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Benjamin Lins

lins_benjamin.jpg“I’d be in a totally different place,” Benjamin Lins says as he considers the impact of his relationships with CCO staff members Doug Bradbury and Dave Tanis at Messiah College. “They were monumental in terms of my relationship with Jesus and my future.” Currently a pastor at First Presbyterian Church in Norfolk, Virginia, Benjamin believes he would have been on a path totally unrelated to God without the influences of Doug and Dave in his life. Although he had grown up in a Christian home and believes he knew Christ as Savior, he says, “I first met Jesus because of them.”

Benjamin remembers the vulnerability of being a first-year college student and is grateful to have connected with CCO staff in Messiah’s Exodus freshman orientation program.  That experience right then, he believes, was, “the best springboard to the rest of my life I ever could have had.”  The CCO created for him a paradigm for a godly worldview, showing him the importance of Jesus in all aspects of life.  He appreciates having learned about life as worship, the need to be fed from God’s word daily, the need to be in relationships, and the need to be about justice.  One of the best things the CCO does, he believes, is connecting students with a church.

As a student, Benjamin was active in Bible studies, fellowship groups, weekend retreats, the Jubilee conference and the six-week Leadership and Discipleship in the Wilderness (LDW) program in Wyoming. He emphasizes the priority of relationships over programs within CCO ministry, however. His relationships with Doug and David were instrumental in his college experience. They served as mentors, encouraged scriptural growth, asked hard questions, and provided accountability.

Relational ministry continues to be a priority in Benjamin’s life. Living in Norfolk, Virginia with his wife Mary and their two children, he seeks opportunities to be involved in his neighbors’ lives with the sole intention of sharing Christ.  As a pastor who is active in the church, Benjamin’s desire is to reach unchurched people. He does this through hospitality, recreation, mountain biking, and simply living his life out in front of people and talking about Jesus. That desire to incorporate faith into work, play and daily living reflects an important concept he came to understand through his CCO staff members: faith is holistic and can not be compartmentalized or parsed out into certain areas of life.