June 2018

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

As I am writing you this letter, Princeton’s reunions and graduation ceremonies have just taken place. It has been an eventful few days as we have connected with alumni and friends of our ministry and watched our seniors graduate. Both reunions and graduation prompted me—and others, I’m sure—to reflect on what this ministry means and has meant to so many. As always, thank you for your prayers and financial support which makes our ministry possible!

In this letter, with the academic year ending, I will reflect on our seniors as well as mention a few highlights of the entire ministry year. Overall, it has been amazing to see the spiritual growth of our seniors. Many in our graduating class are leaving with an evident love for God—they have truly developed into Christian leaders who will transform our culture with the message of the gospel!

As a reflection of their leadership potential, several of our students leave Princeton having won major awards. A former “exec” of Princeton Faith and Action (PFA) received the prestigious Knight-Hennessy Scholar Fellowship—a fellowship given to 100 high-achieving students who, with this award, receive a full-tuition scholarship as well as a stipend to complete a graduate degree at Stanford. Another student received the Martin A. Dale (’53) Fellowship, which is a prize given by the university to several students to allow them to pursue an independent project after graduation. The student will use this Fellowship to write a music album inspired by his work with hospice patients.
Four of our graduating senior women have also won awards. Each of these women were captains of undefeated Ivy-League teams. For being captains of undefeated teams, they each won Princeton Letter Sweaters. These four women were all active participants in Bible Courses. They were also all roommates with one another. Once again, we are excited to see how God will use them!

In addition to students going to various industries to impact these fields with the good news of the gospel, we also have several students pursuing full-time Christian ministry in part because of their time in our ministry.

Beyond celebrating our seniors, we are also celebrating some highlights of this ministry year. First and foremost, this year has been an amazing year of prayer for our ministry. Together, our students and staff have logged the second highest number of prayer hours in PFA history with over 5,000 hours of prayer! In addition to this, there has also been an incredible amount of one-on-one discipleship happening on our campus, with our ministry fellows completing 847 personal discipleship meetings throughout the course of this year. We are thrilled with each of these two accomplishments!

As we look to the future, would you continue to pray for us? We need your prayers. Specifically, we would ask your prayers for the following:

Pre-Retreat
As mentioned previously, this is an important time for our ministry—one which truly “sets the tone” for the rest of the year. We would ask that you would pray that this will be a transformative time in the lives of our students and that God will bring at least 70 students to this event.

Summer Preparation
These summer months are a critical time for us as we prepare for the 2018-19 school year. Please pray that God will “bless the work of our hands” as we prepare. Next year, we will be studying the book of Hebrews and we want to be prepared as faithful ministers of God’s Holy Word.

Summer Cookouts and Evangelism
Even here in Princeton, many students have not truly heard the life-changing message of the gospel. For this reason, this summer we will be gathering PFA students and their friends for summer cookouts at the Melrose Center. We are excited about this opportunity to engage with our students as well as their unbelieving friends. Please pray that God would continue to work in us and in our students to give us a stronger sense of the need for every Princeton student to hear and believe the gospel, for as Paul says, “How can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard?” (Rom. 10:14). Thank you for your ongoing support of our ministry!

Grace and peace,

Ryan Reed
Christian Union Teaching Fellow
Princeton Faith and Action

Please note: if you would like to receive regular updates on how to pray for Christian Union's work at Princeton, please email prayer@christianunion.org.