Secret Church, a new Bible study group at Harding, met for the first time from 6 p.m. to past midnight on Friday, Sept. 14, in the Administration Auditorium.
Headed by Student Association Vice President senior Hector Felix and graduate assistant Taylor Payne, Secret Church is patterned after churches that meet secretly around the world in the sense that those churches will meet for hours at a time to study Scripture.
The idea to have a Bible study that imitates underground churches came from the book “Radical — Taking Back Your Faith from the American Dream” by David Platt, pastor of The Church at Brook Hills in Birmingham, Ala., Felix said. According to Felix, after Platt visited a country where Christians had to convene in secret, he imitated the underground church experience at his own congregation by taking the time to have an in-depth study of the Bible.
Felix said he and Payne wanted to apply this concept for Bible study at Harding.
“We said, ‘What would happen if this came to Harding?'” Felix said. “‘If this radical thinking of not meeting on a Sunday or Wednesday or during chapel, meeting on a Friday night, just to dig through the Scripture, just to be in the word for the whole night — what if we did that here at Harding? What could it look like?’ … We’re just so in love with God’s word that we’re going to be in it and just be with each other and be uplifted.”
At the first meeting, the half-filled auditorium listened as five speakers each delivered a lesson on a different chapter of the book of James. The speakers were Payne, Assistant Professor of Bible Andrew Baker, Associate Professor of Bible & Religion Kevin Youngblood, junior Mitchell Carter and Matt Love, youth minister for Beebe Church of Christ.
Youngblood said he was pleased with the turnout for the first meeting.
“In my opinion, you guys are the Navy Seals of the Lord’s army,” Youngblood said. “[Your] being here tonight and putting in the time to go deep in the word and to exercise your mind with good theology … is encouraging and inspiring.”
The next meeting time of Secret Church has not been announced, but the group will meet at least once more this semester, according to Felix.
According to Felix, Secret Church is important because it is an opportunity to study the Bible in a radical way.
“I just think here in America we place church as a checklist type of thing,” Felix said. “We get so complacent, so lukewarm, with our Christianity that we don’t do radical things anymore. [Secret Church is] just another way of getting into the word, and that’s something we don’t do as often anymore.”
