New Chapel Options Available to Students

For those who are too tired to make the trek to NMC in the mornings or who are diligently focused on homework, there are new ways to get those chapel credits. If you are an athlete, a Huntington resident, or just a student seeking to form a deeper relationship with God, new night chapels offer a variety of locations and times.

THE FINDING
Thursday nights from 9 p.m. to 11 p.m. (alternating between the Forrest & Price Room) students have a deeper, “filter-free” exploration of what it means to be a part of a Christian community. Senior Gregg Patterson started this chapel after pondering his own identity in Christ and longing for the deeper spiritually-focused relationships he experienced in his college group back home.

After Patterson received good feedback on his idea from peers, professors, and Campus Pastor Vince Beresford, he filled out the online form for the Spiritual Formation Department and began contacting professors to speak each week. Patterson steers clear of set topics and instead asks teachers and students to share or ask questions.

“This chapel is a chance for professors to say, ‘Hey, we’re real people! We were in college too!’ It’s a chance for them to give us a real faith to look up to and words to remember long after graduation,” Patterson said.

Patterson believes the entire purpose of the Finding is to help students.

“Physically, we at Vanguard are a tight-knit community, but spiritually we are very distant.You can be standing right next to someone in chapel, worshipping by their side, and have absolutely no idea what they’re going through. The Finding is about that process of building a new and different community, one that experiences God in a social way,” he said.

BAM
Beyond Athletic Ministry began as a small discipleship group for student athletes and has evolved into an open forum for the integration of athletes with the campus at large. This Bible study/accountability group usually features worship and a wide variety of guest speakers, and is held in gym room 201 from 9 to 10 p.m. on five different Monday nights this semester (Sept. 12 and 26, and Oct. 10, 18, and 24)

FAITH IN THE WORKPLACE
Faith in the Workplace will take place on Nov.15. It will be a night of prayer, student-led worship, and devotional sharing/speaking by alumni and other business representatives from different demographics. This mentoring chapel experience, led by the faculty advisor for business administration Ed Westbrook, came about as a response to graduating seniors’ requests.

MOB
Men of the Bible is a focused discussion group led by Pastor Vince in the Cove every Tuesday from 8 p.m. to 9 p.m. Each week, about a dozen men congregate for a dialogue about what it really means to be a man and in what ways this role is distorted by society and the media.

HUNTINGTON FLOOR CHURCHES
Every Tuesday at 11 p.m., the men of Huntington gather as individual floors for announcements, fellowship, and a unique non-mandatory chapel experience led by each of their Resident Assistants.