What is DOPE Week?

Last week our San Diego Cru staff teams gathered together for DOPE Week! But what, exactly, is DOPE Week? What does it mean? If you’re like me, you probably saw this and thought, “Oh, that’s a full week of doing dope stuff!” You know, like saying “That next Marvel movie is gonna be dope!”

Actually, the “DOPE” in DOPE week is an acronym for “Days Of Planning & Evaluation.” Sounds exciting, right?

That’s right, we gathered together to plan for the upcoming school year, evaluate the previous years and summer, map out how to handle all of the potential scenarios Covid might throw at us, spend time together as a team, and, most importantly, to pray for all of this and seek God in every aspect. To be completely honest, it was a pretty dope week.

One of my favorite parts of this week was on the first day when we spent time in God’s Word looking at Luke 15:1-7.

Some things really stood out to me from this passage:

First of all, the people Jesus is trying to reach are seen as so hard to reach by the Pharisees and Scribes that they are viewed as not worth it or some lost cause. This difficulty level, however, does not deter Jesus.

Secondly, it says that these tax collectors and sinners were “drawing near” to Jesus so they could “hear” Him. It doesn’t say here that they believed yet, but there is an importance in the hearing and drawing near. This is a crucial first step on the journey to faith.

Next, the reason they were able to “draw near” and “hear” Jesus is that Jesus first showed up! He went to where they were before, and so that, they could draw near to Him.

Finally, we, as a team, were awestruck by the emphasis placed on rejoicing upon finding this lost one.

We know that reaching college students, especially international students, is a hard task, but we are ready to face that task to find that lost ones. Our hope is that they would have an opportunity to draw near and hear, that they might start or grow in their relationship with Jesus. For this reason, we step out in faith to go to them first. We are praying, and ask you to pray this with us, that our hearts would rejoice greatly each and every time a lost one is found. Like the shepherd who lays the sheep on his shoulders and carries it home, we know Jesus longs to hold these lost ones.

Our team got to spend some fun time together that week, as well, to grow in community with one another. We even got to hang out with the San Diego Destino team, which is a Cru ministry that exists to "help raise up a generation of leaders from the Latino and Hispanic community to change the world!" (www.destino.org)

We are praising God for allowing us come together to be a part of what He is doing here in San Diego and around the world.