For the last two-and-a-half weeks, the spiritual outpouring on Asbury University’s campus drew tens of thousands of visitors to the small town of Wilmore, Kentucky. But today, the campus is quiet once again as the ongoing services have come to a close.
School officials announced last weekend that public services would close on Friday, February 24, so the school could shift their focus back to the students and their education.
“We are excited to think carefully about how we process and steward this experience with our students,” Asbury University President Dr. Kevin Brown said. “We want to capture their voices. We want to walk with them in continual discipleship. We want to commission them to be ‘salt and light’ to serve the world and glorify God.”
Brown added that the last few weeks have been an “extraordinary act” he wouldn’t forget, and he is encouraging others to remember it, too.
“The effort by committed men and women on our campus to redirect energy, forsake other obligations, work tirelessly around the clock, and provide single-minded labor to accommodate our students and incoming visitors has been the high point in my career,” Brown said. “In fact, it may be the most extraordinary act of collective Godliness and hospitable goodwill I have ever witnessed in my life. I am forever grateful. I am forever changed.”
The decision to close down services was a complex choice, but Abby Laub, Asbury’s director of strategic communication, shared that their primary goal moving forward is to equip and teach students who have had spiritual encounters over the last few weeks.
“Some of these kids don’t even know Jesus, they don’t know anything about the Bible,” Laub said. “We have to distill it way down, and we need to have an army of people ready to go out and disciple and mentor these kids.
“I think there’s going to be just a lot of humility and prayer that the Church will take these ‘baby Christians’ and help grow the Church, which I believe is very much needed right now,” Laub continued. “I think we are just scratching the surface.”
Moving forward, the school will return to its regularly scheduled chapel services on Monday, Wednesday and Friday from 10 to 10:50 a.m. ET, which can be streamed online. Asbury has also published archived outpouring services on their website.
