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Scott Kuppe

kuppe_scott.jpg“When I began college, there was a huge disconnect between my faith and my life,” says Scott Kuppe. “Through the CCO’s ministry, I got a vision of what it would mean to let my faith enter every part of my life. This new way of thinking and living led me to my beautiful wife and to my work with high school students in Kobe, Japan. I am really living life to the fullest and my relationship with God guides everything that I do. The CCO’s ministry taught me something that I will never forget and that has and will forever change my life.”

Scott showed up at Carnegie Mellon University as a soccer recruit, and most of his initial friends were fellow soccer players. “I initially looked for a fellowship, but I quickly began to stray from my relationship with God,” he remembers. “It wasn’t until a few of my teammates invited me come and check out Alpha, a Bible study led by CCO staff, that I got connected with the CCO.”

Scott participated in a CCO-sponsored spring break trip, and after CCO staff member Michael Baird engaged him in several one-on-one conversations, he recommitted his life to Christ.

“Michael really helped to change my direction,” Scott says. “After that, I did everything that I could. I went to Bible studies and led them as well, I was a part of the leadership team, and I met with CCO staff members several times a week. I ended up in a much different place than where I started my college journey.”
Scott also attended the CCO-sponsored Jubilee conference. “Jubilee was such a unique and amazing opportunity to be with other college students who seek to apply their faith in their walk through college, and to have access to unbelievable speakers who inspired, motivated, and offered a practical way to live by faith in college. I went to the conference feeling empty and tired, but left feeling inspired and full of energy. It was always a spiritual high-point of my year.”

Today, Scott and his wife, Alisa, who was also involved in the ministry at CMU, live in Japan, where they minister to high school students through Young Life. Scott is the youth pastor at Kobe Union Church, and he and Alisa teach Sunday school and organize events for the church. They are expecting their first child in December.

“I can not imagine where I would be now without the CCO’s ministry,” Scott says. “Maybe I’d be working in a job that I did without joy and living a life that was monotonous and shallow. I would not be in Japan, sharing Christ’s love with high school students. In college, I was inspired by the community that was formed by the CCO’s ministry and by the love that was abundant within it. Alisa and I are working hard to set up something like that here in Kobe. Hopefully people will be as drawn to it as we were.

“The CCO’s ministry helped me to learn to connect my faith with all parts of my life. My involvement with members of CCO’s ministry helped me to go from being a binge-drinking, sexually-immoral, miserable person to being someone who will never again turn his back on God. Michael Baird led me away from that lifestyle and back to God. My life has been forever changed because of that.”