Orange Souls & Alumni Goals
Greetings and Happy New Year from GU Alumni Relations! 🧡🐾🌿 I hope this January issue of “For The RECORD” communicates a sense of being seen, known and loved by your alma mater, amidst the blessings and challenges this new year may bring your way. With alumni in the US and across the world coming face-to-face with weather-, war- and other wellbeing-related concerns, we want to show up for you as time, travel and technology allow. The 12” of snow that fell across the Midwest last weekend extended Christmas break on campus just a bit, but we’re starting to see signs of student life return to the Ville and I pray you will also experience signs of new life throughout this year.
With this post we launch a new monthly column designed to provide our alumni and friends with “A View of GU” from the Tidball Alumni House, where our location on campus—literally and figuratively—affords us the opportunity to be prayerful, watchful and thankful (Colossians 4:2) for all God has done, is doing, and will do in the lives of our prospective students, current students, faculty and staff, alumni and friends. And with this introduction, welcome to the January 2025 edition of “A View of GU” …
I have an orange Soul … an actual (bright 😏) orange car manufactured by the Kia Corporation. I didn’t set out to own an orange Kia Soul, as I typically drive Souls with more neutral colors (I really loved my most recent “Gravity Grey” model, preceded by “Latte Brown” 🙂) and my dad drives the bright ones (“Alien Green,” “Neptune Blue” and, now, “Inferno Red”). But, when I pulled up to my parents’ house a couple of years ago to a “Mars Orange“ Soul parked in the garage, I knew this GU alum was destined to drive it one day. I even said a “little” prayer to God that acquiring the Mars Orange Kia Soul was my cue for this GU orange alumni soul to return home to her alma mater. It was during an unexpected visit to Greenville last spring when I received that call … the orange Soul was mine, if I wanted it.
God works in mysterious ways … even via an orange car. Road-weary from a challenging 15-year journey through five states and as many jobs (plus seminary), the idea of coming home to Greenville was near and dear to my heart. As with many of you, my soul settles in Greenville and amongst the GU community. From the moment I first stepped foot on campus my sophomore year in high school to today, Greenville continues to serve as a soil space for me and many of us who sunk our young adult roots in this place of nurture and nourishment. I didn’t fully understand the promising environment I first experienced as a prospective student at Greenville Youth Advance in 1982, but the rich, robust soil that is Greenville University has continued to provide a secure base from which one can explore, a safe place to which one can return to in the storms of life, and a warm, affectionate, accessible and available “Family of God” in which one can root their character more deeply to Christ and His call on our lives in ways that produce fruitful opportunities for Kingdom service. Not just any service, mind you, but a unique sense of service that inspires, influences and impacts all the parts of the world in which God positions each of us to intertwine and interrelate. (Kind of like replanted ivy 🌿 … but more on this next month. 🙂)
I know, all of you wish you could drive around in a deep orange Kia Soul as well. 😉 But, at minimum, as alumni and friends of Greenville University, many of us find ourselves continually driven by a deeply rooted orange soul–the whole-minded integration of our thoughts, emotions and desires (Ignatius of Loyola) shaped by the rich and robust spiritual, emotional, relational and vocational soil foundational to a Greenville University experience. As the “old” director for College Relations and the new director for Alumni Relations, my main goal will always focus on facilitating the relationship between GU and its people. Through in-person regional alumni events, on-campus weekends, and online gatherings, we seek to prioritize whole-minded care for our alumni, spiritually, emotionally, relationally and vocationally. We are for you.
In our March edition of “The View from GU,” we’ll share more about specific initiatives designed to fortify the framework of future engagement with alumni and friends of GU from the Tidball Alumni House in Greenville, IL. Here’s a brief glimpse:
- Alumni Ambassadors: Continued growth of regional alumni activities led by local alumni facilitators.
- Legacy League: Comprehensive approach to caring for the next generation of our alumni community, from birth to graduation from GU.
- “Fill the Ville” Weekends: Strategic town/gown weekend events, in partnership with the city of Greenville, offering fun, family-oriented opportunities to return to the Ville.
- Prayer Network: Monthly prayer opportunities on behalf of our GU community.
- Vocational Webinars: Online engagement with alumni “voices-in-action,” focused on shared personal and professional investments.
Between now and then, I offer a few opportunities for you to strengthen your orange soul:
- If you are not receiving this column in our monthly GU Alumni & Friends email, “For the RECORD,” please complete this brief Alumni Update form. (You might also check your junk/spam folder in your email inbox. If you find an email here, click “Mark as Not Junk/Spam” so future emails appear in your inbox.)
- Follow Along With GU Alumni Social Channels on Facebook (@gualumniassociation) and Instagram (@greenvilleuniversityalumni).
- Join Us for Upcoming Alumni Meet & Greets, including upcoming visits to KY, FL, GA & TN. Watch your inbox and social channels for upcoming event details!
- Pray With Us using our 2024–25 Prayer Card. We have added a link to a printable PDF version as well.
I’ll close with the “Wesley Covenant Prayer,” penned by John Wesley, inviting each of us to be driven by orange souls—gospel-oriented, Christ-centered and Spirit-filled souls shaped by a Greenville University education and seeking to continue to live lives of character and service in 2025:
I am no longer my own, but yours.
Put me to what you will, place me with whom you will.
Put me to doing, put me to suffering.
Let me be put to work for you or set aside for you,
Praised for you or criticized for you.
Let me be full, let me be empty.
Let me have all things, let me have nothing.
I freely and fully surrender all things to your glory and service.
And now, O wonderful and holy God, Creator, Redeemer, and Sustainer, you are mine, and I am yours.
So be it.
And the covenant which I have made on earth, let it also be made in heaven.
Amen.
