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Spiritual Life

Weekly convocation, student-led vespers, and prayer groups formed by faculty, students, and staff help create a transformational spiritual environment that is integral to the WAUexperience. While Washington Adventist University is centered in the Seventh-day Adventist faith, the University is diverse and accepting of all religions and cultures. We are a cosmopolitan university challenging students to become moral leaders in communities throughout the world.

Service Day 2009

19 January 2010

Office of Ministry Kicks Off Year with Strategic Plan, Partnership

05 September 2009

Spiritual_MstrPlan-webStrategic planning is an important part of doing business for most organizations, including universities. Without strategic vision, institutions perish. The WAU Office of Ministry believes that a strategic plan is also a valuable tool in planning spiritual life on campus. The WAU Spiritual Master Plan (SMP) is a 13-page document outlining the key strategies for guiding all activities related to Campus Ministries at WAU.

The comprehensive plan addresses the spiritual formation process that shapes and disciplines the lives of each member of the campus constituency. According to the SMP “having the mind of Christ; Christ being formed in us; Christ living in us daily; walking in the Sprit; being taught and led by the Spirit, as our daily encounter with God” is the objective.
“Get a Life—The With-God Life” is the overarching theme of spiritual life for the 2009-2010 school year. The SMP outlines a variety of activities and initiatives that address a student’s spiritual needs.

Weeks in Spiritual Emphasis
A standard on Adventist college campuses, the fall Week in Spiritual Emphasis will highlight WAU’s own religion faculty. These six worship services will launch the “Get a Life” theme for the school year.

Pastoral Ministry Team
To augment the access WAU students have to spiritual mentors, Gary Wimbish, Vice President for Ministry, has engaged a team of regional church pastors to minister to the 
WAU learning community. These pastors will help serve the spiritual needs of the campus in a variety of ways, including holding residence hall worships and offering spiritual counseling.

Spring Short-Term Mission Trips
In partnership with Global Vessels, a non-profit organization that operates an orphanage in East Africa, WAU students will travel to Tanzania during Spring Break to assist with this ministry.

Summer Evangelism Opportunity
The WAU Office of Ministry has partnered with ShareHim in their 2010 evangelistic campaign. In May, ten WAU students will travel to Ethiopia with a faculty sponsor to preach for this outreach program.
Takoma Academy Partnership

Wimbish is also working with Takoma Academy (TA) Chaplain Melvyn Hayden III to establish an exchange partnership whereby Chaplain Hayden will join in spiritual life activities at WAU and Wimbish will do the same at TA.

The WAU Spiritual Master Plan does much more than lay out programs and events planned for the upcoming school year. It couches these activities in a well-defined plan for effecting deep spiritual change in the lives of the young people on campus. Please take some time to read the SMP at www.wau.edu/smp.

Missions Week Creates Excitement to Serve

01 October 2009

Missions_weekMention Tanzania and Ethiopia on the Washington Adventist University campus, and you are bound to see many faces light up with excitement about these two destinations for short-term mission trips planned for next spring.

The enthusiasm began, during the recent Missions Week, when the Office of the Vice President for Ministry coordinated an exhibit of mission opportunities and a convocation highlighting the work of Global Vessels, a group serving orphan children in Tanzania.

By the end of the week, more than 100 students had signed up for both short- and long-term mission opportunities. “We didn’t have enough room on the sign-up sheets to handle the positive response to these opportunities,” said Jose St. Phard, coordinator of Missions Week. “Eighty students alone want to [participate in] the short-term mission trips.”

For the first trip, May 2-16, a group of students will go to Tanzania to build group homes and join in education and evangelism outreach with Global Vessels. Leaving just three days later, from May 5-22, another group will travel to Ethiopia to join ShareHim, an organization that trains lay evangelists.

Twenty additional students have begun the application process to serve as student missionaries during the 2010 school year. “There are more people signing up than there are spaces to fill,” Diana Regus, Student Missions director, reported excitedly. “It’s great to see this program growing again, and so rapidly.”

An emphasis on missions is a key part of WAU’s spiritual master plan. The response to Missions Week activities is significant, because a number of students showing interest in service abroad are not Seventh-day Adventists nor are they familiar with the denomination’s mission-focused heritage.

If you are interested in supporting missions at WAU, contact the Office of the Vice President for Ministry at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it or (301) 891-4112.

More Than 200 Help Community During Service Day 2009

01 October 2009

IMG_0857 More than 240 Washington Adventist University students, staff, and faculty took part in the university’s annual Service Day. The campus community served more than 13 nonprofit organizations and area schools by preparing food packages for sick patients, volunteering at homeless shelters, caring for rehabilitating animals, cleaning local creeks, tutoring, packing boxes at a food bank, and volunteering at the local police station. Coordinated through the Office of the Vice President for Ministry, the academic schedule is altered on Service Day to allow students to live out the “Gateway to Service” motto.