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Lusk puts it out in the open
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While most students hurried to their classes last Tuesday afternoon, Senior Sheppard Lusk preached from an unlikely pulpit: a bench outside the Business Building.
Lusk is part of a group called Open Air BSU. Calm and collected, Lusk ended his prayer with fellow Open Air Speaker T.J. O’Brien and jumped into action as he embodied the energy and charisma of a seasoned preacher.
He and friends and former students of Boise State speak about Christianity on a number of Tuesdays every semester at 12:30 p.m. The group aims to bring the message of Jesus Christ to the students of Boise State by reading verses from the Bible and sharing stories of their personal testimonies.
For Lusk, Tuesday is Sunday. His church consists of concrete sidewalks, his building the venerable surroundings of Boise State. While his pulpit is a bench, the students of Boise State, believe it or not, are his congregation.
Lusk chooses to speak on campus because he feels it is his calling from God to do so.
“I feel called to stand up and preach like some feel called to feed the poor, or serve the Lord in another way,” he said. “I have been shown love. The ultimate sacrifice a person can have shown for them is someone who takes their place and pays the punishment for their wrongs.”
O’Brien added that there are 160,000 Christians martyred every year.
“It’s nothing for us to stand up one day a week,” O’Brien said.
When Lusk spoke, it was immediately clear that his words and actions commanded the attention of passers-by.
Most students glanced over to see Lusk, but kept walking.
Some stopped to listen, be it for a moment or a long while.
Lusk, a former Atheist, spoke about absolute truth, tolerance and other religions.
Students offered mixed reactions to what Lusk and Open Air had to say.
Sophomore Tyler Osgood opposed Lusk’s message, calling it an unorthodox, weak argument.
“He spends more time bashing others’ arguments than proving his own,” Osgood said. “I don’t know where he’s getting all his information.”
Jennifer Jaramillo, a freshman at Boise State, said that last Tuesday was the first time she had stopped to listen to the Open Air team speak, although she had seen them multiple times this semester. She supports the message of Lusk and Open Air.
“I think this is a really good thing that they do,” Jaramillo said. “Everyone needs that in their life.”
A majority of the students who stopped to listen kept a comfortable distance. Some hurled insults as they passed and turned down Lusk’s offer to stop and discuss their disagreements. Lusk recalled an instance when he offered a student $10 for 20 minutes of his time. The offer was declined.
“A lot of people don’t want to take the time to get answers,” Lusk said.
Lusk said he thinks the students of Boise State probably consider him a “religious weirdo” and wanted to make clear that he is just passionate about his relationship with Jesus, which is grounded in logic and reasoning.
“All we want to do is share that joy with people,” he said.
The single message Lusk wants to share with Boise State is to research and explore different views before making up your mind about religion. Christianity is not a religion of dos and don’ts. Rather, it is a relationship with God.
“Don’t tell us the Bible is full of errors, prove it. Don’t just go to a Website, do the research yourself. Read a book written by an Atheist, but don’t stop there. Read a counter-book by a Christian and then make up your own mind,” Lusk said.
“Don’t believe your best friend when he says it is in the Bible, read it for yourself. I have faith that Jesus came and died for me so I could be set free of a life of evil,” he explained. “I don’t believe this because of some warm, fuzzy feeling.”
While Lusk has faced his fair share of opposition and hecklers since he began speaking in 2005, he said that no one from the Boise State administration has ever asked him to stop, so he will continue to speak.
“I am a student too, so I want to take the old Constitution for a spin now and then and make sure to exercise my right to free speech,” Lusk said.
JUSTIN NEWELL
Culture Writer
