Janitors for Jesus (J4J)

I meant to post this blog earlier, but it got lost in my list of blogs I've began, but haven't published yet...

The student leaders planned two Janitors for Jesus (J4J) events during the spring semester. During J4J, the students take cleaning supplies around a dorm, knock on the dorm doors, explain who they are with, and ask the residents if they can clean their bathrooms. This earns a lot of strange looks and questions. There are times when students turn us down, but most students will open the door and let the J4J'ers into their bathroom. The goal is to clean the bathroom and engage the students in conversation about what they think about God. Some students are willing to talk and some would rather not, which is ok. The first J4J we did, we cleaned from 8-9:30pm. We were in Curry, one of the 10-story dorms. We had two teams and began on the 10th floor. One team went to the left and one to the right and we met back in the middle of the hallway at the elevators. We decided to clean one more bathroom each on the 9th floor before calling it a night. After that, we went to the cafe for a snack and to talk about how we felt the night went. A few weeks later, we had our second J4J, this time in North Cunninghams dorm. Gil decided to turn the students loose in one team of 4, no staff members. He and I walked around the building praying for a while, then went to the cafe to pray some more and wait for the students. Another staff member, Erin, joined us after a while. The students decided before to clean from 8-10pm, but didn't finish until around 10:15pm. They decided to clean one more bathroom before meeting us and ended up having a good conversation with some students.

Our reason for doing this is from the example Jesus gave by washing his disciples' feet (John 13:1-17). In Biblical days, people wore sandals and walked on dirt roads. At the end of the day, their feet were nasty dirty and tired. Usually, the servants were responsible for the customary washing of the feet of their masters and guests, but on this occasion, Jesus washed the feet of his disciples as an example of serving others.

Today, we have better shoes and roads, and foot-washing isn't a part of our culture. Our thought is what's one of the dirtiest places on a college campus? The answer Chi Alpha came up with is a dorm bathroom. We clean these bathrooms as a practical way to show the love of Christ to these students without making them feel pressured or anything. For us, it's another great way to show Christ's love and to love on our campus in a practical way.