Many have already blogged about Urbana, including a few friends here, here, and here. There have been many different opinions about how Urbana went, some feeling it was great, another feeling it was a lot of work, and others feeling they like they learned so much.

For myself, to put it briefly: Urbana was enlightening!

First, me & my church groupies arrived late for the first session because the restaurant we were at was majorly slow in service & it took forever to get our over-priced food.

The main sessions were an interesting blend of drama and a short exposition of a part of Ephesians. The exposition speaker (”expositor”) Ajith was… brown, which I kinda felt it hindered my own “relating” to what he was trying to contextualize; from as far as I could tell he dosen’t serve much of the college generation directly. His jokes and extravagant body language was good to see in a preacher, and also funny enough that many laughed or clapped along with him (albeit some were a little, out of the ordinary).

The dramatic skits were one continuous story called “The Journey” that spanned all the main sessions, and gave a very interesting look at missions on campus and on short-term trips. It was all in all, an eye-opener for myself, especially in terms of ministry to homosexuals.

I consider myself Reformed in theology and liturgy, and so I found no value in the dance presentations for such a large congregational setting. I am more comfortable in conference sessions of just musical worship + sermon + musical response. I believe art has a great place in the church to draw our minds attention and heart’s affection to the Lord, but I find that sitting there and just observing dance does little in that regard. In and of the dancing itself, the dancers were in their own way worshipping God through their God-given talents and skills; it does not invite people watching to do the same. Nevertheless, I do see that our God is a creative one and gifts us all according to the grace given to each one of us, and may He be praised for that.

About the sermons, it was a pretty straight forward expositions of the Ephesians… it seemed like a good deal of exegesis was involved but lacked a homiletical foundation since no real “message” or “point” was conveyed. Maybe I’m being overtly Southern Baptist or Reformed to think that sermons must have an outline or points, but I only wished there was a more noticeable, straightforward message to the talks. I was glad Ajith referenced various Greek words, but thinking back on the expositions, it would have been better to zoom-out of the text a bit to see how it all fits in with the whole counsel of God via a broader entire-Bible context.

Even though “grace” was talked about so much during Urbana, I found little mention or details about the punishment, death and resurrection of our LORD and Savior, Jesus Christ, and thus I found the convention to be not very Cross-centered at all. Maybe it was, and it was just not clearly visible or audible to me; I just wish there was clear symbol of Calvary for me to focus on, either visually or in the form of spoken words–the very thing that we want to missionally and through missions share with the lost: the beatiful, good news of redemption through Christ Jesus.

I think this lack of “message” during the sermons was in part because of the short time that was alottted to Ajith; maybe Intervarsity wanted it that way. Still, despite the speaker’s vernacular and style, I looked forward to hearing something I have not heard before and expectation of God speaking to me thru this speaker. (I mean, c’mon, I cannot not expect that much from Rick Warren’s send-off talk.) Unfortunately, since I myself have studied and taught Ephesians in Sunday School expositionally before, I gained little new knowledge about the text and context via the sermons & Bible Studies.

In short, I am more traditional and thought this important part of the convention could have been better. As Shuling jokingly encouraged me one night, I’ll try not tear apart the sermons… what’s done is done, and God has spoken, and people have been moved to devote their lives to missio dei - and that is what is most important.

The musical worship was very multi-cultural, multi-ethnic; very upbeat and happy. I gotta say that many of the songs were of very similar black/hispanic-gospel style, and lacked much of the reverence that we should have when approaching the throne of the Almighty Lion. There were few songs about the confession of sin, and of the songs the worship team did lead that displayed God’s message of redemption, it was shallow and lacked the lyrical depth to let us proclaim explicitly in good detail the power of God for the salvation of those who believe. Few hymns were done, unless you count the chorus of “How Great Thou Art” medlied to the end of “How Great Is Our God”. (Thankfully, I attended the Psalms, Hymns & Spiritual Songs seminar where we sang lots of good hymns of the church from ages past for 2 hours!)

Other memorable moments included singing Tomlin’s We Fall Down in madarin, seeing the worship leader signal for a chorus repeat (most of the songs were all very much pre-programmed to start and stop as rehearsed, with little Spirit-led changes), and hearing the choir of 22,000 during the singing of “How Great Is Our God”.

Since Intervarsity switched this year from providing a NRSV to the new TNIV translation, Urbana delegates were also led in singing the TNIV version of Martin Smith’s popular song about atonement, “Majesty (Here I Am)”. The line they changed was

Here I am
Knowing I’m a sinful man –> Knowing I’m a sinful one
Covered by the blood of the Lamb –> Covered by the blood of the Son

I can understand the stupidity of chaning “man” to “one” in order to be gender inclusive/neutral, but I cannot understand why they changed Lamb to Son. There is so much that is lost when we no longer see the image of the Lamb at the slaughter for our sins; we lose the Old Testament to New Testament requirement of the Lord needing a sacrifice to be paid in order for mankind to be right before God. I shake my head again and again at this. Intervarsity has no right in changing the lyrics to Smith’s song, but I hope they receive forgiveness for this little blunder. ~sighs~

About the Family Groups: since they did NOT force everybody to form Family Groups with people they don’t know, it was hard to decide within my church group whether or not we should split off into mixed groups with people we’re unfamiliar with OR stay with church people. In the end, most of us split off. After praying with Perry about trying to find people to join in a Family Group, we found a couple Chinese girls from Vancouver on the first night who also lived on our floor, and a couple other guys from their church joined us later on. We did the evening prayer times together and had a fairly good time praying and sharing despite our unfamiliarity. (In retrospect, I found what Passion did @ Passion conferences–forcing everybody to form Family Groups with people we do not know–to be more effective and efficient.)

About the setup of Edwards Jones Dome: having the stage set at one side of the arena made it harder for most people to see, simply coz of increasing distance from the stage meant it was harder to see. Again, Passion06 had the 4-sided stage in the center, so looking back I found that more effective so that MORE people could have a better line of sight and MORE people could be closer to the stage. During Urbana, I felt like I was a mile away the whole time from the worship team and speakers, so most of the time I was paying attention only via the LCD screens.

In terms of the program: with so many parts and people sharing/talking during the main sessions, I felt that each segment could have been more “connected” and directly related to each other. It would have been more consistent if one or two people spoke during the main session times, so that there’d be more continuity.

Other notable mentions:
-Attending the Pastors & Church Leaders seminar on “Called to Partnership” and talking to 2 Asian American pastors after the Q&A time about the dichotomy we find in 2-congregation Asian churches.
-Sat beside my CC’05 pianist Katie Lam & singing hymns for 2 hours with only a piano at the “Psalms, Hymns & Spiritual Songs” seminar, plus hearing the black pastor/worship leader make up 2 spiritual songs on the fly!
-Hearing and seeing Rick Warren woo the crowds at the “Heart of Leadership” Q&A seminar and during his Saturday evening send-off message.
-Talking to James Emery White, president of Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, about my call to ministry @ the Gordon-Conwell booth.
-Hearing James E. White speak at the “Apologetics in Postmodern Times” seminar, and NOT hearing one question during the Q&A time about Dr. White’s views on postmodernity & the emerging church movement. (I was in the repeat session of it, I hope somebody asked about this during the original session.)
-Experiencing massively long line-ups for dinner every night.
-Eating a porridge dinner that many people with AIDS in Africa eat daily.

I felt kind of disappointed at the attendance numbers & feel of the population. I expected about 25,000 people and there was about 22,000… and it seemed like the arena was barely filled with lots of room left. Maybe the Edward Jones Dome is really just that massive, with lotsa room for future Urbana growth. Anyways, I expected a rowdier, livelier crowd but it semed quite levelled off… it kind of lacked that united intensity that I experienced at every session during Passion06. But honestly, this is not Passion, and I didn’t expect it to be.

I expected great things from God, and am attempting great things for God.

Commitments from Urbana I decided on:

I think that last one was the most difficult to decide upon. I didn’t feel spiritually moved in the moment during the convention, but only a tad during the talk by the black Reverend. But it is a long time coming, and God has been nagging at me to do this for a long time. My personal hindrances has always been the finances, and it is still a big factor for me right now–something that I need to trust God completely on. Since it is God Himself who wills me to be a voice of truth for His people, He will make a way.

I used to think that “callings” only come in dramatic, extravagant packages. But reading John Frame’s words in the package from Reformed Theo. Seminary reminded me that God calls me to serve Christ wherever I find myself. “Only let each person lead the life that the Lord has assigned to him, and to which God has called him.” 1 Cor 7:17 I know my own conversion and calling to be everything short of dramatic… despite my calling to be a gradual, prodding from God over time, I know in my heart that I have been called to the ministry of the word:

How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? 15 And how are they to preach unless they are sent? As it is written, “How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!”
-Romans 10:14-15

During my church’s English Ministry Winter Retreat this weekend, I took some time to reflect on when and where I initially felt a voice from God, of which I discerned to be truly His. And it was during Passion06: during Beth Moore’s talk, I realized that instead of just eating God’s Word and getting full on it myself, God calls me to sow it into the soil of my life and the people around me–He calls me to sow His word, and to sow so hard and persistently that I may never see the great harvest. And the moment I stood in response to obey His calling: Louie Giglio’s send-off talk on Colossians 3:17, to do whatever I do in Jesus name giving thanks to God the Father through Him. I hope to get a job, make money & work at it for Christ before going to seminary, but nevertheless, I am convinced by the work of God in and through me that He desires me aspire be a servant of His word in working for Him.

Anyways, your prayers concerning seminary and a getting a job to help pay for it would be appreciated. I’ve begun filling out the applicaiton for Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, where God has been pushing me towards for a while now, and I hope to send everything in by the end of the month.