GBU Bologna

Tempo di lettura: < 1 minuto

In April, probably the 11-12 and 15, we will bring the GBU “Bible Exhibition” right into the centre of the university! We are praying for the venue to be confirmed as soon as possible and that the exhibition will arouse curiosity in the various students so that they become interested in the GBU (and in God of course!).

We are asking for prayer for our non-believing friends/neighbours, that there would be an interest in what we are doing and that they would be encouraged to know more about it, that we would not be afraid of what we are saying but would rather be always sharing our knowledge of Jesus from student to student.

We are asking for prayer for new coordinators, because both the current ones are finishing their university careers.

We thank the Lord that new people have been coming to the meetings in recent weeks, including those who have not been converted, and there are also others who are interested and have confirmed they will come back soon to do a study with us!!

We thank the Lord because, despite the various university commitments, the studies on Mark are going well and we especially thank Him for the fact that our local GBU staff are always encouraging us and spurring us on!

GBU Foggia

Tempo di lettura: < 1 minuto

The GBU year has started off amazingly, beyond all expectations, with of course highs and lows depending on the more or less demanding times at the University.

On 23 March we were able to run some Spring Training together with GBU Chieti and GBU Bari. It was a really special day of sharing, learning and reflecting, and useful too for taking stock of where our group is in the middle of this academic year.
It was especially encouraging to consider how, despite being set up recently, the Foggia group has already reached six friends who would like to attend our meetings.
For us, that is a lot of people! We are still praying and trying to keep up the contact with them. This is definitely a prayer point.

In addition, a survey we are doing with some questions regarding Jesus and the Bible is underway and should finish soon.
We hope this will be a way to reach other students. Finally, we are still looking for a lecture hall in the university for our meetings. So far, we have not managed to get one and we are meeting in a bar, but it would be good to be able to use a lecture theatre.

We are nonetheless very thankful to God for how He has greatly blessed us so far. The GBU has also been a way of meeting believers from various backgrounds, forming new friendships and sharing Jesus together!

GBU Florence

Tempo di lettura: < 1 minuto
Praise
  • Training sessions during the winter period: we explored and examined topic areas that affect society and the university environment (such as homosexuality, Catholicism, the Bible and science) with the believers of the group, sharing what challenges us and seeking counsel for the “prickly conversations” around the Bible and books from Christian literature.
  • Three studies on the person of Jesus, especially for A, who has been actively joining in the meetings since the beginning of the year, while continuing to not believe in God.
  • Winter camp: especially for D. He has also been attending the meetings since the beginning of the year and is asking a lot of questions about God.
Prayer
  • A. and D.; B who has been coming to the meetings for years.
  • Outreach week in May: three intense days when we will be at the university to speak to students and try to understand what people believe in. We will ask them what they think about who Jesus was and we will try to engage them in conversation to invite them to the themed events we are putting on for three consecutive evenings, but more especially, to invite them to ask questions, to investigate better and get to know Jesus personally! We are asking for prayer for organising the events, for the venues where we can hold events, for people to get involved and for the evangelistic talks, that they would clearly proclaim the Gospel.

GBU Verona

Tempo di lettura: 2 minuti

When the group in Verona started up three years ago already, it was somewhat in its infancy, small and wanting to do a lot but was capable of little.

The two girl coordinators, who were virtually the only ones in the group at the time, had lots of energy and a captivating enthusiasm which certainly came from God and which was one of the reasons why today’s writer wanted to take up their role after they left (Iris has just graduated in Law and Valentina in Economics). I would therefore like to thank God for giving these girls this strength and determination and for the work they did in Verona.

Now, three years on, we still feel like a small group, because even though there were 11 of us at the last meeting, there are over 22 thousand students at the university who for the main part do not know Jesus. Therefore, in order to do our best to fulfil the GBU motto, we have decided to apply through university to become an official group on campus and be able to run events in the different faculties. In view of the requirements stipulated by the university for this application, I would say it will take a miracle, nonetheless we have something else in common with the group from three years ago, we believe that God works miracles.

Thus, we thank God for all the students who have started coming to our group and for those who have finished studying, for the study room we managed to find to meet in and for the friendships that have developed in the group. And we are praying for the application progress which will take place in May, for the young adults at the university who we have talked to about Jesus and that God gives us a sense of urgency and importance to need to share with everyone what Jesus has given us.

GBU Verona has started praying, and we are keen for you to pray with us.

GBU Siena

Tempo di lettura: < 1 minuto

The GBU group in Siena is a bit under-resourced at the moment, there are in fact lots of non-believing young adults coming to our meetings but there are not many of us to keep the activities going, even though staff are actively collaborating.

We are therefore asking for prayer both for the young adults who are listening to the Gospel truth (we are studying the Gospel of John) and also the Christian students who continue to witness and involve themselves in the work of God at the University.

An inter-cultural dinner is planned for next week, we are praying for it to go well and for active participation.

GBU Pisa

Tempo di lettura: 2 minuti
Praise

We thank the Lord with all our heart for the encouraging answers to prayers and blessings that He gives us:

  • we confirmed the reservation of a teaching room for the whole semester, in a very central area of Pisa which is convenient for most of the students. This allows us to prepare flyers, having certainty of the venue;
  • the recent event on the topic of “Who is your #influencer” was very good and encouraging. We learned what works and what we could still improve on, and we thank Giovanni for his support! A sizeable group of students from the University halls of residence took part and are interested in future events too!
  • Young adults interested in the Word of God have been also attending the weekly study on the book of Ruth, to whom we are able to witness;
  •  Thank the Lord for the connections in the group which are developing and deepening. We have increasingly more opportunities to spend time together as friends.
Prayer
  • Thank you for your prayers, for having sustained us this far! Thank you, and keep praying for GBU Pisa:
  • We have thought out the next two GBU events, one on an historical subject and the other on a science-based one. Pray that God will guide us as we run it and inspire those who lead the reflection. The former will be the last event for this academic year, while the latter will be the first event for next year;
  • We are trying to encourage all GBU members to take part in running events. We are praying that everyone would be more involved and for a deep conviction of the GBU’s mission;
  • We are trying to include more and more students in events and in the weekly studies. We are praying that the Lord direct those who are seeking Him and that our witness will be effective!
  • In relation to the last point, as a group we want to grow in our ability to talk about Jesus with our friends, colleagues and also with people we do not know. Our local staff worker (thanks Zach) is preparing material for one-to-one training on evangelism.

“May the LORD repay you for what you have done. May you be richly rewarded by the Lord, the God of Israel, under whose wings you have come to take refuge.”– Ruth 2:12

GBU Rome

Tempo di lettura: < 1 minuto

This spring was full of blessings for GBU Rome! We resumed activities after the winter break and right away, various friends came into contact with our group and attended the evening events. There was also a good turnout to the Bible studies at the University, especially at the Roma Tre University where, for a couple of years there has not even been a stable group! In contrast, this year the group is running and a number of friends from our courses are interested and are attending the meetings, praise God!

We also thank the Lord for having Grace on the team, a new coordinator. We are praying that other students would be interested in this role, and especially that it would be a male student.

In terms of events, we held the outreach week in the third week of March. We distributed around 5 thousand tracts in the universities and held three evenings on the topic “In search of happiness”. We took advantage of the diverse origins of GBU members to propose an international food evening. At the evening event we saw a lot of people for the first time and many of them even came from countries such as Mongolia and Kazakhstan. We are also grateful to God for all the friends who came. Some of them still come to our meetings and we are praying they will understand the message of salvation. We are especially praying for G. and E.

We also thank God for keeping the whole group united through the friendship among us.

GBU Turin

Tempo di lettura: < 1 minuto
Praise
  • we held a conference at Turin Polytechnic on 26 March entitled, “UNDER PRESSURE! Managing stress amid commitments, demands and expectations” given by Dr Susanne Waldner. It went very well. Lots of people came from outside (around 100) who, in addition to everything else, were able to hear a short but effective testimony by Susanne. We had some positive feedback, so we are thanking God for that and we hope to be able to bring some students to God.
  • Lorens (local GBU staff worker) has come back after being absent for a long time due to his broken leg
  • the opportunity that Paula (coordinator) has had to go on a mission trip to Greece
  • for everyone who has stayed faithful to the GBU by getting involved with us, and for those who continue to come along even though they have slightly different beliefs from us
  • for the opportunity to organise conferences on the Einaudi Campus
Prayer
  • for the mid-week meetings and for the group to bond because fewer people are attending
  • for those who we came into contact with us through the conference held in March, though not exclusively through that, that they would come to the GBU and to Jesus
  • for the upcoming conferences, there will be one in April on scientific topics (given by Prof. F. Shaeffer) and one in May on the subject of “Why I don’t do what I want to do” (given by Paul Chatfield)
  • for Lorens who broke his leg in August 2018, that it would heal completely and quickly.

GBU Palermo

Tempo di lettura: < 1 minuto

In Palermo we are resuming GBU activities and introducing a few new ones for the spring.
In our weekly meetings over the last few months we have focused on the first chapters of the book of Acts in order to understand the features of the early church. At the last meeting, our staff member, Domenico suggested dedicating a day to all praying together and so that we can take some trips outside the university since there is in any case already a group of young adults here in Palermo who organise themed meetings. Therefore, we will be meeting in a church tomorrow which is hosting us for the morning so that we can begin these “new meetings”. Our next meetings will continue to be dedicated to prayer combined with going out into the university grounds to ask questions, do surveys etc. This will enable us to get known as a GBU group, understand what the students think about Jesus and talk about him.
Thank you for your prayers. Let’s pray for GBU Italy.

GBU Bari

Tempo di lettura: 2 minuti

We are full of enthusiasm in GBU Bari but there are only a few of us to sustain it. Sadly, the difficulty of managing to find suitable times for most of the members persists, hence we continue the meetings with two or three people at the most. We had thought about running two GBU study groups, one in the Polytechnic and one in the Polyclinic, hoping there might be a solution, given that the lecture times are completely different from one another, but that has not yet proved effective. We are unsure whether to keep to this idea or go back to the former plan of one weekly meeting.
We are asking for prayer for this because we would like to form a big group which, at the same time is constant. In the meanwhile we will not give up because the Lord is with us and we cannot do anything else other than make ourselves available for Him.

In addition to the GBU study, we have introduced a new meeting where we can meet and pray fervently, not just for GBU Bari but also for the various initiatives of other local GBU groups and, if we are informed about them, also the international GBU groups. We will do this twice a month at the home of our local staff members, the Cowell’s. Prayer is the best weapon available to us!

An idea we have been mulling around and which we are getting ready for is to put on conversation courses in English led by a member of our staff, Simon, who is a native speaker. The idea is to promote a social activity without aiming to evangelise, through which to spread news about the GBU’s existence which would indeed promote it.

On 25 January we managed to give out over 900 Gospels in conjunction with the Gideons in the province in the various Polytechnic foyers, and we put a tract about the GBU inside them. Despite the cold and the rain that day, we noticed that many young adults from the University appreciated the public gesture and were grateful for it, as they posted stories referring to it on the University Instagram profile. They had worked out the importance of the Person who had motivated us to do this (it really was a roller-coaster day!).

Another event that took place was the Spring Training, a joint project with GBU Foggia and GBU Chieti, on 23 March. During the meeting the topic of which passages to highlight while evangelising was covered. Aside from the worship and prayers said about the projects and difficulties facing three GBU groups, the day was structured by dividing us up into pairs and simulating an imagined conversation between an atheist or agnostic and a believer, and afterwards reconvening to share the points raised from the individual conversations as a group. It really was such a pleasure to see and hear the young adults encouraged to go back in a different spirit, more prepared to evangelise and more certain of how to go about it. It was also good to catch up with old friends and make new ones ready to share the same goal: to spread the knowledge of Jesus from student to student. We hope to put on another event like this again in a few months’ time.