On Friday Feb. 14, Andrew Baker, director of the Mitchell Center, spoke in chapel about Colton Gordon, an 11-year-old boy who underwent open-heart surgery. In his talk, he encouraged students to take action in living out the call of Christ. In response to Baker’s discussion, many Harding students took to Twitter, tweeting #PrayingForColton.

“The objective at the end was just to get people to see love in action,” Baker said. “Paul says in Romans 12, ‘Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil, cling to what is good.’ That’s not a philosophy it’s an action. So, being that it was Valentine’s Day, the goal was to just see some form of action, and here’s something easy that could be done that would be extremely encouraging to not just Colton, but to lots of people.”

Baker said the goal was not just to encourage Colton; it was to encourage his entire family.

“(The Harding community) saw an action, and responded to it,” Baker said.

Students in Baker’s freshman Bible classes got even more involved, purchasing a variety of different items for Colton including Bibles, balloons and cards. Freshman Morgan Miller, an exercise science and leadership and ministry double major, said it was a great service opportunity.

“We knew of what had happened because Mr. Baker had spoken in chapel, and that day in class we were talking about how to love people and how to be what Christ would want us to be,” Miller said. “(Baker) challenged us to do what we would want someone to do (for us) if we were in that situation. So, he gave us the last 20 minutes in class to do whatever we felt like we needed to do.”

To encourage Colton, Miller and a few fellow classmates purchased a Bible from the bookstore, wrote a prayer for him and they each highlighted verses they thought Colton would want to read.

“Hopefully it will be a Bible that (Colton) can go to whenever he needs something,” Miller said.

In regard to the amount of social media awareness surrounding Colton, Baker said he was not keeping track of or expecting it to become a social media trend.

“The objective at the end was to encourage a kid,” Baker said. “It takes nothing for a college student to tweet ‘praying for Colton’, but when that collective momentum happens, it’s another of many forms of encouragement that can be given.”

Amy Gordon said her family is very appreciative of the warmth, love and prayers they have received. She said Colton was released from the hospital sooner than he was supposed to be released, and he’s doing much better than expected. In response to his condition she said, “God is amazing, and it’s amazing to see how God works.”