You Are God’s Masterpiece
We are officially past fall break and 1/4 of the way through the 2024-2025 academic year, and with it, the chapel theme and verse of the year are now well established and are hopefully starting to feel familiar for you.
The Center for Spiritual Formation has done a great job of introducing the chapel theme — Imago Dei — and the verse of the year — “For we are God’s masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things he planned for us long ago.” (Ephesians 2:10) — and expanding upon them through chapel and other programming.
Thus far in chapel, we have enjoyed messages from our campus pastors and various guest speakers discussing the theme of Imago Dei and Ephesians 2:10, and have also enjoyed worship led by our own Joyful Noise as well as guests like LIFEGATE Denver. Moving forward, there are more exciting chapels to look forward to, including Global Focus week later this month, a panel of former professional athletes who are now HU coaches, and a Christmas carol celebration featuring music professors George and Joni Killian.
To unpack more about this year’s chapel theme and verse of the year, Associate Campus Pastor Karyn Kamphausen answered some questions sharing insights about the selection of the theme and verse and what impact the Center for Spiritual Formation hopes to see come from them.
Q: What are you hoping members of the HU community will gain from this year’s chapel theme and verse?
A: From this year’s chapel theme and verse of the year, we are hoping students will gain traction in the development of their identity in Christ so that their identity will impact their everyday lives. It is incredible that we are each God’s masterpiece and so deeply loved by Him. We can rest in being His prized creation and also know that He has made us anew even when we fall short of being that beautiful creation. Even more so, how beautiful that He invited us into His work with Him by planning good things for us to do that will bring Him glory. We want students to be rooted in their identity, released into new life with Him and to reflect His glory in the good things they do.
Q: How did you decide on the chapel theme and verse? What were some of the main things that resulted in deciding on them?
A: Our spiritual formation team started praying about a theme last academic year. We met together several times, sharing ideas and letting them simmer in our hearts. We agreed that identity was a key piece in being able to live well with Christ and others. After thinking and praying about identity, we brainstormed more ideas and came up with the theme of Imago Dei, the image of God. Then we made lists of Scripture verses that highlighted this idea of the image of God and came up with so many of them. That confirmed that rooting our identity in Christ was an important concept. We landed on Ephesians 2:10, believing that it points to our identity in God and propels us to live out of that identity. We want to know who we are and then respond to daily life out of that identity.
Q: Is there one overarching message you want people to understand with the theme and verse?
A: We would love for students to know you are God's masterpiece, deeply loved by God and invited into new life with Him on an adventure that you can’t possibly imagine.
Q: Is there anything you would like to share about other spiritual formation programming?
A: We started small groups in September and will continue introducing new groups throughout the academic year. We believe groups are a great place to grow in community as we look at what the Bible says about various topics and spend time discussing it. Everyone should choose a group to try this year.
For more information about the Center for Spiritual Formation and spiritual life programming, visit huntington.edu/Campus-Ministries.
