Covenant College’s Mark 10:45 program is a mandatory freshman “volunteer program” where students work for 15 hours a semester. Students do not choose which position they get; they receive a position on a staff team in facilities, the chapel and so on. On the surface, the program sufficiently encapsulates their mission to create selfless students that can go out and serve their communities faithfully. By extension, students should become more appreciatory stewards of their gifts and enhance their own ability to steadfastly follow God’s guidance.
During orientation week, all freshmen participate in a Mark 10:45 clean-up project. Photo courtesy of Covenant College Marketing Department.
Mark 10:45 ought to council and disciple students towards a heart of service and gratitude. Unfortunately, in my opinion, it does not. So where does it go wrong? The program, while not inconsolably time-consuming or exasperating, seems an unnecessary service to the college’s needs rather than developing the character of its laborers. Mark 10:45 seems to only exist to fulfill administrative and manual tasks for the college.
Covenant College makes their purpose clear: students participate in a voluntary program to prepare them for a life of service to the Lord and their community (Mark 10:45). After completion of the 30 hours of Mark 10:45, students are led along and encouraged by staff to continue serving, whether it be the college or surrounding community. “The purpose of the program is Threefold: to further develop our identity in Christ as individuals and as His body. To learn and apply a biblical frame of reference… To serve as Christ would serve,” the college website says. Also, according to Covenant’s website, the program helps students use their God-given gifts and passions to impact Chattanooga. Covenant ostensibly asserts that the purpose of Mark 10:45 is to help students learn how to serve the community.
During orientation week, a member of faculty introduces freshmen to Mark 10:45 through a service project somewhere in Chattanooga. In a short talk, he or she stresses the importance of serving the surrounding community as Christians and spreading the love of Christ through selfless action. It all comes to a head as the speaker quotes Mark 10:45 with an authentic passion and confidence that would assure any freshman. “For even the Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve, and give His life as a ransom for many” (ESV). Invigorated by the speech, students attack the work with gusto and hearts willing to serve, and the project genuinely benefits the community. However, after the service project, students wonder at the broader function of Mark 10:45.
The source of students’ aggravation is not because of the 15 hours robbed from freshmen each semester, but because Covenant is the main receiver of these acts of service. Do students need to incur 30 hours of work cleaning and running the college to learn how to serve?
One could point out that Covenant provides opportunities to serve the community through Mark 10:45, so it’s not exclusively benefiting the college. However, they provide several additional hoops to jump through to be able to genuinely serve the surrounding community and churches, such as approval from the Office of Student Development. This also requires a means of transportation, but most freshmen do not own a car.
Covenant may seem to use Mark 10:45 for its own benefit, but does that automatically mean the students do not derive benefit from the program as well? No. But there’s no follow-up with students about the importance of serving, no guidance, no instructions and no broader implications.
If Covenant really concerned itself with the students' spirit of service, one would expect it to be psychologically conducive to honing that spirit of service. However, rather than helping students develop this strength, it cultivates a bitter and hesitant view of work.
According to Clinical Psychologist Edward L. Deci, true work motivation, an initiative in serving, comes from within. To cultivate the type of servants Covenant strives to build, there must exist some sort of autonomy, determination but come from the students as well as the college (Gagni and Deci). In Mark 10:45, Covenant sets up the opposite. Students finish their mandatory hours so that there is no hold on their account to register for the next semester. The program assumes that the students willingly give their servant hearts to nurture their intrinsic desire to serve while mandating students with the very labor they want them to love. Under these circumstances, Covenant can hardly expect to create selfless students.
When the Mark 10:45 program was first conceived, it was called the “Practical Work Program” Diana Reed said in an interview. Reed said it served two purposes: creating servants and operating Covenant. They had a clear purpose which reflected the structure of the program. However, they renamed the program “Mark 10:45” in 2010, and they took “operating the campus” out of their stated purpose. Despite the program remaining the same in practicality, Covenant claimed that the program’s purpose changed from assisting the College to guiding students and helping the community. 2 Corinthians 9:7 states, “Each one must give as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion.” As the Mark 10:45 Program conveys, Christians are called to be servants, but not under the conditions that the program previously operated, which might be what they are trying to get out from under at the moment.
Covenant may have originally designed Mark 10:45 to fill a few positions, so why not just admit it if that is still part of the goal and ask students to step in? In this case, students might have less doubts about its purpose as stated on the website.