Caption: A group of students from the junior class start their chapel by leading students in a time of worship. [Dr. Cristina Meier]
by Dr. Cristina Meier
Every week during seventh and eighth period class, the secondary schedule provides for an afternoon chapel service in which students gather together to pray, participate in a corporate time of worship and listen to an inspirational and Biblically based message. Traditionally, the chaplain leads these services or finds guest speakers to attend. However, he also designates at least one chapel a year to be organized and presented by a high school class.
This year, the first student led chapel was the Senior Class on October 7. They led both the middle school chapel during the seventh period and the high school chapel during the eight period. After leading students in some worship songs and scripture reading, they began a game of Bible charades in which students and teachers were able to participate. They had a special guest speaker, Ana Luiza Oliveira, come and give her testimony. After she finished, they had time to continue playing the charades game for the rest of the chapel period.
The following Wednesday, October 14, the Junior class led the chapel service in some songs, a few games and then a special sermon from the spiritual life class officer, Hideki Yoshikawa. He asked the students challenging questions about their faith, such as how often they prayed and read the Bible. He spoke on his own story of faith and how he learned to be authentic in his walk of faith.
With Spirit Week happening the week that followed, STUCO was not able to do their chapel as originally planned. However, this gave the Spiritual Life leaders from each grade the opportunity to step up and organize a more relaxing and “spirit-week” focused chapel on October 21. The students met in the gym for some interactive games and activities.
The sophomore class postponed their chapel due to other commitments in the schedule and they will be sharing with their classmates on November 11 and the freshman class will wait until second semester before they are given the opportunity to lead a chapel.
STUCO will be taking over a chapel at some point in the near future, depending on the schedule for other chapel speakers already preparing for their time at PACA.
