Divinity students partner with Greater Europe Mission to spread the Gospel

Every year, Liberty University students are afforded the opportunity to work alongside some of the world’s largest missions and ministry organizations, shining the light of the Gospel as they study, live, and grow as Champions for Christ.

For over 40 years, Liberty has partnered with the Greater Europe Mission (GEM) through internships. This past summer, 28 students in the John W. Rawlings School of Divinity were part of the GEM’s Ten2 Project (coming from Luke 10:2 which speaks of the harvest being ready but the laborers being few), a summer internship program geared toward college students and recent graduates who are discerning long-term mission work. Teams traveled to 16 locations across Europe and participated in refugee work and partnered alongside local churches in discipleship and evangelism, summer camps, and Vacation Bible School.

Recent graduate April Pelletier (’22) led one of the Ten2 trips to the Camino de Santiago (the Way of St. James), a circulate of ancient pilgrim routes stretching across Europe and coming together at the tomb of St. James in Santiago de Compostela in northwest Spain.

“It’s basically a spiritual pilgrimage that people from all over the world come and walk,” Pelletier said.

Pelletier’s group operated a food truck that they parked at an area of the Camino de Santiago.

“We got to serve and volunteer in those locations and got to take care of not only people’s physical needs while they walked, handing out waters and giving out snacks, but we also got to sit down with them and just talk and hear what their story was and why they were walking.”

She said that this relational way of sharing the Gospel is what GEM is all about.

“Something that GEM says a lot and we really try and live by is that the Gospel spreads at the speed of relationship,” she said. “The Camino specifically was all (about) relationship and getting to talk with these pilgrims, walking and hearing their story and ultimately sharing our story and sharing God’s story through that.”

GEM was one of 40 organizations represented during Liberty’s Global Focus Week last week. GEM Vice President of Mobilization Mike Taylor (’17) was on hand to speak with students.

“We love what the Lord’s doing here (at Liberty), and we really sense the Lord is raising up a new generation of not just missionaries, but leaders and ministers,” Taylor said, adding that GEM values Liberty’s partnership.

“We’ve got guys and gals on the ground who were (at Liberty) in the 1980s. So the partnership has been (around) for a long time.”

He said out of the 23 universities represented in their summer program, Liberty’s group was the largest. Liberty students made up the majority of the teams’ leaders.

Brayden Hughes (’19), the GEM Regional Mobilizer for Chicago who was also on campus for Global Focus Week, said he attributes the leadership roles to the strong spiritual education and preparation Liberty students receive in the classroom and around campus.

“I think that they are prepared, and I think that is because of the relationships we have at Liberty with people who have served before,” Hughes said. “We know the quality of the students who are here, and we’ve seen that (connection with Liberty) to be helpful and fruitful in the application process.”

“A lot of them have been resident shepherds or community group leaders, and we know what that means and the training that they’re getting through that,” he added.

Through GEM internships, which are also offered in the spring, the hope is for students to be able to more clearly discern the Lord’s will for the rest of their lives in relation to global mission work.

“I think it was really good for them to step out of their comfort zones and to start to see how God is working not only in their hometowns, but also across the whole world,” Pelletier said. “And the Camino was a great place to see that because we encountered people literally from all over the world.”