HANNIBAL – It was the presence of Christians college students at around Kayla Meier that helped bring her to Christ. She hopes to have a similar effect with college students in Romania later this year.
Meier came to Hannibal-LaGrange University in 2013 to play softball, transferring from a community college, and grew up in a Catholic school.
“I noticed something different when I came to HLGU. I was not on campus long before people started sharing about Jesus. Things turned to gospel conversations. I just had this feeling. They invested in me – colleagues, teammates, and professors,” Meier said.
It became an obvious choice and on October 20, 2013, she joined the family of God as a believer.
She graduated in 2015 with a secondary education degree in English. After that graduation, she taught in a Mexico, Missouri high school and was an assistant softball coach.
“For three summers now, I’ve spent in Romania with Cristi and Michelle Harlea (missionaries who have been sponsored in part by Calvary Baptist, Hannibal). They needed someone to come and teach, I moved to Bucharest in the summer of 2018 and taught there.
“After serving in Romania for a few months, I felt the Lord calling me to full-time missions. For me, it was walking in small steps of obedience and being aware the Lord was opening doors. HE showed me a need for collegiate ministry in Bucharest and gave me a huge heart for it, because of my testimony as a student,” she said.
In March, 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic forced her to come back early. For two years, she was a woman’s residence hall manager at HLGU and took a post-graduate degree and will complete those responsibilities in September. She graduated a second time from HLGU in May this year with a Master’s of Arts degree in Christian Leadership.
She plans to go into full-time missions to Romania as College Ministry Discipleship Mobilization and disciple those who are a comparable age as when she came to saving knowledge of Jesus Christ. She intends to be in Romania in October