On Tuesday, Sept. 4, over one hundred students, faculty, and staff of Kingswood University gave a helping hand to churches and community organizations throughout the Sussex, New Brunswick area.
Sixty-one new young adults from Canada, the U.S., and St. Kitts had arrived to start their first year at Kingswood. With lots of excitement, the new students moved into the dorms and began to get acquainted.
To encourage a spirit of service, faculty and student leaders coordinated service projects for all the new students. They fanned out into the community to clean up brush, build flower beds, organize storage rooms, paint walls, and wash buildings. They cleaned windows at a home for abused women and stuffed envelopes for a Salvation Army Christmas campaign. In all this service, including reading, singing, and playing games with shut-ins, the freshman class experienced the community that will be their “home” for the next four years while studying at Kingswood.
“We want students to learn that ‘work’ and ‘worship’ can often be synonymous,” said Dr. David Smith, Vice President for Academic Affairs. “Actually, the word for ‘worship’ and the word for ‘service’ are precisely the same word in Greek. The shaping of our hearts often begins with the employment of our hands.”
In keeping with its mission of equipping Christ-like servant leaders for global impact, Kingswood has designated Wednesdays to be Pulse Days to be set aside from regular classes for a specific focus.
One Wednesday a month is Head Day (to intellectually challenge the students), one Wednesday focuses on Hearts (for spiritual formation), one on Hands (to shape for Christian service), and the fourth is a Sabbath, reinforcing a rest from labors.