Episode Details

Danielle and Maggie are social distancing, recording from their separate homes same town.

Sandhya Oaks is an enthusiast, an extrovert, a foodie, an international transracial adoptee. She’s a full time missionary with Cru (Formerly Campus Crusade of Christ) and is a part of the Lenses Institute Team.  She speaks and writes and has been a part of the Allender Center.

Danielle and Sandhya have many mutual friends and Sandhya reached out to Danielle to connect about being a woman of color in leadership.

Sandhya finds herself in Wisconsin, she is self-quarantining. She is originally from India but was adopted by a family in Wisconsin so she grew up in Wisconsin. She lives and works at the University of Minnesota as a campus missionary with Cru, and she is continuing that work remotely. She loves her work but it’s been very strange to do it all through the computer. She is very relational so this has been a challenge for her. She says she is “riding it out,” even though she doesn’t even know what that means. She has been coping with the social isolation by having hangs out digitally through zoom, FaceTime, google hang outs. She is also going on walks and talking to friends on the phone.

Maggie adds it is indeed a strange time to be involved in a ministry, business or organization that involves so much face-to-face contact and personal interaction. While the technology is great it is just not the same as being in person.  Sandhya says that it’s hard to have back to back meetings and interactions on screens. She needs the full person to person sitting together otherwise miss out on the whole person. We can be thankful that the technology does exist for us all to stay connected.

Danielle says Sandhya’s job is built on relationships. Part of what has motivated her to make those relationships has been from her own story.  Sandhya said she always been very relational, she loved school and loved being around people, but her home was not that way. Her home was filled with trauma and so she was always wanting to be away from home and with other people, taking every opportunity to do so. Not too much as surfaced for her from her own childhood but she does think about the kiddos who are at home now with their families and it’s not a safe environment for their flourishing; think gin about the kids who are living in spaces of trauma.  Her heart is near and dear to those kiddos. Her prayer has been “Would you redeem families through this time? Would this be a time where you actually bring families together? And kids who don’t have great homes, would you protect them? Would  be near to them, would you draw near to them?” Sandhya’s heart is breaking for kids right now that don’t have a good home and are trapped with them and don’t have an outlook.

Maggie says, everyone’s lives has been turned upside down. Not knowing when this is going to end keeps us all heightened. What a great prayer to redeem this time.

When everything started growing with COVID it caused a shift in her ministry. Her first thoughts were to care for the students who are having to make hard decisions in the midst of upheaval as well as creating spaces for them to grieve: Stay or go. Indefinite online classes. Loss of graduation. Job offers. Living out the rest of their Freshman year…. Sandhya has been leaning into these spaces with the students to help bring them to a place of gratitude. These students were scared when this all started. They have gone from just needing someone to talk to to trying to figure out online classes, and now they have moved back towards discipleship to feel connection with each other. The students are all now back at their homes, sheltering in place, and wanting to engage and connect with their friends not just on social media but with real r