Author: River Falls Ministry

River Falls News / October 2018

October 19, 2018 River Falls Ministry

RF-News

We continue to meet on Tuesday evenings for Street Level for a meal and study. There have been a few students that are consistently coming around and becoming more involved. We pray that they will continue in their desire to follow God and find what he has for them. We also had the opportunity to participate in a few other events.

Outreach

On a Tuesday evening Street Level did an outreach on the UWRF campus. They were giving away coffee and Dutch frites to students. We are thankful to the Street Level Menomonie and The Blind Munchies Coffeehouse volunteers that helped us. The University gave us a great spot in the middle of campus. It was right outside of the University Center to set up the coffeehouse trailer. There were some good conversations with students and people hung out for a while. We gave away over 120 frites and 100 cups of coffee.

Guest Speaker

Also, on a Monday evening, a group of us piled in a couple of cars and joined Street Level Menomonie to hear Jon Bloom speak on his book “Don’t Follow Your Heart.” It challenged us to think counter culture. At the end of the month we are looking forward to the Street Level retreat with Menomonie and Duluth.

Study

On Sunday evenings, we recently started the book of 1 Thessalonians for the community study. We have been reading about how these believers followed God with so much passion that all the other towns new about them and their conversion- even though they have been going through persecution. Lately, we have been also doing a discussion on how we can apply the verses to our lives. We still end with a meal and fellowship (We are hoping to keep using the grill as long as the weather permits).

Street Level

The Street Level space has been open on Thursday and Friday evenings for people to come have coffee and hang out. A few people have stopped in to see what we are doing, and students have been using the place often to study. Also, Word on the Street has joined us from Menomonie for a few Thursday evenings working on the next publication with us.

Thank you for your prayers for the River Falls outreach. Please pray for the group that we grow in discipleship, and that we would continue to meet and engage with the people in our community.

November Calendar

Sundays: 5pm / JFBelievers Bible Study, 6pm / meal
Tuesdays: 6:30pm / Street Level Meal, 7pm / Bible Study

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River Falls News / September 2018

September 19, 2018 River Falls Ministry

We’ve now made the transition from Summer to school, which has meant a lot of changes, as well as some renewed excitement on our part to see what God is going to do this semester. We’ve restarted Street Level, and have seen a number of new faces around. Most are Freshman who are new to college life and are discovering all the new opportunities, relationships, and interests vying for this their time and commitment. It’s been refreshing to see them around, and we are praying that some get plugged in and can find what God has for them here at school. This year. we are are encouraging “involvement” in the Street Level, which means taking up regular participation in a ministry like WOTS.

In addition to the weekly meetings and doing some outreach tables on campus, we are also planning to partner with Street Level UW-Stout to engineer a few outreaches on the UWRF campus. These will likely take the form of food giveaways via the Mobile Coffeehouse. Our hope is that these outreaches will be fun way to meet new students as well as offer opportunity to serve with with the greater Street Level family.

New to our weekly schedule, we have nailed down official regular “open study hours”, which are every Thursday evening, 5pm-9pm. During these hours, we are running the Street Level place much like a “coffeehouse”, with the espresso bar open and music on, the goal is to make the space conducive to study, projects, or discussion. There have been several students and wanderers-by who have visited over the past few weeks.

Our Sunday evening gathering continues, and we continue our chapter-per-week pace through the New Testament letters. Joining the studies and discussions have been a few new faces – also due to school restarting. We are consistently encouraging people from Street Level to consider and pursue involvement in the local church. For many, their “church” is back home, and, for a variety of reasons, fail to seek out a Biblical fellowship dynamic while they are away to college. This is an unfortunate pattern that we see being set all too often for students that consider themselves Christians.

Please pray that we are, with discernment, providing the right teaching, personal challenge and friendship to the new students that have been joining us this semester, to the end that they can participate in all that God has for them.

October Calendar

Sundays: 5pm / JFBelievers Bible Study, 6pm / Meal
Tuesdays: 6:30pm / Meal, 7:00pm / Street Level Meeting
Thursdays: 5:00pm – 9:00pm / Open for Coffee and Study
October 26-27: All Street Level Retreat

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River Falls News / August 2018

August 19, 2018 River Falls Ministry

What’s Happening

The end of Summer is near which means a new season for the River Falls Ministry. Starting in September we will be changing some of the things we are doing at the Street Level Place and focusing on reaching out to the college students as they come back to school.

We are still meeting for a Sunday Bible Study and Meal at 5 pm which will continue into the fall. Right now, we are in the book of Colossians and will be moving into 1 Thessalonians. Doing the meals after the study has offered the opportunity for us to get to know people more.

Until the students come back we will be hosting two more community grill outs. The Tuesday grill outs this summer have allowed for us to continue to meet people in the community. We never know who God is going to bring in the door to have a meal with us.

Once the students are back in September Street Level will resume on Tuesday nights. We are looking forward to seeing some familiar faces that we haven’t seen in a few months. Also, we will outreach on campus through tables, posters, and possibly a bonfire on campus and trail walk.

Additionally, the Street Level place will have more open hours this semester. It will be a coffeehouse type atmosphere. We will be open for study and for people who just want to hang out. There will be music playing and the coffee bar will be open for full service.

We are looking forward to seeing what God has in store for us this semester. Thank you for all your participation and prayers!

September Calendar

Sundays: 5pm / JFBelievers Bible Study, 6pm / Meal
Tuesdays: 6:30pm / Meal, 7:00pm / Street Level Meeting
Thursdays: Open for Coffee and Study / 5:00pm – 9:00pm

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River Falls News / July 2018

July 20, 2018 River Falls Ministry

July was a good month to stay outside and do a lot of grilling as well as move forward with connections in the community.

Our big event was the rummage sale at the Street Level location. It was a very hot day, but we were able to still entertain 50+ shoppers. The mobile Coffeehouse joined us, which was a very helpful contribution to the day – it drew in people that stayed to talk. We were able to meet many of the neighbors in our building, including several exchange students from India. They actually purchased most of the furniture we had in the sale. The success was, of course, mostly in the people interaction, but thankfully, we were also able to raise money for the 2019 Street Level Kentucky trip in the process.

We’ve also continued our Tuesday evening grill outs. We have met several people from the community, as well as seeing a student who stayed behind for summer. We’re usually surprised at who shows up and it keeps us on our toes for conversation and listening to what God may have for us in the situation. It’s good training for us – I would expect this is a large part of what God is doing.

Please continue to pray for us as you are led. We need God’s guidance and empowerment to continue to be of helpful impact for the Kingdom.

River Falls News / June 2018

June 19, 2018 River Falls Ministry

We have been enjoying the summer. It brought us into a season of change, and we are looking forward to seeing what God will do.

Since the UW River Falls students finished school for the summer, we made a few updates to our regular schedule. Instead of meeting for Street Level each week – because most of the students are home for the summer – we started doing a community grill out at 6:30pm on Tuesdays. Our goal is to meet people in the neighborhood and more people in the building that Street Level meets in.

On Sundays we continue to do a bible study and are enjoying a meal together afterwards. We just finished up studying Galatians and a short study in Jude. Both books spoke about people coming into the church and bringing in false teaching in different ways. In Galatians we talked about the law verses following God with our hearts; while in Jude we talked about people coming into the church that we don’t initially recognize as unbelievers. The next book we look forward to beginning is Philippians.

This summer we will continue with these outreaches as well as include some other events. With the support of Street Level Menomonie, we are currently planning a rummage sale at the end of the month. During the sale The Blind Munchies mobile trailer will be at the serving drinks. The purpose is to raise money for the spring break Street Level Missions trip as well as engage with the River Falls community.

Thank you for your prayers for the River Falls outreach. Please pray for us to continue to meet the people and engage with the people in our community.

June Calendar

Sundays: 5pm / JFBelievers Bible Study, 6pm / Meal
Tuesdays: Community Grill Out, 6:30pm
Saturday June 30^th: Rummage Sale 8am-3pm

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River Falls News / May 2018

May 20, 2018 River Falls Ministry

Hello Spring

It felt like an abrupt end to the winter and consequently the semester here in River Falls. One week we are calling off people from driving over due to snow, and the next week we have windows open at the Street Level place. But, now we’re full-on summer and looking forward to what lies ahead.

What’s been

As the semester wound down, we had the chance to take the Tuesday night Street Level group to attend a lecture on campus by a former atheist-turned Christian. He was a material scientist at the U of M for many years, where he spent a lot of time looking into the plausibility of the chemical origins of life – and he discovered that the random chance theories just didn’t make sense. He spoke to the crowd of about 200 in very down to earth terms and took and answered a lot of questions from the attendees. Getting outside of our norm to attend an event like this was a welcomed thing for our group.

Street Level just finished the last few weeks of the semester wrapping up “The Story” curriculum. We believe it was a good series to give everyone a comprehensive understanding of the big picture of the Bible: God’s plan throughout history to restore humankind’s relationship with himself. The series ended by looking at Revelation – not to discuss plagues and the Antichrist – but learning about what kind of life lies ahead for believers in the New Creation. Our very last meeting of the semester was a great excuse to grill out together and enjoy the weather. We played some games and kept the mood pretty light. As we said goodbye to the students, who were all returning home for the summer, we wished them well and in our minds prayed that God would keep them growing over the next 3 months. We hope their summer is fruitful.

This Summer

The Sunday evening Bible study will continue through the summer at 5pm, followed by dinner at 6pm. Our focus will remain very heavily on verse-by-verse followed by open discussion concerning application of the text. We are currently in Galatians and plan to move around in the New Testament letters over the course of the summer. We’ve had some new visitors recently to the study, and we are curious what God has planned for it. In addition to the Sunday study, our other official outlet for community outreach will take place on Tuesday evenings. We will be doing a weekly grill out at 6:30pm and have the Street Level place open for hangout.