About Exodus
Our Mission
Being a college student can feel stressful and overwhelming. We want incoming students at TCU to know they do not have to face these challenges on their own! At Exodus, they will meet other freshmen campers, upperclassmen counselors, and pastors of five local churches. We seek to be a welcoming community for everyone, whether you are already a Christian or are from a different faith background!
Our goal is to connect first-year students at TCU to Christ-centered community, and we believe that local churches are the launching point for that! We want every camper to feel at home at Exodus. We want them to know that they are seen and loved by a community at TCU, but more importantly they are loved by God.
History
In 2012, a few TCU students gathered from across the campus to try to figure out how to get more students to get involved in local churches. They determined the best strategy was to address freshmen students, inviting them to experience the welcoming community in churches all around the campus at the beginning of the year through a weekend retreat they called the Exodus Retreat. Ever since, the Exodus Retreat has been completely student run, and it now has a committed staff of over 60 college students.
Just like in the book of Exodus, when God pulls His people out of Egypt into the wilderness because He has a very specific purpose for them, we take freshmen students off campus to Latham Springs Retreat Center for a weekend on the Exodus Retreat so they can connect with God and begin to understand God’s purpose for them back on our campus. For a short time we take away the distractions of classes and homework, fraternities and sororities, new freedom and new pressure, and we create a physical and spiritual space where students will begin or deepen a relationship with God and His Church.
Staff
Our retreat staff consists of 60 counselors, each who actively serve and attend one of the churches sponsored by Exodus. They walk alongside campers throughout the retreat and lead our small group time. They also continue to play a role in the campers’ lives after the retreat to ensure they are cared for and loved in our churches.
We also have a board of directors of students that are committed to the local church and to Exodus. They do all the logistics of the retreat from the start to the finish and lead our counselors to be equipped for their role.