DBU students minister during spring break trips

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DALLAS—Dallas Baptist University students spread the gospel and served people in need during spring break. Seventeen students traveled to Pensacola, Fla., to help build a house for a family through Habitat for Humanity, while an 11-member team traveled to South Padre Island to participate in Beach Reach and minister to fellow college students on spring break.

A Dallas Baptist University team worked with Beach Reach on South Padre Island during spring break.

When the Habitat for Humanity team arrived in Florida, "there was just a foundation slab, and when we left, it looked like a house, with doors and windows," said Christy Gandy, director of global missions at DBU. "It is neat to know we played a huge role in providing a place for a family to live one day."

While DBU has participated in spring break mission trips with Habitat for Humanity for the past 23 years, this was the first time for many of the students on the trip to help build a house.

For two days of the project, DBU student Jacob Winslager worked alongside a young man named Robert. Winslager began talking with Robert and learned his family would be receiving one of the houses built by Habitat for Humanity during the week.

"Robert would walk through the incomplete house with a huge smile on his face," Winslager explained. "He would walk in each room and just smile as he observed every detail of what our hands had just put together … imagining what he would put in each room and how he was going to arrange everything. He received a great joy from a great blessing."

Led by Andrew Briscoe, DBU's director of service learning, projects during the week included framing the house, decking the roof to prepare for shingles, wrapping the house in preparation for siding and preparing the inside of the house for insulation, plumbing and electricity.

Dallas Baptist University student Jessica St. Hubert helps build a house with Habitat for Humanity.

"I had no idea how much hard work it takes to build something as simple as a home held together by precisely placed nails and pieces of wood," DBU junior Kristin Autry said. "It's a great feeling when you leave the house site at the end of the week, knowing you helped build this home for someone when it was just a slab of concrete when you arrived."

The DBU team working in South Padre Island joined 700 other volunteers from 22 other Texas churches and BSMs to offer the college students on vacation free middle-of-the-night rides from the beach, along with late night and early morning breakfasts. They also spent portions of their days trying to meet people and praying for them.


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The team returned home with stories of ways they saw God working in other college students lives, even seeing some of their new friends come to faith in Christ.

"Beach Reach is honestly one of the most impactful things I've been a part of in my life, said BSM Director Chris Holloway.

"I think more than even the students we went to reach, the lives of those on our team have been changed and shaped for the better. We were so stretched in this ministry, and the lessons we learned are something we don't want to end—ministry doesn't end when we get home."


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