GCU Global Outreach fosters healing through ministry
By Dylan Vander Leest
The dusty, breaking-down Glendale apartment complex holds refugee families from Central Africa and Afghanistan who do not get along. Their kids get into fights, their teens are forbidden from dating each other, and the adults glare at each other from their porches. Broken glass litters the complex’s playground, cats roam feral, and the pool is coated with green scum. In the midst of looking for work, attending school and paying bills, these refugee families are separated by culture, religion, and choice in ways that feel unmendable.
Grand Canyon University students are also at this complex, passionate about serving and reconciling these residents.
“I’ve seen a lot of common grace through Global [Outreach],” said Ethan Lee, an engineering senior and student leader at GCU. “A lot of pain has been mended through refugee ministry, families have been brought together, kids have had their faith in Christ restored.”
Global Outreach, affectionately called Global by the students who participate, is a program at GCU that umbrellas over multiple student-led ministries that serve the global community in Phoenix. English lessons, kids’ ministries, teen programs and many others, all have one goal: to magnify the name of Christ and reach those who don’t know Him. Global began to take on a life of its own a decade ago, and now in 2024, it is a large, organized missional force in GCU’s community.
Streams of Purple
Being a GCU student means knowing that the neighborhood surrounding campus is not swanky, but it comes with its own opportunities. Because of the location, students have unique opportunities to minister cross culturally just down the road from their dorms. As Lee said, “the nations are right here in our backyard,” referencing Christ’s command in Matthew to go and make disciples of all nations.
In 2014, an apartment complex called Serrano Villages was the first home for many refugee families from Central Africa and it bordered GCU’s campus. A Gallup Poll found that those with a college education are 25% more likely to give back to their community, and it certainly rang true here. Students walked down the street to play with the refugee kids who lived there, which grew to helping them with homework and then spending extended time with their parents. Some students even moved into Serrano Villages to truly become these families’ neighbors, inspiring GCU News to write a story about them in January 2014.
“You used to look out down Camelback in the afternoons, and just see streams of purple shirts walking down to Serrano Villages,” said Pastor Tim Griffin, dean of students at GCU, who remembers when outreach began to take off on campus, “all around the neighborhood really, purple shirts going out all over the place.”
From these humble beginnings, a movement now thrives with specialized ministries that serve different needs of the Phoenix refugee community.
Every Nation Tribe and Tongue
The families from Serrano Villages eventually moved, and GCU students moved on as well. However, there are now student-led ministries at two different apartment complexes and a refugee church near GCU campus. Many of the refugees that come to Phoenix are from Central Africa (Somalia, Eritrea, and the DRC), Myanmar or Afghanistan, according to Refugee Council USA. There are now 12 ministries that run Sunday School classes, welcome refugees as they enter America, teach English to Afghani moms and play soccer with their kids. Three full-time staff mentor the student leaders who run the teams, 15-passenger vans drive students around Glendale to serve, and twice a year, all the children Global serves come to GCU campus and play in a day-long soccer tournament organized by volunteers.
Global began as a student-led movement, and that is just as true today. Amanda Waugh, a junior in her first year of leadership with Global feels serving on Global Outreach gives irreplicable experience.
“I’ve always been drawn to – and find myself doing the best – when I have leadership and responsibility,” she said. “I get to do things I never would have known about if I wasn’t on Global.”
As a college ministry first, Global serves both refugees and college students, equipping students with the skills and training to lead others in sharing the Gospel.
Every year, the Global staff choose a theme. This year’s was ‘every nation, tribe and tongue,’ pulled from Revelation 7’s prophecy of the day when the whole earth will worship Christ as king. By sharing the good news with people from parts of the world that have never heard of Christ, GCU students are bringing that day closer. As a senior, Lee has seen student engagement really take off the past few years, which he attributes to the shift in how students lead their teams.
“As leaders, we started to see that when we showed up and led with boldness, we got a lot of boldness back… students here love to serve and be involved in a hands-on way.”
By first meeting the practical needs of these communities, challenging their volunteers, and embracing the calling to serve, students are taking the gospel to new places.
A Spirit of Boldness
According to a recent study done by the Barna Research Institute, barely 40% of American Christians believe that they should be serving regularly in their community; those on Global firmly disagree. Caitlin Titus, one of the staff members responsible for guiding Global students, shared her dream for the future: that they would be an instrument of peace and reconciliation. Phoenician Palms, the apartment complex where many ministries serve, is clearly split between the African and Middle Eastern refugees, and Titus wants Global to help unite the two groups.
“We’re already pretty established there. What comes next is bringing reconciliation; it might take years to get there completely, but that’s where I want us to go,” Titus said.
Students volunteering with Global believe they are on the mission field whenever they walk out their door, but for some, their time volunteering inspires them to go further. Leaders from the beginning recall the fearlessness and passion that GCU students had in ministering cross-culturally, and the hundreds of students going on mission trips each summer. Today, Lee feels this is no longer the case.
“I’ve seen people come through Global, go on a mission trip, graduate, get a job, and now the way that they’re talking, it’s like they’re never going to go long term [as a missionary].”
While he doesn’t believe that spirit has vanished, Griffin acknowledges that it’s certainly smaller, though campus itself is exponentially larger. He said that he “just pray[s] that there would be a spirit of boldness in the student body again.” A spirit of boldness in their walk with the Lord, in their relationships, and in sharing the good news they have received, especially to those who are currently unreached.
Planting Seeds
Global keeps GCU students busy, doing everything from welcoming refugees in their first 24 hours here, teaching English or playing a competitive game of soccer. There’s an intensity to these students’ actions; urgency, but also peace. The students know they are part of taking the gospel to the ends of the earth, but they also know that the results are not in their hands.
“We’re doing something that I know people before me prayed for, things are happening that they never could have imagined, and I hope that maybe even hundreds of years from now we can look back and say this is what Global was doing then,” said Waugh.
What is only a dream today will become the rosy past just a few years down the road. As this year’s theme has reminded them, the Lord’s heart is for all people to know the gospel, regardless of language, culture, or location.
Waugh prays that “even if [these families] move one day, hopefully we’re planting seeds now that will be watered by others in the future.”