College Students, Go Back Without Going Backward
Every August in the United States, nearly twenty million college students go back to campus.
Go back. It’s an interesting phrase.
Go back sounds like the language of retreat, regression, or returning to where you once were. Sadly, that’s exactly what many people expect the college years to do. Students go back to school — and go backward in their walk with Christ.
The college campus is sometimes portrayed as a graveyard for faith. Stories of students walking away from Christianity are common enough that it hardly surprises us to hear a recent graduate say, “I no longer believe.”
But what if that doesn’t have to be your story? What if going back to campus becomes the very thing God uses to launch you forward?
Think of a slingshot. Before a stone moves forward, it first goes back. In the same way, what if returning to campus could become the means God uses to deepen your faith rather than diminish it? What if you stepped onto campus this fall with the expectation that God intends to use this semester to launch you forward in your relationship with Jesus?
Instead of allowing college to send your faith six feet under, let’s pray that God sends it eighteen inches — from your head to your heart. Let’s believe that this can be a season where, like the apostle Paul, you “press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 3:14). That is our prayer for you as you start a new semester — not merely that you would know more about Jesus but that you would know him more personally.
To help you take a step in that direction, we’ve curated three back-to-school resources so you can grow forward as you go back.
As one student prepared to leave for college, she asked Pastor John a question that countless freshmen have wondered: How do I stay close to God amid all the distractions and temptations of campus life?
Pastor John’s five pieces of counsel won’t answer every specific question you’ll face, but they’ll provide the kind of biblical foundation that will help you navigate almost every situation. While all five principles are worth revisiting throughout the school year, the first and last stand out to me as particularly helpful.
The first is a call to adopt a wartime mentality. While campuses are busy preparing residence halls, class schedules, and welcome-week activities, Scripture reminds us that someone else is preparing as well: “Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour” (1 Peter 5:8).
Rather than producing fear, this perspective fuels vigilance and reminds you why daily communion with Christ is not optional but essential. When you prepare for the spiritual battle ahead, you’ll find fresh motivation to cultivate a vibrant devotional life.
The final principle is a call to humble dependence. Pastor John reminds you that self-sufficiency cannot empower the Christian life. Instead, he urges you to turn everything you read, hear, hope for, and fear into prayer. You have a good and generous Father in heaven who delights to answer the desperate prayers of his children.
This back-to-school article, written in 2013 by Marshall Segal, feels as timely today as the day it was first published.
Segal offers five foundational truths to help you honor Christ in every part of campus life. What I find especially refreshing, however, is Segal’s attention to the classroom itself.
“Following Christ isn’t something you set aside when class begins.”
Much Christian content written for students understandably focuses on life outside the classroom — avoiding temptation in the dorms, navigating relationships, or making wise decisions on the weekends. Don’t get me wrong; those conversations matter deeply. But you’ll also spend countless hours sitting in lectures, reading textbooks, and writing papers. You need a biblical vision for those moments too, and Segal provides one.
He reminds you that education is about far more than earning a degree or chasing grades. Every lecture, every chapter, and every assignment is an opportunity to better understand God’s world and learn to think Christianly within it. As he writes, “If we’re going to apply God’s word to the world, we need to know the world God has made.”
As you return to campus this fall, let Segal remind you that following Christ isn’t something you set aside when class begins. The classroom itself is one of the primary places where God intends to shape your mind, humble your heart, and prepare you for a lifetime of faithful service.
Nearly one out of every three freshmen never makes it to sophomore year. Simply surviving college is no small achievement. But Alex Chediak has a much bigger vision for your time on campus. He doesn’t just want you to survive. He wants you to thrive.
What I appreciate most about this brief article is that it gives you a compelling vision for who you can become. Too much advice for college students comes from a defensive playbook: Avoid this. Run from that. Don’t go there.
Chediak doesn’t ignore the defense. But the heart of his counsel is refreshingly proactive. From the moment you step onto campus, he urges you to pursue two things that will shape the rest of your life.
“Don’t wait until you’re isolated to look for godly friendships.”
The first is to walk with the wise. Don’t wait until you’re isolated to look for godly friendships. From your very first days on campus, find a faithful local church, show up at a campus-ministry gathering, and ask God to lead you to what I like to call a “2:22 Crew” — friends who join you in fleeing youthful passions and pursuing righteousness, faith, love, and peace (2 Timothy 2:22).
Once you’re rooted in a faithful Christian community, Chediak challenges you to see college as a training ground for the future. Whether you’re sitting in a classroom, gathering for a dorm Bible study, or worshiping with your local church, God is using this season to prepare you to be a force for good in this world.
For resources on specific questions and everyday college life — like “Should I drink alcohol?” “What should I study?” “How far is too far in dating?” or “Why am I so anxious?” — visit the Joy on Campus page, a collection of articles and podcast episodes specifically curated to serve college students.