformed by Jesus at Camp this year. They have spent 3 or 4 years casually making fun of the GDIs (non Greeks) on campus, laughing about white culture and privilege over others without understanding it, and only wanting to be with people like themselves.

“God is helping me not to be ashamed of the privileges in life, but to use them in order to glorify Him. I need to redefine my heart and attitude toward God, people and His creations.”

“God showed me how other cultures reflect different aspects of His character. He is calling me to engage with brokenness, choosing diversity, and stewarding my money. I need to organize and commit to giving with my first paycheck.”

Pray these revelations will stick with them and that they allow Christ to continue shaping their hearts for the whole world, not just the frat guys.

The Six and a Half rule

RJ Clouse — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 19:18:15 +0000

6.5*, that’s the rule. The Indiana University Senior Challenge requires a Greek senior to go out 6.5 times per week; it might as well be Greek law. But here is a question, how can someone go out 6.5 times a week and have any involvement with anything else? It’s a major commitment! There are so many other things going on between class (optional), organizations (expected), meetings (mandatory), groups(necessary), and something less conventional… faith. Students in the Greek system are asking questions about faith and making time to find answers. Can these Greeks look at faith without compromising their Greekness?
That’s what Greek InterVarsity Christian Fellowship, also known as Greek IV, is trying to figure out. Greeks across campus are getting into small gorups, question forums, and one on one discussions to figure out what faith is all about. So many of us already confess some sort of religious heritage, be it Catholic, Protestant, Jewish, Muslim or something in between; there has to be something worth talking about. Greek students are not looking for their parents’ religion. They are challenging what is true and what is important. Students are finding out that partying hard might be more than just the challenge of 6.5. If you’re a person asking similar questions about issues outside of where to go on Wednesday night (I’m still confused), reach out. You can check out Greek IV on Thursday nights at 7 PM in the Dogwood room in the IMU, or ask someone in your house looking at the same issues. If you have questions, there are answers; you might just have to take the first step.
Can all of this take place on Thursday night and not be hypocritical?

Silent Sorority Girls

Erin Ravensberg — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 21:29:14 +0000

A few weeks ago I was grounded. My supervisors asked that I stay home from campus for a week to focus all my efforts toward my funding. While this is what I needed, there were times I was lonely and seemed to be unable to see beyond the end of my nose. I was frustrated I could not be on campus with my students who had been studying Ephesians and pulling incredible things from the text. I missed seeing them struggle with things, and come to new understandings right before my eyes.

If I wasn’t there, what would happen? Would God continue to stretch and grow the students, while I was home alone? Funny I should ask. Their assignment for the week was to spend an hour away from the house (or face the threat of 10 push ups upon my return) with a guided retreat of scripture and questions about their current circumstances. Each of the scriptures were the many times Jesus got away from it all: his friends, popularity, responsibilities… and went to spend time with his Father. He needed to be renewed and refreshed through conversation about who he was and his purposes. And through the silence of just knowing who his Father is.

So the students set themselves apart. They went to cafes, libraries, museums, and parks. Phones were forgotten, minds meditated, and hearts honed in on the voice of Jesus. They were asked tough questions about pressures they were feeling, anxieties they were bringing to situations, dark clouds that were looming ahead, and what they might need to turn their backs away from in order to take steps forward. And as we discussed some of these ‘not fun to think about’ issues, and examined the ‘negative’ influences in our current situations, we actually found it was ‘just what we needed!’ In a culture that bases its pride on being ‘so busy’ we’re somehow surprised that we need to retreat from it all… just like Jesus did.

World Changers developed at IU

Andy Dalton — Thu, 02 Mar 2006 16:28:55 +0000

Amy (Powlen) Bennett graduated with honors in 1998 from Indiana University with a B.S. in Accounting. She was a member of Kappa Alpha Theta sorority and a student leader in Greek IV at IU. Upon graduation she worked as a CPA with KPMG (a Big 4 public accounting firm). In 2003 she received her law degree from UCLA and worked in the LA office of a large NY based firm. She is licensed to practice law in the Central District of California, in the 9th Circuit of the US Court of Appeals and before the Supreme Court of California.

Two years ago, Amy became the Director of Finance for the Fulfillment Fund, a nonprofit college access organization that helps promising yet educationally underserved and economically disadvantaged students graduate from high school and complete college. The students she works with come from the lowest performing schools in Los Angeles where the graduation rate is less than 45% district wide. But 70% of the students in her program graduate from high school and out of those, 90% go on to college. Amy says this:

“It is great to be a part of an organization that is trying to make a positive difference in the lives of students and by extension, the community. I love being able to use both my financial and my legal background to make the world a better place.”

Beyond work, Amy is a six time participant in the Breast Cancer 60 mile walk, teaches a kindergarten Sunday school class at church, volunteers weekly with elementary girls in the church Awana program, and leads a weekly church small group in her home with her husband.

Andy Dalton, Amy’s former staff worker and current National Director of Greek InterVarsity says, “As her staff worker, I have very fond memories of how God met Amy at IU and worked through her to share His message with her sorority sisters. But I can honestly say that I am just as excited now to hear how God is using Amy as a World Changer. In my eyes, she is a joyous representation of the 7000 graduates that God has reached through the ministry of Greek InterVarsity over the past 15 years.”

Join us in praying for the more than 2000 Greek students across the country presently involved in this ministry, that they too would become World Changers wherever God calls them.