Cru’s summer projects offer university students an opportunity to make an impact for Christ during their summer break. This year, Cru’s summer project students shared the gospel 76,201 times in places all across the world; 4743 people indicated they made decisions to receive Christ.

The students in stateside projects usually hold a job in a specific resort area, spending evenings and weekends with their team as they reach people with the gospel. Overseas projects might be centered around a campus or a community outreach.

WDW Summer Mission

A project close to home for us is the WDW Summer Mission. That’s right…  Cru has had a summer project at Walt Disney World (WDW) in Florida since 2006 to bring the gospel to over 8,000 annual WDW college interns from over 500 US campuses and from over 60 countries.

Right from the start, we’ve found the student interns working at Disney to be very open to the gospel. That initial summer project still runs in addition to: a semester project coupled with an internship group from our headquarters, six full-time staff members and others, so this ministry operates year-round. Our students and staff build friendships with WDW interns, training them to be life-long leaders for Jesus, sending them back home to the world to be a witness for Christ.

Jersey Shore Summer Project

One student (we’ll call him Zack) participated in the Jersey Shore Summer Project. The third week of the project, each student was challenged to set a witnessing goal as well as an emotional goal. Zack set a summer goal of sharing the gospel with 67 people. Emotionally, he trusted God to help him begin initiating spiritual conversations with his sister and brother.

One night, instead of joining the students sharing their faith on the boardwalk, he stayed home and phoned his sister. He listened to her struggles and her fears about the future. Zack asked her about faith and presented the gospel to her.

At one point, all Zack heard was silence. When his sister came back on the line, she told Zack she had prayed and surrendered her life to Christ. Zack encouraged her to start reading the book of John and challenged her to pray for God to bring someone in her life to help her grow in her faith. In less than a day, God re-connected her with an old friend who is helping her with her questions as a new follower of Christ.

After decades of summer projects, we personally know of several friends who would say a summer project was very significant for them as they looked to their futures after graduation. Would you take a moment and pray for the students who went on projects this summer that they will sense God’s direction for their lives as a result of what they learned spiritually?

Thank you for partnering with us to encourage students to share their faith on campuses, at home, and throughout their lives.

These photos are “snapshots” of students from 2013 – 2014 summer projects at EPCOT (WDW) and in Ghana, Uruguay, and Paris (clockwise). For more snapshots and a video by the students go to Cru Summer Projects Storify board

You might be interested in:

• A witnessing story from one of the students.
• The Summer Projects website.
• Summer Projects on Facebook and Twitter