deeandstacey: April 2007

This is from the Campus Outreach, Virginia Director, Matt Bradner. Stacey and I both went to school together, and served on staff with "Matty B" and a few other staff members of CO-Virginia. Please be in prayer for them:

Blacksburg, Virginia – 4/18/07 – 11:02pm

Supporters, friends and family, (feel free to forward this to anyone you like)

As I sit to try and write you an update on the past 36 hours, I begin to recognize how mentally and emotionally exhausted I am. It seems like there are both an enormous amount of things to say and report…yet at the same time it feels like silence might very well say it best.

First of all I want to sincerely thank all of you for the calls, emails and text messages over the past couple of days. Your encouragement, perspective and counsel have really been of great value to me and my team. God tells us that “two are better than one” and we have definitely experienced that through your help.

Monday’s event is truly as dark and as evil as anything I have known. This is not the way things are supposed to be. Even so, we believe that God can and will take what was meant for evil and turn it for good. We are not thinking that this will happen overnight. Saying that, we appreciate your continued care and concern as we move forward.

I dream of the days ahead when men and women from Virginia Tech will point back to 4.16.07 and not only think about death, but also about how that horrible day was the catalyst that pressed them towards a relationship with Jesus Christ.

In this email, I will try to give you a picture into our day on Monday, the current scene here in Blacksburg, how we as a family and team are doing, and how you can be of continued help to us.

4.16.07

It was a whirlwind. We were in the middle of a staff meeting at our office (at edge of campus) on Monday morning when my VT Campus Director, Doug Rose, began receiving text messages about the shooting in West AJ. We paused the meeting to pray and then all began calling students we are connected to from the West AJ and surrounding dorms to check on their safety. As we were talking to students, we received report of a second shooting. At that point I ended the staff meeting because the sirens and ambulances were blaring constantly down Main Street and the Emergency Response Intercom was notifying everyone of the presence of a gunman and telling everyone to “Remain indoors and stay away from windows.”

The ride from the office to my house takes me even closer to where the shootings took place. I was passed by nearly 15 ambulances with sirens and lights blaring. At this point the report was that there were three people shot and my honest thought was that the Ambulances were called on the scene to help look for a gunman on the loose. Little did I know that they would all be very much needed in the moments that followed.

I arrived at my house to find the coverage well under way on every major news channel. Throughout the morning, the reports got worse and worse.

One of the most shocking moments for us was when the news channels changed the fatality number from one to 22. We were all sure it was an error.

As the news unfolded, including the shooter, the death total ended at 33 with over 15 others wounded.

Our house began to take on the feel of a “rescue mission” throughout the afternoon with our staff and various students showing up. Julia had plenty of food and drinks for everyone who was up for eating.

Perhaps the most memorable thing through the afternoon was the sight of students scanning through “Facebook” (social internet site) and frantically searching to see that there friends were not among the wounded or killed. Due to the amount of cell phone usage, many circuits were jammed for hours which made the internet the main source of contact for students.

As the day went on, it became clear that none of the students killed were deeply involved with us. We do have a few students that we are working with that did lose a close friend or faculty and many of them lost someone from their same dorm.

At about 5pm I received an email from the Dean of Students whom I work with through an organization known as the VT Campus Ministers Association. He requested help at Squires Student Center because they were opening a room up for students to go if they needed to talk. I went over with another of my staff, Andrew Schwartz. It was not to our surprise that there were not many students seeking out counseling. Most students will tend to start within their network of relationships when seeking help. (That is why we believe so strongly in building relationships at a grassroots level.) Nevertheless, we were happy to show our support for the department of Student Services.

Around dinner time, we ordered pizza at the house and everyone agreed to turn off the TV for a little while, which was a great move. We had people over at the house until midnight while other staff spent time on campus with students.

The Scene in Blacksburg

I have never experienced anything like this. Every single major news channel currently calls Blacksburg home. CNN, FOX News, NBC, MSNBC, ABC, CBS…they are all here. It is truly a madhouse. There are news trucks, cameras and reporters everywhere. It is hard to go anywhere without getting a microphone put in your face and a reporter asking you questions about Mondays events.

President Bush and Governor Kaine were on campus yesterday.

I just came from a prayer gathering on the Drill Field (center of campus and yards away from Norris Hall) involving all the various campus ministries. There were literally dozens of camera crews shooting the prayer time. Every time I opened my eyes there was a camera in my face or beneath me at my shoes looking upwards. After our final prayer time (we prayed for four different areas of need) I opened my eyes to see Franklin Graham standing a few feet away. He walked up and asked if he could share a few words to all present.

Police are everywhere. A number of buildings are still yellow taped.

Memorials, flowers, notes and candles dominate the main areas of campus that would be filled with college students playing football, soccer and talking on a beautiful day like today.

The scene is very much surreal. Like a Hollywood movie is being filmed with all the top news personalities in the world. Though we know this is very much real.

We are, and will continue to use our homes as places of refuge where students can remove themselves from the madness of the campus. It seems that our best and clearest conversations with students and each other have occurred around our dinner table or while in the front yard playing with our boys.

Students are beginning to leave town and go home since all classes have been cancelled until Monday. With the swarming presence of the media, I tend to think that it could be a good thing for the students to get away for a few days. I don’t think they realize that the frenzy of reporters will still be waiting for them on Monday morning when things are supposed to be “normal” again.

As for us, we are staying here. We believe that the greatest work lies in the weeks ahead as students return to school and the shock of everything wears off. We want to be here and be ready. We are meeting tomorrow as a staff team to talk about our follow up plan for the rest of the semester and how God might desire to direct us in the coming weeks.

To be honest with you, every Christian ministry that I know of on campus is putting together things to invite people to come to. For the most part, the students that come to those events are students who already know they are interested in God.

We desire that God might use us in the coming days to reach men and women that are interested in dialoguing about Christ, yet for one reason or another won’t go seek out help. How do we do that? We go to them.

Through our current network of relationships we believe that we can reach many students in East and West Ambler Johnston dorm. Please pray for this.

How we are doing:

I think we are doing fairly well. We are all pretty exhausted mentally and emotionally. Our exhaustion isn't necessarily from having tons of intense people contact...a normal week for us actually consists of much more people time. This is due to the fact that after the shootings on Monday, the campus was on lockdown and most of the on campus students and freshman that we are working with took off Monday evening or Tuesday morning.

Our exhaustion is more from the combination of conversations, lack of sleep, the constant news coverage and the ever present environment/reminder of loss and hurt and evil.

We also are aware of how great the need is going to be when the students return for class on Monday and so we are spending good amounts of time thinking/praying for that.

I am trying to give my best to Julia and our boys (Isaiah and Toby) when I am around. Isaiah definitely has felt the event in various ways. We have tried to help him interpret this in a way that would be beneficial for a three year old.

I am really sensitive towards my VT Campus Director, Doug Rose. He has invested deeply in the students at Tech all year long and has had many men in Bible Studies throughout the year that will need much comfort in the days ahead. Please pray for him.

John 16:33 has been a rock for me. In Christ we have peace. In the world we will have trouble. Take heart, He has overcome the world.

How you can help:

Pray for our daily time with Christ. 2 Corinthians 1:3-4 is a good passage to pray through for us. That the comfort we receive from God will be the comfort we pass on to others.
Pray for our physical rest and comfort. Many of our staff are showing physical signs of stress already.
Pray for wisdom in the days ahead. God tells us in James if we lack wisdom we are to ask Him for it (1:5). We greatly feel the need for wisdom! Wisdom for when to speak and when to listen. Wisdom for where to extend ourselves for the good of this community.
Pray our follow up plan for the rest of the semester. We will be seeking to make contact with every person that we have spent time with this year and we are praying that many would come to faith in Christ.
Pray for continued unity among Christians on campus. Today was a wonderful demonstration of this as we had a joint prayer gathering in the center of Tech’s Drill Field. (John 17:20-21)

Beyond Prayer

If you feel led, please send an encouraging note to one of my staff below. I know that it would mean a lot to them.

Doug Rose- drose@campusoutreach.org
Adriana Pariz- apariz@campusoutreach.org
Collin Setterberg- csetterberg@campusoutreach.org
Andrew Schwartz- aschwartz@campusoutreach.org

· Many of you have asked about sending a financial donation. We do anticipate needing some additional funding in the upcoming weeks for providing meals and putting on a few gathering events. Beyond that, our greatest funding needs are more long term in nature as our entire ministry is 100% support funded through churches/individuals/businesses. You can reply back to me if you are interested in hearing more about our long term needs. For immediate donations, all checks can be made payable to Campus Outreach Virginia and sent to the address below.

Thank you for your partnership,

Matt Bradner

Campus Outreach Virginia Director

mbradner@campusoutreach.org

814 Cambridge Road

Blacksburg, Va. 24060

These are all the places we have been in the last week. Dee had Spring Break so we decided to take a trip to DC to visit his mom who has just moved into a house there. It's actually in Fort Washington, MD right outside DC. It really was a great trip full of so much encouragement for us. We realized we know more people in that part of the country than we realized. We had lunch with a guy that Dee discipled who now lives in Baltimore. We had dinner in Gaithersburg 2 different nights with the Swans from our church who are at the Pastor's College and the Nelsons who are great friends and mentors of ours who used to live in Atlanta. On Sunday, we drove up to Philly and went to church at Epiphany Fellowship, a plant that the one of the guys from Cross Movement is helping to plant. Duce (The Ambassador) is one of the pastors there along with Eric Mason. Manny (Da' TRUTH), Brady (Phanatik), and Shai Linn also attend there. It was a very worshipful service presented in very different means. We'll have a whole other post just about Philly real soon.
Of course, we had a great time with Grammie Lanier and she just ate up her time with Karis. Karis did SO good considering us dragging her all over the place. She slept great and was really happy pretty much the whole time. Dee's mom has a great house there and she is still getting set up. There's lots of room for us and Karis and the 2 dogs!! Yes, Noah & Buster went also and we left them there for a while. We totally neglect them now that Karis is here and Dee's mom has a great place for them. They have a huge yard to run around in (& escape from!) AND they get to stay inside! They don't get that privilege here. We're going to work on our yard, I mean mud pit, maybe have a garden, then bring them back later. I know, I know, they will mess it all up again. Oh well, we'll give it a shot.
It was really cold there all week, so we didn't visit many sites since most things in DC are outside. We went to the Pentagon, but got there too late to see anything. So, mostly we just ate, visited friends, watched a movie or 2, got in the hot tub at the house in 40 degree weather, and hung out with Grammie! It was a wonderful trip! Here are a few pictures...

This is Karis putting herself to sleep after we had laid her down to play while we got things together to go out. She literally covers her eyes, sucks her thumb and goes to sleep wherever she is.

Karis in the car...again and again and again!