Every Monday, Wednesday and Friday, students flood the gym for the “big” chapels. Yet not every student knows what happens behind the scenes to make these chapels possible.
“Chapel is a place for students, for faculty, for staff to come together in community and spend time around the throne and worship God,” said junior Kevin Zimmerman, assistant Chapel Board chair.
Behind the scenes details
The Dean of Spiritual Development Todd Pickett and the Director of chapel programs Lisa Ishihara are in charge of choosing the chapel themes. Themes must be planned months in advance because the process of selecting a speaker is a time-consuming task.
Under Pickett and Ishihara, the AS Chapel Board has the opportunity to bring in guest bands for “Spirit and Sound,” and host a small chapel series as well. They have chosen a series on wisdom this semester, and the series next semester will focus on the spiritual realm.
There is a quite a bit of effort that goes into each chapel. Before chapel begins, Kyle Donn Chapel Board Chair, or Zimmerman handles all of the preparations for the speaker. They also make sure the onscreen announcements are ready, and that the speaker’s biography is ready for whoever introduces him or her. The worship team arrives around 8 a.m., followed by a time of reflection and prayer.
Leaders focusing on Christ first
“[We] center our hearts around Christ before chapel,” said Zimmerman. “It would be a shame if we weren’t able to focus on Christ before we lead others into His presence. So we’re intentional about taking that time to really center our hearts before things start getting crazy [and] groups start coming in.”
After this time of prayer, the worship team does their sound check. The band also makes sure sound and lighting are ready. The speaker then shows up around 9 a.m.
Everyone involved in preparation gathers at around 9:10 a.m. and checks that all is in order. They then spend a few more moments in prayer.
“The temptation is to have so much structure that there’s no room or flexibility for the Spirit,” said Donn. “We’re seeking out the Lord in flexibility and are trying to really be intentional with what it would be like to just allow His spirit to do whatever He wants in there.”
Allowing room for the Spirit in worship
One area where the Spirit is very present is in worship. The worship bands are selected through auditions held at the end of each semester. Ishihara works with the worship coordinator to decide which bands will play.
According to Zimmerman, they do not look for a particular worship style. They simply want to broaden the students’ perspective and understanding of worship.
“We’re not just looking for musical talent, we’re looking for diversity, we’re looking for authenticity,” said Zimmerman. “We’re looking most ardently for people who have a heart for God and a heart for His people.”
Seeking diversity in chapel
Donn finds this challenging because he often feels chapel is not very diverse.
“If the picture of the Kingdom is that Revelation 4 picture of people from every tongue, tribe and nation, then there are a lot of different cultural ways to worship,” said Donn. “And the way that we can best love people…is by broadening their perspective of what worship is.”
Although the styles of worship are generally quite similar, the Chapel Board wants to be able to communicate to people from all kinds of worship backgrounds and incorporate these genres into the program. They want to encourage worship teams with different perspectives of worship to get involved.
Along with worship, there are other ways Biola students can get involved. Students can apply for Singspiration and After Dark staff positions at the end of each year. They can also apply for an AS Chapel Board position. In addition, students can volunteer at the Torrey Conference that occurs every fall.
Students contribute to chapel
The biggest way students can get involved is by being vocal and conveying the needs of the campus and the student body to the Chapel Board, said Donn. One way this can be done is by being a part of focus groups. This is where students can gather in small groups about twice a semester and give feedback on the chapel program.
Both Donn and Zimmerman feel that there will always be room for improvement in regards to chapels, so they appreciate feedback from the Biola community. They want the Biola community to grow from their experience at chapel.
“It’s our prayer and our desire that chapel doesn’t stop,” said Zimmerman. “It’s not 9:30 to 10:20, but that people would go out and truly be transformed as Romans 12 tells us. It’s that they would go out and reach the world with the love of Jesus Christ; that they would reach La Mirada, reach L.A. It’s that they would go to the ends of the earth. [Our prayer is] that what we do in chapel doesn’t stay in chapel, but that it just spreads.”
