Students travel to join Asbury’s revival

Students travel to join Asbury’s revival

Inside view of worship inside the Hughes Memorial Auditorium at Asbury Seminary.
Courtesy | Tully Mitchell

“It felt like the chorus of heaven,” senior Ashtyn Harms said.

Two weeks ago, several groups of Hillsdale College students made the pilgrimage to Asbury Theological Seminary for one of the largest spontaneous gatherings of Christians in years.

The event began when a group stayed after a mandatory chapel service on Feb. 8, continuing worship through the night. Word quickly spread on social media, predominantly on TikTok, which led to thousands from across the world flocking to the rural college campus. The service has been described as peaceful, lacking many contemporary worship elements.

While Asbury’s service officially ended on Feb. 21, similar movements have sprung up at colleges across the country, including Hillsdale’s campus. On the first day of Lent, a 24-hour worship service began in the Dow Chapel. It will finish at 7:30 p.m. on Thursday, or until leaders feel called to end it. Before Asbury, The Grotto hosted a 24-hour adoration in preparation for Christmas.

Though the term “revival” has been debated, many students agree that this sudden outpouring of faith has been an influential moment for an otherwise irreligious generation. According to the Survey Center on American Life, more than a third of Generation Z Americans identify as religiously unaffiliated.

“You could tell there were people from every age there, but you could also tell that there was a significant number of college students,” Harms said. “There was an attitude and assumption that it’s Gen Z’s turn to take on the Great Commission. We’re a very chaotic generation that has struggled to define ourselves, but this shows us that our identity is in Christ.”

Though on vacation, college chaplain Adam Rick quickly learned about Asbury.

“Whenever something like this happens, Christians ought to engage it with cautious optimism, weighing it by Scripture and the experience of the ages,” Rick said. “Asbury Seminary’s president Timothy Tennent, a former professor of mine as it happens, prefers to call it an ‘awakening’ instead of a ‘revival’ for reasons that are very well argued. It involves both a renewed sense of affection as well as personal repentance, healing, and reconciliation.”

Harms, like many other Hillsdale students, attended the event at Asbury on a whim.

“It was Wednesday afternoon. I was in A.J. ‘s before my 3 p.m. class, and Jake Studebaker texted me,” Harms said. “He said, ‘You wanna come to Kentucky with me?’ I was like, ‘What? Now?’ He was like, ‘Yeah, right now.’” 

Later that afternoon, Studebaker and Harms hopped in the car to drive six hours to Kentucky. They spent three hours at Asbury from 9 p.m. to midnight on Wednesday. They drove through the night, returning to Hillsdale at 6:30 a.m.

Admitting that she was nervous about the emotions of the event, Harms explained how Studebaker encouraged her during their drive. Studebaker explained that feeling emotions about your love for Jesus is not a bad thing, and it also doesn’t mean the Spirit of God isn’t there. 

Because of the organic nature of the event, Harms said it was initially difficult to find the Hughes Memorial Auditorium.

“We walk into the building and it just kind of hits you,” Harms said. “It felt like something was sitting across the top of our chest and our shoulders. Jake likened it to a breastplate.”

The worship had an emphasis on hymns, with only acoustic guitars, a piano, and box drum as the instruments. A few times during Harm’s visit, a woman came to the altar to deliver a brief sermon on denominational unity.

“Revivals were recurrent throughout the 19th century and into the 20th,” professor of philosophy and religion Thomas Burke said. “The Jesus Movement of the early 1970s brought many young people into the Christian faith. I have no doubt this is a genuine movement of the Holy Spirit, and would hope it would spread far and wide and help bring our country to affirm religious and moral principles once taken for granted. Of course, it may only turn out to be a local and short-lived phenomenon, but I hope not.”

According to Harms, it was comforting knowing all of the visitors were worshiping the same God.

“There were different ages, socioeconomic backgrounds, races, all worshiping together in one voice,” Harms said.

While some of his parishioners were away at Asbury this weekend, Hillsdale College Baptist Church pastor Benjamin Cuthbert took notice.

“Revival is a verb; and God is the One who does the action of reviving,” Cuthbert said. “In other words, humans can’t fabricate an authentic revival on their own. So, we can and should pray for such a wonderful work of God, but we can’t manufacture it.”

But, Cuthbert explained how revival can turn astray.  

“Within the history of evangelicalism in America, well-meaning Christians sometimes attempted to create a revival by holding revival meetings—which were often marked by a certain type of music, a certain style of preaching, and (sadly in some cases) some forms of manipulation to garner certain results,” Cuthbert said.  “In this way a revival becomes a noun, instead of a verb. It can accidentally focus on a short-term experience instead of a long-term result.”

Junior Charlie Miggins, like Harms, attended Asbury spontaneously.

“Being Catholic, I thought that this sounds a lot like adoration, and I don’t see anything wrong with it,” Miggins said.

On Saturday night, Miggins was invited by junior Fernando Bravo to join him in driving to Kentucky after his RA shift ended. Alongside sophomore Draevyn Spies, the three friends left Hillsdale at 2 a.m. Miggins attended mass Sunday morning, and went across town to Asbury afterward. The group stayed from 1-4:30 p.m. on Sunday.

“Initially I went because I wanted that giant leap of faith– to sacrifice my day, sacrifice sleep,” Miggins said. “I thought it’d be awesome to travel to Jesus. I feel like that type of decision is pretty attractive to Gen Z, to go on spontaneous adventures with friends. Of course, there was also TikTok blowing it up. That was awesome. I definitely see the fire spreading to other campuses.”

Freshmen Tully Mitchell and Nathan Dilliner attended Asbury this past Saturday. They left at 6:30 a.m. and arrived at 12:30 p.m. They stayed until 8:30 p.m., but the majority of their visit was spent waiting in line to enter the chapel. Feb. 18 was the busiest day at Asbury, as many people waited for the weekend to make the pilgrimage to Kentucky.

“I found out on Valentine’s Day actually. The morning of, my parents both reached out,” Mitchell said. “My parents are not at all the type to be like, ‘You should go on a trip, forget about classes.’ But instead of trying to talk me down from a trip, they told me to pray and see about going.’”

When the two entered the chapel at sunset, it created what they described as an ethereal view.

“On the inside all their windows are stained glass,” Dilliner said. “It’s mostly cream colors like orange. We got inside there just as the sun was beginning to set, so the entire section was covered in golden sun beams. It was beautiful.”

Rick reflected upon the multiple ways God shows himself to his people.

“There is certainly a need in our age of hype and algorithm-fueled sensationalism to remember God’s normal work of daily devotion and quiet transformation, where his creative power is just as operative as in the mountain-top moments of revival,” Rick said. “On the other hand, the Spirit does sometimes move in unique ways designed to get the attention of people, and we should always be ready to receive him however he chooses to minister to us. All movements of the Spirit can be liable to human manipulation, and excess should be avoided.”

All of this activity lends itself to the question of how it will affect Hillsdale students, and the greater Gen Z community. Many believe it will have lasting effects upon the youngest adult generation.

“You don’t need to go to Asbury to find God,” Harms said.



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