Sheridan Christian Church has a whole history of training young people for the ministry. Jason Hawk, Jonathon Mitchell, and Mike Moser come to mind. Now, Garrett Hawk, the son of Jason and Joni Hawk, has entered the ministry; he is now in his second year as Christian Campus House's minister at Northwest Missouri State University. Garrett gave a talk about his work at Sheridan Christian Church on Sunday. SCC has supported Campus House substantially over the years; they have contributed $27,000 to their work over the last nine years.
Hawk's entire life has been leading up to this moment. For many years, he was a fixture at CCH as his dad came and preached there regularly when he was back in town. Starting his freshman year in college at Northwest, he saw a need and began transporting college students who had too much to drink back home late at night. This has allowed CCH to form partnerships with organizations and people that would have been unthinkable a few years ago.
The goal of Campus House is to equip people to be missionaries for Christ wherever they wind up after they graduate. Hawk said that one person is teaching English in Thailand while another is working for a seed company. But he said both are important mission fields.
Garrett's work in giving drunk college students a safe ride home found him some unlikely partners on campus. The sorority Phi Mu is now partnering with them in various projects, including one in which 100 of their girls took nothing but water for two weeks and donated their savings to a clean water project in Haiti. International students are another partnership that CCH values; they have a Chinese service where a minister comes up from Cameron and preaches to Chinese students and authentic Chinese food is served.
Hawk noted that 85% of international students never set foot in an American home while they were there; to change that, he has formed a partnership with Countryside Christian Church to host Indian students and share hospitality with them. He once brought three Indian students out to a farm, where they freaked out at the large combine present. There are 500 Indian students at Northwest, of which 495 are Computer Science majors; the university is having a challenge housing and accommodating them all. The university reaches out to Maryville area churches to house international students over the winter break, but Hawk said there was a great need for more.
CCH has a regular meeting every Tuesday night at 8:04 while school is in session. There are multiple small group Bible students, mentoring, and regular fundraising with area churches. Frequent points of emphasis are finances, Bible interpretation, family, and church leadership. These efforts all bear fruit; they have baptized seven students into Christ this semester. They have a satellite ministry at Missouri Western; currently, it is in transition with Jason and Joni Hawk ministering down there currently.
Being a young man with so many responsibilities can be overwhelming, but Garrett said that getting away for one day and shutting out the world helped keep him going. During the other six days, he makes time for prison Bible studies at Nodaway County Jail as well as his regular duties at CCH. But much of the time, he walks the campus, prays over it, and meets new students. For him, it is not about any elaborate theology, but about forming relationships with people. That is something he is natural at; during his high school years, he was always going into the Trails End Cafe and buying snacks for people and striking up a conversation. "Students can smell a phone a mile away," he said. "The key is authenticity."
He said that the biggest challenge of his job was to balance the needs of the ministry with the fundraising needs of CCH. His duties require him to go to at least one church a month, but he usually makes time for a lot more than that.
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