Over "The Edge"

Crystal was crying softly, moved to tears at the thought of those who might never hear about Jesus on our campus and in the world. We were in the middle of an exec planning meeting in a student’s dorm room at Hood College, a small women’s college in Maryland. It was December 1999, and we were discussing plans for next semester. God used Crystal’s passion to remind the rest of the leaders of our mission to love fellow students with the life-changing message of the gospel. We’d all been trying to do this on an individual basis, but our attempts to introduce our friends to Jesus felt as though we were out on our own. Crystal’s fervor motivated us to look beyond what we were doing individually, and to help our fellowship take bolder steps toward loving the whole campus for Jesus.

A few days before, I had heard some stories about how some InterVarsity chapters in California were using “The Edge,” an event geared towards skeptics. The Edge requires lots of creative publicity. It consists of a live band playing secular songs, plus quality dramas or media clips. Then a speaker talks about an issue and how he or she can relate to a particular movie character or situation in a clip that was shown. Then the speaker tells how Jesus met him or her in the midst of that situation and finally closes with a challenge to the students to take a small step in the direction of Jesus.

The aim is to provide a place where Christian students can invite their non-Christian friends, even if they have no interest in spiritual issues. They will hear about Jesus in terms familiar to them, identify with struggles familiar to them, and can take steps towards following Jesus. There is no push for conversion at The Edge. But there is the context of friendships, so that Christians who bring their friends can have an easier road into a spiritual discussion by asking, “What did you think about what the speaker said?” The key element is that friends are praying for and inviting their non-Christian friends. The follow-up is in the context of those friendships. There are also three-week investigative Bible discussions planned for those who want to investigate the Bible in a non-threatening situation with others who aren’t believers.

When I first heard about The Edge, I thought that it was only possible for large schools like UCLA and UCSD. We didn’t even have enough students for a worship team, much less a band that could play good cover songs! Not surprisingly, the student leaders had similar concerns about how we, at a small school (450 residents), with a very small fellowship (about 20 people), could pull off such a large event.

As we talked about the possibilities, we grew excited about providing a safe place for our non-Christian friends to hear about Jesus. We wanted that to happen, no matter what the personal cost to us would be. For the leaders, the potential cost would be their reputation if no one came, money to hire a band (from a nearby I-V chapter), the time it took to make The Edge happen, and effort in relational evangelism. The leaders would have to model friendships with non-Christians and invite them if the rest of the chapter were to follow.

That spring semester, we faced the task of painting a vision for something so large and requiring so much faith that God would have to show up, or it would fail! This is particularly difficult when you’re looking at only 15-20 at a large-group meeting. The leaders chose the theme “Jesus Meets American Pie.” At that time, American Pie was the most shocking movie for Christians, yet the undeniable favorite among non-Christians. The provocative title also sparked great conversations as publicity went up.

All through the process of getting ready for The Edge and in helping get the rest of our chapter on board, the most difficult part was trusting God for something no one had ever seen before. The students found it hard to envision The Edge, since they had only seen the video clips from UCLA, a totally different setting. When the dramas were not coming together the week before The Edge, the student planners got nervous and wanted to cancel it. We decided to do a video interview of students in the student center, asking the question, “What makes a good relationship?” Later we found that some people came just to see themselves on video! We also showed clips from the actual movie instead of writing and performing a drama. After a semester of talking about how we should be able to trust God to bring other people to himself, we had to trust him ourselves as we got closer to “the edge” of our own comfort zones and nearer to the date for The Edge itself.

Finally, on The Edge night (a Wednesday), InterVarsity students were shocked when the campus cafe started to fill with non-Christians and non-InterVarsity people. About 45 come—nearly a tenth of our school population! Everyone had heard about it, and students who didn’t come wished they had. The chapter members were inspired as they found God faithful. Some students have started going to small-group meetings with their friends and are taking significant steps towards Jesus.

The movie we selected created surprising interest at a school where apathy runs high. All the students had seen American Pie and our publicity. Many came out of curiosity, with arms crossed and very skeptical. But after the band played the familiar “Ice Cream” song by Sarah McLachlan, any chill in the air was gone, since her music is a perennial favorite among many students at Hood College. We were amazed as we watched our skeptical friends hear about how Jesus met the speaker in her broken relationships. She talked about how God wants us to have real religion—a relationship with him, not just going through the empty motions of a hollow tradition.

On The Edge Again

Since The Edge began a year ago, we have seen that students find it easier to talk about Jesus with their non-Christian friends whom they invited. It’s as if their faith has come out of the closet! And students who missed our first Edge came to the next. We had a whole new crowd at the second Edge this past fall, and even more signed up for investigative Bible discussions. The InterVarsity students are taking more risks in talking to their friends about Jesus. They have been so jazzed by watching him work in friends’ lives in ways they never thought he would! They have stories to tell of changed lives, making it worth all the effort, time, faith and risk that it took to pull off a big event at our very small school.