The Campus Mission, Knoxville TN

h the Campus Mission and David Freels. I met David my freshman year in the University Center and shortly thereafter a one-on-one lunch led to the beginning of a profoundly spiritual disciple relationship. The phrase “doing life together” sometimes gets overused, but that’s essentially what this ministry is. We took trips to the Smoky Mountains, went to watch baseball games, had countless meals together, had silent retreats, even went to an art museum once. There was no recipe or script for our time together, for good reason, and God was in all of it. We met in small groups to delve deep into his Word, learning not only about what God was teaching us in those scriptures but also what it looked like to meditate on the living, breathing Word of God, “chewing” on verses so that we might encounter the Holy Spirit and not miss what he was saying to us. The wonderful thing about my time with David’s ministry wasn’t that David was a great bible study leader who gave us good lessons (true as that may be), it was that he was a leader who was giving us tools that we needed for spiritual growth and discipleship years down the road. I’m married and living out of state now, and the way I pray, read the Bible, and even relate to God on a daily basis are all in some way or another rooted in things that David had passed on to us. I’m so incredibly thankful for this ministry in my life and the work that God has been able to do in me through it. It has been a blessing to me and my wife, and I know it has been for other guys as well. Jonathan Tackket , freshman UT 4/16
Ever since David and I first met, I’ve found myself growing in a spiritual way I’ve never experienced before. Not only do I find it very helpful to have a mentor reflecting and pointing things out to me, I enjoy having a friend to have a conversation about God. Several times when we’ve met, I’ve often seen things in a new light that caused a complete paradigm shift. David is a great man, and a good friend, who’s always ready to have a good conversation. Quite a few times this school year I’ve experienced difficulties with different issues, questioned my own values, struggled with inner convictions. But every time I’ve sat down with David at the local coffee shop or deli, he brings something to my attention that I may not have noticed, or supports me by providing advice that is just perfect for the issue I find myself troubled with. I’ve learned from his lessons that it is always good to have someone on the outside looking in from a different perspective. He is well versed in God’s word and experience, and I wouldn’t trade a single conversation we’ve had for anything. George Bullock Senior UT 5/15
I started meeting with David my senior year of high school. When we started meeting, school was going well, I had committed to playing football for Tennessee and I had no idea what the Lord had for me in the coming years. Early on David and I started talking about what it would be like for football to be taken out of my life. If we skip forward to my freshman year at UT, I was on the field during practice, about a week before our first game. I was punting a ball when one of my teammates, who was trying to block the punt, got to close. His helmet made contact with my shin. Next thing I knew I was on the ground screaming in pain. I lay in bed that night crying tears of joy because I knew God was right there with me. He had told me I would play at UT and here I was with a broken leg. I knew God was going to work through that pain in my life. I often thought back, throughout my recovery process, to the conversations I had had with David. From those conversations about what if football was taken from me? It helped remind me that my identity was not wrapped up in football. Since breaking my leg, football has been anything from what I expected it t be. I haven’t played much but thankfully God isn’t concerned with my stats. David has helped guide my spiritual direction, which I have found typically comes from true, honest conversations. I have come to a point that I have decided I would rather be in a tough place in which I felt dependent on the Lord then to have everything going well and just going through life content. Throughout the last four years, my conversations with David have grown in so many different areas of my life. He may not always have the answers I am looking for but David is always ready to listen and challenge me to find what God is up to in my current situation. Austin Witt graduate UT 10/14
“ No one can put a price tag on good discipleship. The value of learning solid scripturally based theology, the practice of quality conversation about tangible ways God is moving in your life, and the presence of a leader who has walked the same path of life as you can’t be overstated. That is why I have come to develop such a passion for what David Freels does at the University of Tennessee with The Campus Mission. Dave impacted my life in uncountable ways in just 3 short years. We met at the dawn of my sophomore year. I had been following Jesus for almost a year, but still had only a childlike understanding of the character of God. I didn’t understand my place in the narrative he was writing. I spent a lot of my time being angry, bitter, and shut off to the way God was moving, or in my mind not moving, in my life. David has taught me spiritual disciplines that create space within the confines of my day-to-day life that allow me to more accurately perceive how the Lord moves and what his method of operation actually is. Whether that be techniques for studying scripture, seeing the Gospel portrayed through art and music, or simply getting out in the woods of the Smoky Mountains to appreciate the vastness and complexity of creation; David has shown me that God resides in so many places other than the confines of a church. One of David’s most valuable assets to young men he disciples is his listening ear. He has taught me what the true value is of simply having someone who cares available to listen to what you have to say: joys, anguishes, or otherwise. David seldom offers direct advice or concrete answers, but what he does is ask hard questions that require you to seek what the Holy Spirit is up to in yourself in order to answer them. The journey to the answers is always more important and spiritually formative than the answers themselves. The greatest thing I have learned while being discipled by Dave is that this life I have been given is a story. It is not only my story though; it is a subplot to a much larger narrative that God is writing. The climax is the coming of His kingdom, but the plot twist is that it is already here and he is just preparing us to be a part of it by providing glimpses of it while revealing just what kind of King he really is, a King who loves wildly, gives graciously, knows us fully, and who wants nothing more than to draw near to his people. We are given free will to create within our own short stories of life what we like, but the important thing to consider in doing so is how we go about creating them. The real question is how do we go about creating them in a way worthy of the calling we have received? This is a question I look forward to pursuing alongside David for as long as the Lord ordains The Campus Mission to be a part of young men’s lives. “

Bryan Kerr, UT 11/13
When I first met David Freels in Rocky Top, one of the cafeterias in the University Center at the University of Tennessee, I was a freshman still learning my way around campus. I was still in the process of adjusting to college, and since I hadn't yet found a bible study to be a part of, when David told us he was looking for guys to start a small group with I was eager to get started. What I didn't realize then was that David was offering so much more than simply a weekly bible study. I found out over the next five years that David was offering us the chance to enter into a spiritual friendship in which we could walk alongside one another, learn from someone older and wiser, and begin to notice and make space in our lives for a God who wants more from us than a once-a-week time slot. In other words, he was offering discipleship. Throughout the years we went on numerous camping trips, met and talked over good meals and hot coffee, and even went to an art museum. No matter what the setting was, the theme was always the same: spiritual formation. What is God up to? What is he stirring in your heart right now? I was constantly being pushed to think deeper and take notice in the things that God was trying to accomplish in his Kingdom and in my life, and I have to say that it has deeply changed how I relate to God and how I approach my relationship with others. I have seen through David's ministry a glimpse of what it looks like to share your life with your friends, to walk alongside them and love as God calls us to love. Having David as a mentor and a friend for all these years has been an amazing blessing in my life.