Sunday night I was invited to North Park’s Sunday evening Collegelife, a worship gathering for our students. It is student led and orchestrated, but mentored and guided by folks like Brian Wu and Rich Johnson — and probably others. I got there plenty early because the commute in the snow wasn’t as slow as I thought it might be.
Anderson Chapel was decked out in candles in order to increase the theme of the night: prayer. The skit team ran through their skit as more and more began to arrive, and then we prayed together. Welcome and announcements, and then about 30 minutes of worship with an excellent band leading it all — with one of my student assistants, Tim King, doing some guitaring and singing. I didn’t know this side of Tim, and it showed me again how well-balanced our students are. I’m keen on drummers, and the drummer was excellent. I was also impressed by the expressiveness of the students in worship.

I spoke on working to eliminate the tohu va-bohu (“formlessness, voidness”) in our prayer life by learning to pray not only alone in the Church but also together with the Church. I encouraged the use of prayer books in the prayer life. And then Brian Wu announced an inititiative to have midday prayers at NPU at 11:30am at the back of the chapel. 10 minutes. Not long; just enough time to gather together and pray in the rich prayer tradition of the Church. I’m looking forward to this.