More than 50 students met on the patio at Walk-On’s Bistreaux and Bar on Burbank Drive on Sunday night — but not for food or beer.
They gathered for the first meeting of a new service-focused church for University students called Sojourn.
Casey Tingle and Pete Jory, Sojourn’s co-pastors, held the meeting to conduct a worship service, determine interest and plan Sojourn’s future.
Tingle said the term “Sojourn” means “alien or stranger,” used to describe Christians in the book of 1 Peter. In the Bible, the apostle Peter tells Christians that they are strangers on earth because heaven is their true home, Tingle said.
Tingle, a University graduate and budget analyst for the Department of Public Safety, is the former pastor of Kedron Baptist Church in Amite, La.
“I felt a calling to come back to Baton Rouge and reach LSU students,” Tingle said.
The Jake Smith Band, a local Christian music group, opened the service by playing worship songs as well as some of their original songs.
Tingle delivered a biblical sermon about the need to serve others and told students how Sojourn could help them accomplish that goal, Jory said.
Jory, Tingle’s classmate from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary as well as a University graduate, is a Bible teacher at Parkview Baptist School and the former pastor of First Baptist Church in Galveston, Texas.
Tingle and Jory decided to start a student group focused on serving the community around them, Tingle said.
“We wanted a different kind of church focused on performing service and being active,” Tingle said.
Though the first meeting was Sunday, Tingle said members of Sojourn did several service projects last week, including handing out bottled water on campus and to people running around the LSU lakes.
Jory said he hopes Sojourn becomes “a very different kind of church.”
“Our real goal is to have students doing acts of kindness and acts of love for other students,” Jory said.
Tingle said he and Jory decided to hold a “large-group worship event” to determine interest from students in this new group.
The rest of the meetings will not necessarily be at Walk-On’s, Jory said, because the church is currently looking for other locations for worship.
Jory said he and Tingle deliberately did not hold the meeting in a church because they wanted to bring the Gospel to everyone, including people who do not regularly attend church.
“We are an evangelism-style church,” Jory said. “We want to be in a place where we can talk to students, in a place that’s familiar and on their own turf.”
Walk-On’s manager Lauren Taylor said the restaurant will often let groups have meetings and parties on the patio.
“We’ll work with any group who wants to meet here,” Taylor said.
Taylor said the group spoke with the manager, Brandon Landry, and received permission.
Monica Vandermyde, a dietetics junior and member of the Baptist Collegiate Ministry, attended the meeting Sunday night.
“I thought it was excellent,” Vandermyde said. “I’m definitely going to stay involved.”
Mike Hollier, a finance junior, has been working with Tingle and Jory to establish Sojourn.
“I had been praying about finding somewhere where I could actually serve people,” Hollier said.
Hollier said he wanted to use his different abilities to serve others through volunteer work and service projects, and Sojourn seemed to offer that opportunity.
“A lot of churches don’t actually serve,” Hollier said. “Every Sunday they talk about it and then go home and forget about it.”