Center for Christian Leadership

CASTING CROWNS The Healer Tour

Wisconsin Lutheran College and the Center for Christian Leadership hosted a sold-out concert featuring Grammy Award-winning artists Casting Crowns with special guests We Are Messengers and Jonathan Traylor. The event, which was part of “The Healer Tour,” took place April 1 in the college’s Time of Grace Center in front of more than 2,000 people.

Photos by Michael Kuether ’24

Competing to Make an Impact

The fourth annual Serve2Lead Impact Challenge was held on Saturday, February 26 at Wisconsin Lutheran College in the Schwan Concert Hall. This challenge was established by WLC’s Center for Christian Leadership as an opportunity for students to create servant leadership impact plans that would positively impact the community.

This year, four teams competed in the finals, and three were selected to receive funding for their projects.

TEAM SLEEP IN HEAVENLY PEACE focused on the issue of people in Milwaukee having a comfortable place to sleep. This team is partnering with Sleep in Heavenly Peace, a national organization that hosts bed-building events for the community. The team will organize volunteers and not only build the beds, but deliver them to families in need as identified by the Lighthouse Youth Center. With an approximate cost of $250 per bed, the grant will allow the team to build 24 beds.

Senior Sam Rodmyre, team captain, said: “I heard about this program last summer while I was working as a handyman. The initial draw for me was using my skills and being able to recruit people to build. As we got further into this project, it became entirely about the people to whom we would provide beds. I attribute much of my success in academics and general wellbeing to good-quality sleep, and I hope to be able to give the gift of good sleep to these children.”

Due to the amount of poverty in Milwaukee, some people can’t afford hygiene products. TEAM HIGHLIGHTING HYGIENE plans to address this need by creating hygiene product kits and donating them to homeless shelters in the community. Junior Brandon Schultz, team captain, shared: “This project means a lot to my team and me. We want to serve others out of our love for Christ. WLC has changed the way I lead in many ways, one of which was taking a class on leadership with Dr. Stacy Hoehl (’01, professor of communication). I learned valuable skills during that class; it had a big influence on the way that I lead.”

TEAM MUSICAL EFFECTS wants to help get music back into local classrooms. They will work with students to build rhythm instruments that will be used as part of the music curriculum, and they will purchase additional instruments. Students from the team as well as from the music program at WLC will volunteer their time by teaching lessons and working with students at St. Philip’s Lutheran School in Milwaukee.

The team’s captain, senior Lillyan Burmesch, said: “This whole experience has been such a humbling moment. Our goal with Musical Effects was to impact the lives of students right here in Milwaukee. I was surprised by the amount of support that we have received throughout this project. What is really exciting is that we have schools on a waiting list, and my dream is to keep Musical Effects going, expanding it to these other schools.”

Special thanks to Tim Dittloff, Chellee Siewert, and Jeff Knudtson for taking the time to judge the competition and give feedback to the participants.