The student-sponsored Prayer Walk for Life will take place on April 13, educating attendees about pregnancies and adoptions while supporting Save the Storks, a pro-life non-profit.
The Walk for Life, organized by Clairissa Derickson, junior biblical counseling major, and Caleb Skaggs, freshman Bible major, for Com 314 Leadership and Communication, kicks off BJU’s BEYOND, which intends to instruct students on how to keep serving the community after graduation. “The goal of the walk is to truly have people who have a desire to pray to come out and pray for the women and the families facing these situations,” Derickson said.
Ian Dyke, communications director for the student leadership counsel, said the leadership organization received many requests after Paul Isaacs, the CEO of the non-profit organization Save the Storks, spoke in chapel about the organization’s ministry and needs. “USpeak was flooded with suggestions,” Dyke said. “Our Facebook and Instagram received, I’d say altogether, hundreds of messages.” “The Prayer Walk for Life is really an outgrowth of that passion that we saw,” Dyke said.
Check-in for the walk will begin at 8:30 a.m. and continue until 9 a.m. at Alumni Stadium. The walk officially commences at 9:30 a.m. at Alumni Stadium with prayer. Participants will follow a one-mile course, with posters along the way displaying the development of a child over the nine months of pregnancy. “You’ll start out, and it’ll be hardly even recognizable as a human, and you’ll get to see how it develops and how it looks right before the mother gives birth,” Dyke said.
These development posters will help guide prayers. “We want to pray for the development of the babies as well,” Derickson said. There will be three prayer stations along the path of the walk. The first will focus on women and the second one on dads. The final one, at Palmetto Green, will include information about local non-profits, such as Miracle Hill, Piedmont Women’s Center, Bethany Christian Services and Nightlight.
“We want to help guide people’s prayers as much as possible,” Derickson said. “It can be hard to pray for a long period of time.” Derickson said a walk was chosen to differentiate the event from pro-life marches. Additionally, while the pro-life color is typically red, the event will use blue to represent the unborn. Derickson said that some red was used on the event’s poster to display the gravity of abortion but also said that gravity is not the focus.
“Our main focus is the love and the care and the support for the women who feel like they can’t support their child,” Derickson said. Because the event is open to the public and not just to the BJU family, the communication class heading up the event partnered with local churches to raise awareness for the event. “It’s our way at Bob Jones [University] of showing the community that this is something that we’re passionate about,” Dyke said.
The event will cost $5. The proceeds will go to Save the Storks, which uses a fleet of 47 buses outfitted to give women free ultrasounds and allow them to hear their child’s heartbeat. “I think it’s awesome to see not only the passion of the student body but how that passion has come from fruition into action,” Dyke said.
BEYOND, which was officially announced March 12, seeks to instruct students on how to keep serving after graduation. People can sign up for the Prayer Walk for Life at Eventbrite.com.
