On Saturday, the Senior Vice President for Spiritual Development at Liberty University announced that there would be a spontaneous worship gathering on Sunday night.
The following night, 4,000 students answered his call and showed up to worship God.
David Nasser, the SVP for Spiritual Development tweeted a video, encouraging students to attend, to pray, worship, and meditate on God.
“Inviting LibertyU students, faculty & staff to join tomorrow night as we worship & pray with a stunning sunset as our backdrop,” Nasser tweeted.
On Sunday, thousands of students arrived to worship and pray.
Nasser, who founded D. Nasser Outreach and Christ City Church before starting at Liberty, shared a video of the worship to Instagram writing, “..where morning dawns, where evening fades, you call forth songs of joy” / Psalm 68:5 -selah.”
Liberty students took to social media to express how much they enjoyed the night.
“What a beautiful thing I love my school,” tweeted LU student Wilton.
Liberty Office of Spiritual Development also shared a video of the spontaneous event to Instagram, writing “The blazing sun shall pierce the night!”
The night of worship comes at a time where Liberty University is facing heavy criticism from mainstream news outlets.
“I think the best part of this worship session was that Pastor David a portion of it reaffirming his students, and reminding us that it’s all about Jesus, in the end,” Ian Parish, a senior at Liberty University, shared with Faithwire. “Despite what you see on the news, we’re not just Jerry Falwell Jr., just like we’re not just David Nasser or just Ian Parish. We’re a body of believers, and that doesn’t mean we always get it right, but that does mean we are unified as brothers and sisters in Christ.”
He added: “If you see any of us in the news, you see a small snapshot of the kingdom work that Liberty University is invested in doing, and that small snapshot isn’t always an accurate description in light of the giant tapestry that is Liberty.”
“I love this school despite the circumstances,” freshman Abigail Fuce said, “God is working here and will continue to do so.”
The background
A week ago, Politico published a piece on Jerry Falwell Jr. titled, “‘Someone’s Gotta Tell the Freakin’ Truth’: Jerry Falwell’s Aides Break Their Silence,” targeting everything from the Liberty work environment, to his business deals.
“I’m not going to dignify the lies that were reported yesterday with a response, but I am going to the authorities and I am going to civil court,” Falwell said in regards to the report.
Days later, Reuters published a piece titled, “Exclusive: Falwell blasted Liberty student as ‘retarded,’ police chief as ‘half-wit’ in emails,” where they exposed emails Falwell sent in the past.
In an interview with the Associated Press, Falwell explained that at the end of the day, showing private emails is theft and needs to be treated as a crime.
“Liberty owns every single one of those emails. It’s our property. They were working for us when they used our server. And our policies make it clear every email sent on our server is owned by Liberty and if anybody shares it with anybody outside Liberty, it is theft. And so that’s the underlying crime,” Falwell said.
On Friday, a small group of Liberty students gathered on the steps of their student center to protest Falwell in light of the recent allegations.
Falwell took to Twitter to commend the students for exercising their beliefs in a positive, and respectful way, calling their behavior “Christ-like.”
“I’m so impressed with how @LibertyU students conducted themselves today at the protest!” Falwell wrote. “The ones who had concerns and the ones who supported me were both respectful and not angry-very Christ-like in their behavior. Our students are an example the world can learn from!”