My Dream is Becoming Reality

I am seeing a dream become reality before my very eyes…and it’s starting to gain momentum.

This past weekend I hosted a group of a dozen students in my home for a 24-hour experience of God’s heart for the poor. We ended the night with clarity about what that means for us as Americans: we ARE the rich and need to learn to identify with the poor.

We had students sleep on floors and outdoors to experience homelessness. They went without showers. Each of them was given three dollars and they were sent on foot to local markets to turn that into breakfast and lunch. We traveled by bus.


After a tour of the financial district, we started the 10-block walk from a center economic power to a den of despair: Skid Row. By the time our visit was over we had seen a man smoking crack in broad daylight, two women fighting while the crowd wagered on who would win, and a number of children who call Skid Row home. Students reflected on their experience as we took the bus back to my house.




The combination of teaching and experience brought students a unique clarity about what it means to follow Jesus. We ended by having students write letters to themselves. Judith told herself this:

“It is very evident that God was present at Skid Row. Don’t be scared to approach these people! Remember, God himself has been through this. God made us a promise of a new city, where there is no poverty and all tears will be dried.”

To see students being transformed before my very eyes, and to get to play a part in that transformation…for me it’s the beginning of a dream come true. Never have I felt so sure that I am exactly where I am supposed to be.

Launching the New Movement

This evening marks the beginning of something new with LAUP.

In about one hour, 16 students will arrive at my house to allow God to give them his heart for the poor. We'll tour my neighborhood, experience simulated homelessness night and tomorrow morning, and then spend tomorrow serving at Skid Row with Central City Community Outreach.

I'm nervous. I'm excited. I feel like I'm corking something open that has the potential to revolutionize InterVarsity Los Angeles and even our whole city.

Please pray for us any time over the next 24 hours...and if you want to play a role in the next one, we have one each month for the next four months!

Redefining Reality

Greetings to my partners in ministry from the inner city of South Los Angeles!

Even here in sunny Southern California it’s finally clear that summer is over. But in response to one of the central themes of LAUP—learning how to slow down and to be present to God and to people—I have been reading through students’ reflections on what God did in them and through them this past summer. There are a number of exciting developments of LAUP into the future, but first I want to lead you into celebrating what has already been achieved. Listen to Ophelia’s testimony:

“The key word of this summer is probably ‘reality’. This summer I was dragged out of what I thought was the whole world and was put in a completely different environment: a neighborhood where drugs, gangs, teen pregnancy, drop-outs, and homelessness are the reality. At the same time, I saw the deeper spiritual world that I didn’t even fully believe, and I saw that it is more real than the world I had known. I finally realized that my understanding of reality is limited by my experience. This summer my understanding of God shifted from creating my own image of him based on my experiences, to digging into Scripture, taking God for His words, getting to know who He is through my relationship with Jesus, and living in his reality.”

The consistent theme of students’ reflections was encountering heartbreaking stories in the youth and families of the inner city—physical and verbal abuse, parental neglect, pre-teen sexual activity—but seeing how their prayers, their presence, and their love brought transformative healing. Students saw themselves become the presence of God to those in desperate need of it, and are now back on campus and in the work place with new hope for what God can achieve through their own lives.

I encourage you celebrate the hope that has come--both to college students and to the poor--and to thank God with me for involving us in such a wonderful work

When Theory Becomes Reality

In the wake of such a glorious summer of God moving students into becoming good news to the poor by the power of the Spirit, this morning I'm feeling the reality of the spiritual battle in which we are engaged.

Yesterday one of the neighborhood youth was hanging out with me as I was working from home. Things proceeded as they normally do, talking about music, future plans, and life in the hood. Then, as we talked, we drifted into discussing his life on the streets:

"What would you do when folks come at you?" I asked.

"I'd pull a gun on 'em," he shared, directly.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, I'm strapped...I'm carrying right now."

"Show me."

And he reached into his pocket and pulled out the gun you see here...loaded...with a bullet in the chamber...in my basement office.

This is a wonderful kid, a kid we love deeply, a kid we're invested in...yet he's caught up in a system that's far bigger than him, and it's changing him.

Jenny and I have been thrust into a more real counting of the cost than we have before. Clearly there's a deep component of spiritual attack involved...but with our kids in the mix, and the unpredictability of our environment, our current course of action is a temporary retreat. We spent last night with friends in Culver City and are seeking temporary housing in a place that feels safe and allows us to make space for prayer and discernment about God's will for our future.

We would love your prayers about God's desire for where we would live. I also invite you to pray with me for this youth who it setting himself on a course that has prison or death in its future. And I urge you to pray and consider--in your own heart--how are we, as the people of God in Los Angeles, supposed to respond to these realities in our city?

Alone, Jenny and I have no chance of fighting the entrenched powers of violence in the city. But as I have experience the hospitality of friends, the generosity of churches offering housing, the initiative of friends praying on our behalf...I am seeing anew the power that we have in our partnerships as the community of faith.

Right now that power is working to help us retreat and reassess, which feels needful, welcome, and appropriate. But in the bigger picture, how is God inviting us to use that power we have as his people to advance his kingdom, and to bring the peace, hope, safety, and love of Jesus to the inner city of Los Angeles?

Interpreting the Parable

This summer was a parable.

For students and staff alike, this summer brought a level of spiritual vitality that was unparalleled. In the midst of living in some of the most dangerous, depressing, and avoided parts of the city we found hope, healing, and joy. We saw God's power transforming ourselves and those to whom we were serving. In the darkest valleys we saw brighter light than ever.

The irony was almost lost on us. In our last week, the directors and student leaders realized that there was an uninterpreted parable: how have we thrived when everything around us says that our summer lacked what we needed to be happy and whole? As we asked the question, the answer was obvious: we followed God's invitation to pour ourselves out for the poor...and God's Spirit met us there.

Students and staff leave with a vision for seeking God's kingdom and bringing it near to the world. They leave with deeper hope, healthier relationships, personal healing, and spiritual authority. They're equipped to speak prophetically to our culture of self-indulgence and entitlement. Most of all, they leave with a richer experience of how good God is, and how much hope there is for even the deepest brokenness of our world.

My hope and prayer is that this experience will send students on a life-long trajectory of living their lives as the presence of God in our world. I, Scott, will spend the fall and spring developing more opportunities for students to have this kind of experience.

Thank you for coming on this journey with us...I'm filled with expectation as I dream about where we're going!

Pouring Out Power…and Needing the Protection of Prayer

Last week one of the LAUP interns, Nathaly, stood up and shared how she has been taking risks to pray for people’s physical healing. She shared about a man at Door of Hope who has a job at an auto shop. As he was working last week, he slipped and hit his mouth on a wheel rim, giving him a small gash on his upper lip. When Nathaly offered to pray for him, he gladly accepted. After a few minutes of praying for him, she checked in to see if anything was happening. “Keep praying,” he said with passionate focus, “I feel my lip getting hot and tingling!” Nathaly kept praying. A few minutes later, she checked in again…to find the gash in his lip healed and gone!

This is just one of the twenty physical healings that have happened through students praying for people this summer! Students have also brought the power of God to liberate urban youth from psychological and spiritual oppression—seeing some of the worst-behaved kids change become peaceful and eager to learn—and have recognized the power they can bring for personal and community transformation. Students are living in the reality of God’s power and presence in our world, and they’re loving it!


I believe God is giving these students this experience not just to empower them that they can bring real healing and change to our world, but also to change them and shape their futures. My deepest hope and sense is that God is shaping them to let the purposes of his kingdom permanently transform their lifestyles, relationships, and careers.

But there are hundreds of factors working against that transformation. In less than a week, students will finish LAUP and go home to their families, head back into jobs, and head back to campus. If the experiences and lessons of the summer don’t become rooted in students’ hearts and minds, if they don’t take in the bigger-picture of WHY God has given them this summer, the power of God during LAUP could become nothing more than a fond memory.


These students and their leaders need your prayers this week! If the attack of the enemy is in proportion to the significance of God’s work, by that rationale, these students will have spiritual attack coming at them in force this week and over the next several. Please pray with me and our directors’ team for God’s protection of these students, that they will see the enemy coming and resist him, and that the principles of the summer will take root deep within healthy soil of their hearts. I encourage you to pray, yourself, and welcome you to pass on this prayer request as far and wide as you would like.

These students are a potent force of good in our world right now…but the real goal is who they will become AFTER LAUP. Together we need to call upon God to finish and seal his work in them, and to release them into living as salt and light in our desperate world.

Heartbreak at the Door of Hope

“What are these pictures for?” the 9 year-old boy asked me this morning. An innocent enough question…until I slowly took in the layers of meaning behind it.

I spent Friday morning visiting LAUP students working with urban children in the Northwest Pasadena area. I began at Door of Hope, a ministry that helps homeless families and children get off the streets, gives them a safe and healthy place to live, trains and helps them find jobs, and eases them into stable living over the period of a year. The six LAUP interns spend each day taking care and running programs for a dozen homeless youth in the program.

As I was leaving breakfast with the LAUP team there, I thought, “Hey, I should get some photos of the LAUP interns working with the youth.” As I raised my phone and took my first picture, I was met by the previously mentioned question. “I want these guys’ friends to see what they’re doing this summer.” After snapping a couple more pictures, one of the LAUP interns pulled me aside. “You know you can’t post those anywhere on the web or for public viewing, right? These kids need to be protected.” Embarrassed, I told him I didn’t know that. I thanked the team for letting me visit and walked out the door.

As I walked to my car, I took in the unspoken history that came from this cute 9 year-old. These kids’ lives have been a study of abuse, brokenness, and violence. Most of them have been sexually, physically, and emotionally abused. Some may have been taken from parents who are a threat to them. For this 9 year-old boy, someone pointing a camera at him—as well-meaning as my intentions may have been—represented a threat, a danger, a reminder that life is not safe.

I deleted the photos on the spot.

Sitting in my car, I couldn’t drive, layers of my own emotion rising to the surface. I was startled by my own naiveté and punched in the gut by coming face-to-face with the realities of violence, brokenness, and evil already too familiar to a 9 year-old child.

This is where Jesus would be. This is where six college students are pouring out their energy, time, and hearts for the summer. This is where the power, peace, and purpose of God will become real, both to the youth at Door of Hope and to the college students ministering to them.

When you give to, pray for, volunteer with, or offer support to LAUP in any way, this is where you are investing: you are stepping outside of yourself, acknowledging that our world is not as it should be, and asking what part you are to play in healing it. Thank you for your partnership...we need each other in this daunting but worthy task.

If you would like more information about how become involved or give to LAUP, please email me at Scott_Hall@ivstaff.org

Oil and Water...and Food Coloring

Last week our focus was on money and the poor. To help students recognize the challenging nature of Jesus' teaching on money--the way it's most likely to just "sit" on our hearts for awhile only to be skimmed off by our materialistic, consumeristic culture--we gave students a visual. "Instead of the teaching resting on us like oil on water, may you permanently transform us," our worship leader, Erna, prayed as she dropped food coloring into a vase of water. We ended the night hearing from Tom Hsieh, one of the founding members of Earthlink, and how his early patterns of giving and generosity prepared him to handle the two million dollars he found himself owning after Earthlink's initial public offering.

Interestingly enough, this week has brought more conflict over team money and how it's spent than any so far. Students are grappling with what it looks like to steward their resources responsibly and creatively, and are going deeper in conversation as they work out those challenges.

On another note, God's Spirit continues to be powerfully at work. Laurie is severely lactose intolerant, but found herself at a crossroads when a Spanish-speaking man offered her a taco covered with goat cheese after church. Sensing the importance of the gesture, Laurie took and ate the taco, only to find that she was physically unaffected, possibly being healed from her condition.

Leah shared about her teammate's prayer for God's Spirit to protect their house, and the way that--for the first time--she physically felt the presence of the Spirit of God in a way she had only heard about.

Students are deep in the trenches of loving children and families at this point in LAUP...which means that the character lessons are abundant, and the challenge of sacrificial love and compassion are becoming more real. Please pray with me for the LAUP interns, that these next couple weeks would open them up to a joy, power, and vision for walking with God that would transform the rest of their lives.

Lastly, there are three more Thursdays for you to visit us, and we'd love to have you. And if you are a LAUP alumni, you're invited to our alumni night on our last Thursday, July 28th. Feel free to email me at Scott_Hall@ivstaff.org for more details. I leave you wiht a short video that captures some of what our weekly worship times involve. Enjoy!

Two Weeks In and Two Vignettes

We're two weeks in and seeing a powerful combination of students being vulnerable with God and each other, and learning to hear from God and be led into ministry. Something special is happening. Here are two vignettes:

Last Monday, the Long Beach team went to a local park, where they spent time listening to and serving the homeless. One man there had a recently broken leg in a soft cast. As the students interacted with him--in response to our conversations and training at LAUP--they felt led to pray for his healing. They prayed once...it was a little better. They prayed again...better still. They prayed a third time...he said the pain was gone. They asked him if he would be willing to stand up to test out his leg...and he stood up to find all the pain gone! He shared he'd love to check out the Fountain of Life Church they're serving in Long Beach. Interestingly enough, this was the same team struggling to believe that God could work miraculously just days before...they took a risk and are seeing God's power working through their very hands!

This past Thursday, all the LAUP interns gathered for our weekly time of teaching, training, and worship, this time about the realities of the spiritual realm and the power and importance of prayer. One team serving homeless children in Northwest Pasadena had been struggling with the ways the children they were serving would responded to them with physical violence, regularly punching them in the face and running away. As the team took time to listen to God in prayer, they sensed God calling them to pray against anger...but not in the way they would have guessed. They felt led to confess their own struggles with anger and the ways they'd been mistreating each other on the team. They confessed their own character flaws, and then took time to pray for kids on their site.

The following day several of the team members were given menial tasks...they kind about which they had been complaining and getting angry just one day before. Instead of giving into anger, the team used each break time to confess their own anger and pray against anger in the kids they were serving. By the end of the day they noticed a tangible difference in the children as well as themselves.

Students are being transformed as we speak, and are being empowered to bring real transformation--even with supernatural power--to the urban communities of Los Angeles.

This week (July 7th) will be focused on God's love for the poor, the power of money, and how we can use our resources for powerful godly purposes. Don't hesitate to come on by this week, Thursday, or any Thursday in July to see us in action!

Becoming the People of God

As we train our LAUP interns for urban ministry this summer, our hope is to root them in the biblical story of the world’s brokenness, and God’s choice to enter in and redeem. After beginning with the reality of the world’s brokenness (see previous post) we laid out the role of Jesus, entering into our world to conquer death and brokenness, and giving people access to the Kingdom of God. “Much like a massive explosion at the base of a dam,” LAUP teacher Chris Harry taught, “Jesus’ death and resurrection struck the death blow to brokenness. The dam hasn’t come down yet, but if you look closely, you can see the cracks.” Using this image, we invited students into participation with God in “pulling apart the cracks” to let the power and reality of God's kingdom come rushing into their lives, and into the inner city.

In the midst of this vision, my (Scott’s) hope from the beginning has been to nurture a sense of community that would embody the Kingdom of God: that our group of 60 would be a safe place for honesty and encouragement where God’s grace became tangible.

I put this hope into action--as previously mentioned--by making a point to share very vulnerably about my own brokenness and weakness, even in the midst of leading the entire project. At the end of day one, I went home feeling naked and second-guessing the wisdom of sharing so vulnerably in the midst of establishing my leadership of a group of students for the summer.

To my surprise, day two ended with a spontaneous time of training students in listening to God’s Spirit, and as they did so, a consistent theme of God calling students to be refined by him emerged. One woman saw a mental image of a hand being slowly twisted off, convicting students that in the midst of serving the poor this summer, we ourselves needed to be refined and transformed over a period of time. Students left engaged with their own issues of character.

Fast-forward to our last night of orientation, Thursday. As we wrapped up the week, we made space for students to share what God had being doing in or around them. Having never had a time like this during the week, and knowing that students were drained by the amount of content and input, I wasn’t sure what to expect. As the time was opened, immediately one student shared how he had been feeling spiritually flat and had just been revived with joy and hope, supernaturally, just minutes before. Another man stood and confessed his struggles with lust and pornography, followed by a woman who confessed the same thing. For the next fifteen minutes, student after student shared honestly, vulnerably, and hopefully about God’s work in their own character, and their awareness of his grace.

As I sat, listening, I realized that what had been a fragile hope was actually coming to life right before my eyes. We spent the rest of the evening in joyful worship of God, collectively aware that—in the midst of our own issues, and the brokenness of the world—God, indeed, was present, offering healing, hope, and redemption.

I leave our first week surprised by the depth and potency of what is already happening. I look forward to see what is in store as we move forward into serving the youth and families of urban Los Angeles.

Taking in Reality...the First Days of LAUP

We’re one week into LAUP and I’m already in awe of God’s work…the stage is set for something very significant. Since last Sunday, the 19th, we’ve been meeting with the students daily for the purpose of training them for service in the inner city and giving them a spiritual lens through which to understand their summer.

We launched LAUP by offering the narrative of the Bible as an alternative to our 21st century American culture understanding about truth, meaning, and reality. Much like when the nation of Israel lived in Babylonian exile, American Christians are beginning to be more shaped by our surrounding context than we are shaping it, often just as caught up in materialism, consumerism, and ambition as our secular neighbors. To counter this, we shared the overarching story of scripture: things were not always this way. We told the story of Genesis and had students capture how their hearts yearn for the beauty, peace, and trust of the Garden of Eden through painting white tiles. The tiles were beautiful and the mood was sweet.

But, we continued, humanity didn’t submit to the boundaries of the garden. As we chose to defy God’s authority, brokenness entered the world, from the murder of Abel by Cain all the way through the world we live in today. “Not only is our world broken,” I (Scott) challenged, “but we ourselves are participant in that brokenness.” As I said this I walked over to our tiles and pulled mine down from the board and placed it on the podium in front of me. As the gasps punctuated the room, I raised the hammer I had in my hand, and with each confession of my own participation in damaging the world, I struck my beautifully painted tile. As the tile shattered into more and more broken pieces, I poured them into a bin, and invited students to reflect on their own participation in damaging our world. The next fifteen minutes was a powerful time of taking in the reality of our world, the sharp staccato of steady hammer blows shattering tile adding a wave of grief with each hearing. The underlying spiritual realities of our world were beginning to set in.

But as the mission of LAUP is to engage urban poverty unto transformation, a theoretical understanding of brokenness wasn’t enough.

The following morning we took a walk down skid row. Starting near little Tokyo, and working our way through the financial district at 5th and Flower, we looped back down 7th street as we headed back the the East. As we turned the corner onto San Julian, time suddenly stopped. Life felt like it was moving in slow motion as we walked the two blocks from 7th Street to 5th http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifStreet, seeing hundreds of homeless men and women living in abject despair. The numbers of people, the tents on sidewalks, the absence of cars driving down the street—all in the middle of the day—were other-worldly. Having walked straight from the corporate culture of lunch in the financial district brought a contrast that made the brokenness of our world all the more vivid, and the inequity that our world is so used to all the more repulsive.

We returned to our session and discussed the experience. As we used the lens of Genesis to interpret our world and ourselves, students felt the ache for divine rescue in a new way. It was with this kind of God-informed sobriety that we continued taking in the story of God’s response to the brokenness of our world, and the invitation to us to participate in its redemption.

If you'd like to be praying for LAUP specifically, please see the calendar of topics here...we'd love prayer for each topic each week!

Preparing for a Work of God

LAUP has begun! On Thursday the student and recent alumni who are leading the nine teams throughout urban Los Angeles arrived and began their training.

As a parallel of our journey with Jesus through the inner city this summer, I took them on a literal journey...a three hour hike to the top of a mountain! To their surprise, as the hike began I pointed to a radio tower at the peak of a mountain and told them, “Meet me there,” and took off running. As they figured out their way to the top, they discovered who they were as a team, and how to trust themselves to make decisions. (What they didn’t know is that all paths they could have chosen all led to the same place.) At the top, we took time to look at and pray for Los Angeles as a team, that God would prepare the way for his work this summer. By the end of the day, they had taken away a number of leadership lessons, one of the chief ones being the importance of not losing sight of the people for the sake of the goal.

We've had a great three days of getting vision for where we're leading students, gaining spiritual eyes to see the issues of the inner city, and committing to making space to gain God's heart for the poor.


Today is our last day of preparation before the interns arrive tomorrow!

Pray for God to protect and shape our kick off to LAUP, especially tomorrow as we arrive, and Monday as we launch the content and curriculum of our summer.

From Self-Focus to Significance

What’s it feel like to help students discover their deep yearning for significance, to gain a vision of being a part of something bigger than themselves, and to launch them on a path of becoming the kinds of people God uses to change the world? It feels like my new job.

Last month, as Director of InterVarsity’s Los Angeles Urban Project (LAUP), I led 75 students in preparation and training for their summer ministry experiences at our Student Training in Mission (STIM) conference. It was a weekend of cross-cultural exercises, gaining perspective on global inequalities, and focused prayer. Students caught the vision for meaningful participation in God’s mission to love the world and were inspired toward the character growth required to bring good news to the world in word and deed. (For students’ quotes about STIM, click here.)

One of these students was Claudia, a Latina woman from East Los Angeles College. After our last session, students were invited to approach staff for prayer and Claudia approached me. Weeping, she shared, “Every time I try to hope that God can work through me, I hear a voice in my head say, ‘You’ll never do better than working at McDonald’s’”. My heart broke at the thought of this amazing woman trapped underneath lies about her own significance. It was my joy to pray the truth into Claudia, and to play a part in helping her begin to step into God’s hopes for her life.

For two reasons, Claudia captures the heart of LAUP. Claudia was once very much like the urban Latina youth to which LAUP students minister—youth whose spirits suffocate underneath multiple layers of hopelessness, inferiority, and insignificance—to whom LAUP brings love, dignity, and investment. Yet as a college student, Claudia also represents her generation: today’s college students were raised in a culture of self-focus and materialism and need spiritual leadership to transcend the small picture they have of their future. LAUP pulls students out of the stream of culture for six weeks and places them among ministry to the poor, creating space for them to catch a vision for participation in God’s love for the world, and shaping them into people of character.


The great news is that the ministry of LAUP is too big to be shared just by me! Your partnership is invaluable to the advancement of LAUP, and there are a number of ways you can participate:

-sponsor a student intern by clicking here

-set up a visit to LAUP this summer here

-learn about the LAUP facebook group here

-get instruction on how to pray for LAUP here

-or give to LAUP’s program budget here and type out: Los Angeles Urban Project

Thank you for your partnership, and I look forward to deepening our experience of seeing God work in students and in the city, together.

STIM Quotes from Students

Students shared some of what was significant for them from our recent STIM conference. Listen to some of what happened for them in terms of identity, being outward-focused, and becoming convinced that God's real and can work in them:



“All my life I've defined myself through the things that I do…(but) God has slowly been breaking down my access to those activities and renewing the way I define myself. I want to be able to serve God…in anyway that He calls me to…and I hope that God will continue to show me more through LAUP"


“(At STIM) I…felt like I was being taught how to be peaceful and joyful no matter what situation…LAUP (will be) a time to focus on the people I am serving and not myself no matter what I am going through.”


“(God) spoke to me by reminding me to remember to use my spiritual gifts and to be myself for this project, and not try and be someone else.”


“I ended up having to miss part of the STIM conference because of a school project…I was feeling let down by God because he didn’t let me go to the whole conference…I also had a lot of lingering doubts and fears about doing LAUP because the living conditions would be uncomfortable. I’ve also been going through this huge phase of worrying about the rest of my life, and what I would do if God called me to give up having a comfortable home, etc. I thought that this summer would be the most I would be willing to give up. After this, I thought, I would not be willing to give up another summer or anything bigger. Then (after hearing) all these really cool testimonies about how God spoke to (people) directly through dreams or through other people…I was thinking, “Well, God speaks to other people that way, but not me, because there must be something wrong with me. God just doesn’t like me enough to speak to me.” Then during the worship session I was thinking about all these things, and thinking maybe I should get prayer, when my leader (who was sitting next to me) turned to me and said “God wants to tell you that He really loves you and that this summer is going to be a really good and transformative experience for you and that it’s going to affect the rest of your life,” which was exactly what I needed to hear. I knew for sure that that was from God as soon as she said it, as it addressed every single one of my concerns and was really comforting about all of them. Not only that, but it showed that God did speak to me through other people, which I had been doubting.”

How to Pray for LAUP

We'd love to have you in prayer with us for LAUP!

There are three main prayer seasons associated with the summer project: prayer before LAUP, during LAUP, and after LAUP.


Before LAUP (May through June 18th): Pray for housing assignments to come through, wisdom in assembling curriculum, and for students as they fund-raise and prepare for their summers. In particular pray that students would come into LAUP with soft hearts that are teachable and ready to grow.

During LAUP (June 19 through July 30): The best way to focus your prayer is to follow our teaching schedule, listed below. Additionally pray for God's work through our technology fast: a six-week abstention from lap tops, internet, cell phones, ipods, t.v., and anything with headphones. This is a big part of making space for God, but in today's world it's like pulling teeth. Below is our teaching schedule to focus your prayers each week of LAUP:

June 19 to June 23--Orientation week: each day covers a different LAUP focus
June 30--Structures of Power and Spiritual Warfare
July 7--God's Heart for the Poor and Our Repentance
July 14--Crossing Cultures and Incarnational Ministry
July 21--Compassion and Servanthood
July 28--Wrap Up of the Summer/Alumni Mentoring Night

After LAUP (July 31, and on): In many ways this is the most important part of LAUP. Pray that students will turn their summer experience into principles they can carry with them back to campus and into life after college. Pray they will make good choices about how to protect the values of the summer, and for creativity in implementing their deepest experiences of the summer into their normal lives.

Come Take a Look Inside LAUP By Joining Our Facebook Group

For the first time ever, we're trying a LAUP Facebook group.


The purpose of this group is to help LAUP interns begin connecting before the summer and to get them thinking about some of the issues that LAUP will be about.

Director, Scott Hall, will post various videos and articles every week or so for students to watch and read and begin reflecting on. Student can interact over their responses on Facebook.

If you are interested in joining the LAUP Facebook group to learn some of what students are talking and thinking about, you can request that I add you to the group by searching Facebook for LAUP 2011 and requesting that you be added to the group.

If you are not a participant in LAUP, I ask that you keep your comments and interaction to a minimum to preserve the sense of safety and trust in the group. Thank you!

Sponsor a LAUP Intern!

For those of you who would enjoy personally sponsoring one of our 60 student interns, this is the spot for you!

Each intern participates in the LAUP by raising $1600 toward the cost of housing, food, and program events. For some students, finding friends and supporters to bring in the full amount is very challenging.

If you know of a certain student by name, you can click here and type in "LAUP" to find them and give to them, electronically. If you want to give to a student in need who is having a difficult time raising their funds, please contact me by clicking here, and I will give you a few names and details from which you can choose.

Thank you for your investment in LAUP...you're joining in a movement of God on behalf of the future generation and the future of our cities!

Getting Involved with LAUP

If you are a donor or prayer partner of InterVarsity and/or LAUP, we'd love to have your presence this summer! The LAUP program goes from June 19th to July 30th.

There are two major ways you can come alongside us and experience LAUP this summer: through visiting sites where students work with urban residents, or through joining us for one of our evening teaching and worship times.


Site visits:

The first is to join one of our student teams at their ministry site. These teams are made up of five to eight students with a designated student or InterVarsity alumni leader, and they spend six to eight hours per day, Monday through Friday, working with various community agencies in South LA, Long Beach, East LA, Korea Town, and Northwest Pasadena. If you'd like to get your hands dirty and see what students are doing, please contact me and we'll set up a time. As all sites are working with at-risk youth and vulnerable adults, communicating with sites ahead of time is necessary, so please contact us at least two-weeks before you intend to visit: Scott_Hall@ivstaff.org


Evening teaching time visits:

For the duration of LAUP, all students will gather every Thursday night at 7 pm for a time of testimony, teaching, and training. These times involve student sharing, worship, and teaching on a weekly LAUP theme. Additionally, the first week of LAUP--July 19th through 23rd--is our orientation week, and there is teaching all day and in the evening. Any of these times you'd like to visit would be great, or you can visit us based on the teaching focus of the week as seen in the schedule below:

June 19 to June 23--Orientation week: each day covers a different LAUP focus
June 30--Structures of Power and Spiritual Warfare
July 7--God's Heart for the Poor and Our Repentance
July 14--Crossing Cultures and Incarnational Ministry
July 21--Compassion and Servanthood
July 28--Wrap Up of the Summer/Alumni Mentoring Night

All teaching times happen at the Workman Street Church, located at 2620 Workman Street, Los Angeles, CA 90031.

Feel free to just show up, but if you know you're coming, let me know so that I can look for you and email me at: Scott_Hall@ivstaff.org

The Pull Toward the Pressure-Cooker

There’s been a narrative unfolding for the past 18 months that I’ve been waiting to share with you. Well, the wait is over: God has clarified a new layer of focus and calling in my work with InterVarsity!

Back in the fall of 2009, InterVarsity began looking for a new director of the Los Angeles Urban Project. “LAUP” (pronounced “lay-up”) is InterVarsity’s six-week intensive immersion experience in which college students partner with community-based organizations to serve the needs of the urban poor in Los Angeles. On a whim one afternoon, I filled out the application…the more I wrote, the more excited I became.

After being told I was an ideal candidate for the role, I started to really consider it. The more I thought and prayed, the more drawn I felt to this intersection between college students and the urban poor. “Before I get carried away,” I thought, “I should really experience this.” Within my first week as assistant director in the summer of 2010, I was hooked. I saw fruitful teaching flowing from my lips, I was re-energized by the transformation I witnessed in students…I felt that I’d found the role for which God made me.
As of March 1st, I have stepped into the role of full-time director of LAUP. My task is to lead college students into immersion experiences of urban ministry, spiritual formation, and leadership training that change them forever. I will lead our six-week summer internship, will develop additional weekend-long and spring break experiences, and will speak at campuses all over the Greater Los Angeles. My role of supervising the campus works in Los Angeles has been divided up between several supervisors to release me to invest more deeply in student leaders, and to expand the scope and impact of LAUP over the next two years.

I’m not sure I’ve ever felt this excited about campus ministry. LAUP is like a pressure-cooker of high-octane, accelerated, intensive transformation in the lives of students: exactly where I feel like I was made to be. And if that were not enough, the result of this transformation is that students consistently dedicate the rest of their lives to creatively caring for the poor and combating the social problems of urban America. I feel honored and humbled by the way God has led me to this dream job.

Please pray for me and for LAUP! There is a lot of work to be done preparing for the summer. Over the next three months I will be designing our summer curriculum, recruiting leaders, networking with urban ministries, and attempting to raise $50K to fund the project. As excited as I am, I am a rookie in this role, and need wisdom, partnership, and encouragement. As you have ideas, contacts, or resources, as well as questions, please don’t hesitate to contact me.

I am so grateful for your support and partnership in the work of investing in the next generation. Thank you.