Why I Give

Aaron Barth

I contribute to Real Life Boston because of the invaluable support and resource that Real Life Boston and its members were to me while I was in college. As a freshman I was immediately welcomed into the wider circle of young believers in the Boston area, and as my four years at university passed, many of the relationships and experiences that brought me closer to the Lord came as a result of my involvement in the ministries on my campus associated with Real Life Boston. I was fortunate enough to be able to give a year back following graduation serving as a volunteer intern. Now that I have moved away from the city, I count it as an amazing opportunity to give financially to the organization that contributed so immensely to my spiritual growth during some of the most formational years of my life.

Andrew Chi

Like most people, I have been chained by things in my life which promised fulfillment, but instead consumed and choked out my life. But by (1) bringing me into a relationship with Jesus, (2) working through the community of believers at Harvard, (3) grounding me with faith in His sovereignty this year, and (4) working through me powerfully this year, God has been breaking through the these chains and making me the person He wants me to be.

For me, it started with chess. After I won my first national championship, the first 15 minutes were great, but after that I was completely empty. I had ruined everything—friends, eating habits, even the joy of the game itself—just to win. I started seeing who I had become, and even went home and asked my parents why I was playing chess, and what the meaning of my life was. They didn't realize it was a serious question. They told me that if I had enough time to think about these philosophical questions, I probably wasn't busy enough, so I should go do practice problems for my next math competition. I was devastated. enough to consider ending my life there, but as I reached for the martial arts weapon, my head hit the top shelf and there was my old Bible from 1st grade when I had gone to a Christian school. It hadn't been touched for 8 years, but it opened to the bookmark at John 3:16: “For God so loved the world, that He gave His one and only son, that whoever believes in him would not perish but have eternal life.” While I didn't understand it all, what blew me away was that even while I was doing everything for me and hurting so many, God would die for me anyway. It was probably the only time in my life that I would have listened, and that's when I said, “God, I need you.” At that point my heart motives were changed to really wanting to love others rather being completely self centered.

At that point, though, I didn't have a Christian community, and through high school that isolation bred a lot of distortion. When I entered Harvard, I didn't really understand why I needed others. So I didn't invest very deeply, locked myself into a performance mentality that I knew was wrong, and put a girl in my life where God should have been. However, the half a dozen times I went to Aaron Barth's lifegroup my freshman year got me connected enough that I ended up rooming the next year with three other guys who were involved with CI, and who for the first time showed me that community of grace and truth. They would be able to ask me, “No, how are you doing really?” And they didn't stop there: they loved me enough to say the hard things that would heal the wounds of the past, and change my life.

I learned to share my faith, and then went on my first mission trip through Harvard, and God finally called me to join Campus Crusade for an internship.

And I would have to say that this year has been the best year of my personal life. My mental picture is that it has been a year of God breaking through all the hard soil of my life so that it can receive the healing rain and grow new life. I don't have time to tell you the details, but God did something miraculous in the fall which brought me to my knees, and broke the fear of man (and my doing everything to please man) and replaced it with fear of God and the faith that wherever I am, God will be right there with me. My chains to parents were suddenly broken when, through God's working, they backed me into an intellectual corner where I could no longer explain my work on their terms. “It doesn't make sense why you'd want to give your life for this!” So essentially, they forced me to share the Gospel with them! The fear that has governed so many of my actions has been turned into faith this year.

There's more: as God has worked in my heart, He's immediately used me to change people's lives, and shown me what kinds of things He's doing here and around the world. This year, there has been an unprecedented amount of prayer—students have been praying every morning and every night since the beginning of the year, sometimes to 2am or 3am. I had the privilege of going to a closed country for a winter mission trip, where prayer was visibly incredibly powerful. We would pray before entering the student dorms, and we would be miraculously protected. One day, we got kicked out, and as soon as we went outside, we realized that we had forgotten to pray. But then two days later, we prayed and got in, not only through God's physical protection, but by having the person who kicked us out the first time actually sneak us in right under the nose of the supervisor. There, I also learned that God's plans are better than mine. One frustrating day, I ended up on a part of a campus where I normally wouldn't have gone (and never went again). There, I ran into someone who ended up being really curious about how I had become a Christian. After I told her the story I just told you, she started crying and told me that her being stuck on that part of the campus that day wasn't an accident, nor were the dreams she had the night before and her impulsive call to her Christian grandmother at 5am that morning. She practically begged me to tell her how to she could have Christ on the throne of her life, and prayed to receive Christ. A few hours later, she found me again, and when I warned her to be careful with what she talks about if she ever contacts me, she confirmed that she understood by saying the word for evangelism. And then said, “Don't let your heart be troubled.” And just to prove it, as she rode off on her bike, she shouted at the top of her lungs in her own language so that anyone could hear it, “God loves all of us!” God is bigger than any threat the government could put on her.

Given everything that God is doing at Harvard and through Harvard students, I am incredibly excited at what the future holds.