Melissa Marks

Melissa Marks (Left)

Class of 2019

Honors College

Looking towards a career

in professional writing

Current member of Intentional

Current Student Leader in CRU at UNCW

Current member of the 514 Revolution ministry

If I could describe Melissa in a sentence or two it would be thriving ball of positive energy. She is happy, sweet, kind and empathetic that it would be hard to imagine her have a bad day.

Here is a little bit of her story:

I grew up in church with parents who are believers. However, we never really prayed or read the Bible together at home. when I was 9 years old I went to a church camp and felt like I should get saved and pray the little prayer because that was what everyone did at 9 years old.

So I did the little formula of prayer and baptism, but wasn't changed, I was just nice to people for about a week afterwards. My life went on and I really didn't care about Jesus or faith that much because, as far as I was concerned, I was saved.

When I was 16 years old I had a teacher at Hoggard who was a strong believer and she was so much like Jesus. She stayed late to pour into students and I was really close to her. She always talked about how much she loved Jesus and she slowly made me realize that we must have been talking about different types of saving faith because I didn't feel the way she did about Jesus at all. On my 17th birthday, I got a voicemail from her about how much Jesus loves me and I was sobbing by the end of it. I prayed to Jesus and was, for the first time, actually changed by the Gospel and began to look like a different person.

When I got to UNCW I found out about Intentional through my dorm mates and friends Julie Dimemmo (pictured above) and Sarah Kate Delacourt who were attending. Although it was late, I went and afterwards, I didn't care how late it was. What kept me coming was two fold. First, it was the girls and how truly kind and open everyone was. It was real and I felt like family the first time I went. Secondly, I was sick of passive services and meetings. I knew I needed meat and not milk, basically, ya girl needs a spiritual steak. Intentional was exactly that. It is so countercultural to the "you can do what you want and love Jesus" mindset and it was actually changing my life and not just modifying it. I am constantly sharing the material with others.

One thing that really stuck out to me was the purpose of women and what they are actually supposed to look like because it is so vaguely spoken of in the church. It is often cloudy and not talked about in order to not offend people. Women often question where they belong and who they are in Christ because of this. But I don't anymore and I have an excellent role model.

I have been in an accountability group since February. This group is basically people that point you closer to God and speak into your life in a way others can't or often don't. We have 4 people and we are really close. We meet face to face once a week as well as text in a group chat or facetime throughout the week. We follow the look back, look up, look foreward model. We do this by sharing our weeks with each other, reading scripture together, and then take notes on how to be accountable and pray for each other through the week.

Accountability has done so much in my life. It is so amazing to have a group of girls that you can trust so much. I have a lot of christian friends, but this is the first group where I never second guess telling them what to pray for or what is happening in my day. They are always praying for me and know more about me than most people. We are doing life together in real tangible ways.

I also do CRU and am part of leadership there and 514 revolution which is a stripper outreach ministry in which I will start training for outreach. Intentional has been huge in affecting my other ministries through understanding what it means to be a Godly women. It has made me treasure women friendships and be able to speak into needs in other ministries like understanding submission and accountability. I have seen how it has helped girls in my community group and at the women's retreats.

To those reading this who are considering being partners with Grant and Lexi financially and in prayer, I would like to say that this is a worthwhile ministry to invest in. Living on a college campus, especially as a girl, it can be really difficult to find who you are when everyone around you is drinking and having causal hookups and always trying to fight there way to the top instead of loving others. To have a ministry speaking love into women's lives and helping them find identity in Christ is really powerful and I think if more girls heard this material and the ones in the study spread this material it could revolutionize campus and help women understand things like submission not because they are less, but because they are a treasures. This can be so widely spread and it should be.