For a while now, Beth Gardner has been working on different ways to reach out to international students at the University of South Alabama (USA). She and others at USA’s Baptist Campus Ministries (BCM) have tried some things but had trouble finding an effective way to reach those students.

But this year God opened a door to build relationships that she would have never seen coming — emergency pillows. And it started with a simple request.

“The global office asked us if we could pick up a student from France at the airport,” said Gardner, USA’s Baptist campus minister. “My husband and I picked up three students that night.”

They realized as they were checking the students into their residence halls that the students had shown up with only one checked bag and a carry-on for a whole semester. That meant they had no room for sheets, pillows, towels or anything like that.

“It was around 10 p.m., and we told them we would be back,” Gardner said. She and her husband scrambled to round up some pillows and blankets from the BCM office and BCM students… (continue).

The article “Alabama BCM Students Meet Needs, Connect with Others on Campus” was first published in The Alabama Baptist Newspaper.