In today’s world, everything screams for relevance. Companies tell you their newest product is applicable to you, organizations persuade you that their cause is important and everyone wants to know whether or not they are significant.
Knowing this, the student and faculty-led chapel committees decided it was time for Christianity to make a claim for relevance. This past week five students attempted to do just that in Harding’s latest chapel series titled “Why Christianity Matters Today.”
May 2012 Harding graduate and current graduate assistant and adjunct professor Taylor Payne said that this topic is of utmost importance for the student body. Working with both chapel committees, he was one of the major leaders in organizing the series.
“We made it a broad thing because we wanted the speakers to speak from their heart and not confine them too much to a specific topic,” Payne said. “It matters because each day of the week students heard from another student about the heart of Christianity.”
Payne and the chapel committees selected five students to lead the series. Clay Smith spoke Monday, Travis Helton on Tuesday, Brett Cravens on Wednesday, Brent Hall on Thursday and Jacob Robertson on Friday.
According to Payne, there were three qualifications that needed to be met when they were searching and praying for the right speakers. First, the speaker needed to bring truth from the Word. Second, the speaker must be genuine. Finally, the speaker must show great humility.
Junior Bible major from Nashville, Tenn. Clay Smith led the series on Monday. According to him, this is a much needed topic to be discussed.
“Honestly, this could be a semester-long theme for chapel because it is geared toward everyone,” Smith said. “This topic is a reminder for devoted Christians, a wake-up call for luke-warm Christians, an encouragement for doubting Christians and a conversation starter for non-Christians. Hopefully it will remind us that we are not relevant because of what we can provide but because of what God can provide.”
One of the more unique aspects about this series that separates it from normal chapel series at Harding is that it is led by all Harding students. According to junior finance major Travis Helton from Orlando, Fla., letting students hear from fellow students on such an important topic is vital to the success of the message.
“It is important that students speak on this topic because (students in the audience) get to see their peers’ hearts,” Helton said. “It is much easier for students to relate with student speakers. You always like to hear what students are thinking about and going through and are always encouraged when you hear that students are living for the Lord.”
Helton said that talking about the relevance of Christianity is an opportunity to call students out of their spiritual slumber and wake them up to the call of the Gospel in their everyday lives.
“It makes you think about why you are a Christian and why it’s important to you,” Helton said. “It’s easy to go through the day and not think about those things.”
