mission

On Campus Crusade for Christ’s new name: Cru

by jay on July 21, 2011

Our new logo and name.

Our new logo and name.

Right now in Ft. Collins, CO Campus Crusade for Christ is in the midst of our biannual National Staff Conference. Neither Carrie nor I are there because of some difficulties with Sofia’s slowness in gaining weight and consistently difficult feedings. Fortunately we’ve been able to watch the video feed that they’re providing on StaffWeb.

This year is significant for two reasons. Firstly, this year marks 60 years since Bill and Vonette Bright started bringing the Gospel to students at UCLA. The other part (which you may have heard about throughany number of news outlets) is the announcement of our new name on Tuesday night. Starting in early 2012 Campus Crusade for Christ will be known simply as “Cru.” I think this is a good choice and will serve to make our ministry of lifting up Jesus Christ and His Gospel even more effective.

Unfortunately, some of the media coverage – particularly in the Christian media and the politically conservative pundits – have questioned the heart behind the name change. I’d like to take a moment to assure you that we have not lost our commitment to Christ or to the Gospel even one iota. We live and breathe the Gospel, everything we do is so that people will respond to the Gospel and Christ will be glorified through their belief and worship.

I know this might sound a little backwards, but it’s Jesus renown that led our leaders to make this choice.

Our name has been a significant hindrance to the Gospel. As CCC looked into the possibility of changing our name over the past three years, there was one fact that stood out that made us know that we had to change it – of people who said they were willing to have a conversation about Jesus 20% said they would no longer be interested when they heard the name “Campus Crusade for Christ.” That means that 1-in-5 people who might be open to the Gospel became closed to the Gospel when they heard our name. That is an incredible loss in effectiveness.

Campus Crusade for Christ, and indeed none of following Jesus Christ, has ever been about “making a stand” for Christianity – we have always been about bearing witness to the Good News that Jesus Christ has come to save us! It is Pharisees that care more about making a stand than bringing people to the saving knowledge of their Savior. Our Lord was humble and we must be as well.

All of this is to assure you – we have not changed who we are. Language changes over time, and words that meant one thing in 1951 carry very different baggage 60 years later. We, just like John Wycliffe – the first man to translate the Bible so it could be understood by the common people of his day – have to be shrewd enough to know that changing our language does not mean changing what we’re about. As a matter of fact, sometimes we have to change our language to continue to be who we’ve always been.

This is not about political correctness, it’s not about hiding who we are and Who we’re about; it’s about people hearing about Jesus in a way that they will respond to it.

If you have any questions, please contact Carrie and I or visit the Frequently Asked Questions page on the Campus Crusade for Christ website.

Tagged as: cru, effectiveness, mission, name, name change

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At the Very Beginning (Statement of Faith)

by jay on July 10, 2009

The CCC statement of faith begins:

The sole basis of our beliefs is the Bible, God’s infallible written Word, the 66 books of the Old and New Testaments. We believe that it was uniquely, verbally and fully inspired by the Holy Spirit and that it was written without error (inerrant) in the original manuscripts. It is the supreme and final authority in all matters on which it speaks.

We accept those areas of doctrinal teaching on which, historically, there has been general agreement among all true Christians. Because of the specialized calling on our movement, we desire to allow for freedom of conviction on other doctrinal matters, provided that any interpretation is based upon the Bible alone, and that no such interpretation shall become an issue which hinders the ministry to which God has called us.

These two paragraphs provide a solid groundwork for understanding the why and the what that we believe and live out.

Let’s start with the second paragraph. “We accept those areas of doctrinal teaching on which, historically, there has been general agreement among all true Christians.” What this means is that we fall into the category of orthodox (small O, as in more general than the Eastern Orthodox churches), we are committed to the doctrines that are central to what it means to be a faithful follower of Christ and to what God has called us to as a ministry.

There are some controversial issues that the statement of faith will not cover – predistination, the sign gifts, what version of the Bible is the best, church government, modes of baptism, or the age of the earth and specifics on the methods of creation. The reasons that Campus Crusade for Christ does not take stands on these is because they do not affect at a basic level the ability to be a part of the mission of reaching the world for Christ. Also, there has not been a consensus over the course of history on these issues and God has not called us to take stands on these issues – He is using others to speak to those issues.

Also, it does take on issues that may not be in a church’s statement of faith because it also sets down some guidelines that are important and are central to the mission of Campus Crusade for Christ, you’ll see these toward the end of the list particularly dealing with our belief in the unversal call for all believers to “do the work of evangelism” regardless of their vocational call.

On the Bible

We do agree with the historically Protestant view on the the canon of the Bible, the Apocraphal books and sectionsof books that some Christan traditions view as scripture are seen as at best good history and insight into beliefs that some of the Jewish people had at certain times. For example the books of Maccabes are a good historical account of the Jewish rebellion agains the Greeks, also the canonical New Testament book of James quotes the book of Enoch which is not viewed itself as canonical but that James chose to quote something that is eternally true. I actually would encourage all Christians who have the free time to talk to one of your Catholic friends or a library and borrow a Bible that has the 6 or 7 apocraphal books and read them with very large grains of salt. Just as you would with any “Christian” literature or books you need to remember that only the 66 books of the Bible can be trusted 100% – everything else very probably contains errors.

The next half of the first paragraph contains some densely-packed statements. To clarify my statement of what can be trusted, only the original manuscripts can be trusted 100%. The hard part of that is that we do not have any of the original manuscripts that were physically written by the apostles or prophets. What we do have is a huge number copies of them so that we are able to be sure about every important passage. We’re able to compare them all and know where someone had merely made a mistake because the overwhelming evidence

“Uniquely, verbally and fully inspired”

These three words are very, very important in understanding what we we believe. The Bible is the only (uniquely) book that’s content can be considered to be God’s Word (fully) and God’s words (verbally). There is no other book, magazine, preacher, newsletter or any thing else that we read that can successfully contradict the Bible, if it does it is not God’s word and it is not to be fully trusted (without the aformentioned large or small “grains of salt”). This also means that we believe that no other religious text is inspired by God or to be trusted as vital for our spiritual growth. Also, all of the Bible is God’s word (it must be read in the right literary and historical context) and each individual word in the original manuscript is the word (in Hebrew, Greek or Aramaic) that God chose for it. All of this together indicates that, while other books may be good for our growth in our walk with Christ, only and all of the Bible is vital to our growth.

Tagged as: apocrapha, bible, canon, doctrine, inerrancy, inspiration, mission, orthodoxy, reliability, sof, theology

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