“Zooming in is sometimes called pinching out, because you’re spreading your fingers, like a reverse pinch. Here’s how you do it. Put your finger and thumb tips together and place them gently on the item you want to make bigger. Without lifting your fingers from the screen, spread them apart a little.”

So, it’s Friday afternoon and I’ve been camped out today at Zen Coffee – just down the street from Creighton University here in Omaha. This is what just about every staff worker of every campus ministry (in its right mind) is doing, mid August. You get yourself to campus for the student involvement fair and set up your table. InterVarsity table cloth. Brochures. Pens. Information cards. Invitations to your fall events and group meetings. And…chocolates. An hour later, the students are gone – all that’s left are the info cards they filled out (and some empty chocolate wrappers). Staff and student leaders take the cards, type them into a spreadsheet, then start making calls and sending texts.

Pinch and Pray now, please!

I would absolutely love it if you would combine your twin superpowers of pic-pinching and praying. If you don’t know what pic-pinching is, I guarantee you’ve done it a hundred times today by the time you read this post (instructions are at the top). You know what to do. Pinch this pic till you can see all 15 names on those follow-up cards. They’re in the first column of the table you can see on my computer screen. That’s not just a stack of cards sitting on my table at Zen. That’s not just an NSO follow-up spreadsheet. Those are fifteen graduate students I’d love you to pray for by name sometime this weekend. Fifteen grad students well-known by God and their loved ones.

A few specifics you can pray for:

• Relief from the anxiety of starting their program next week.
• A little slice of availability to me and my student leaders.
• Helpful conversations with their professors and advisors as they get oriented.
• Pray for these students to engage their faith with the demands of their program.
• Most of them have just moved here – figuring out a new town.
• Several students asked us to help them find a local church!
• Some new students are from another country! Lots to figure out.
• Friendship. New grad students need friendship every bit as much as freshmen!
• Pray that they’ll be able to come to next week’s first brunch (Aug 19th)
• These students can be consumed with pressure and anxiety about professional school.
• Sleep. It’s an extremely restless time.
• Peace. Managing new expectations.

Thanks so much for your prayers for me and my staff teammates. Thank you for your prayers for these students (and hundreds of others). Thank you for your faithful support which allows us to be on campus.