By Dr. Ben Sells

President, Ouachita Baptist University

Adapted from President Ben Sells’ Convocation Chapel address on August 31, 2026

With Convocation, for the first time we bring together new students, returning students, faculty and staff to formally mark the beginning of the 2026-2027 academic year. To my left is the university's mace.

Originally, a mace was a medieval weapon carried to protect dignitaries. By the 14th century, it had become something different: a symbol carried before university leaders. Today, most universities carry a mace as a ceremonial, symbolizing the institution’s authority to confer degrees.

Ouachita’s mace was crafted from wood salvaged from “Old Main,” which served as our primary classroom and office building from 1889 until it burned in 1949. In a real sense, our mace carries a piece of our own history with it. It leads the way at Convocation and Commencement as a visible reminder of our history.

It was also in medieval times that the idea of a university first emerged in Western Europe, largely through the church. Those early universities were built on what were understood to be the twin sources of genuine knowledge: truths discovered through human reason, and truths revealed by God and grasped through faith.

As people moved from Europe to America, they carried both institutions with them — churches and colleges together. Most colleges founded in colonial America and many that followed them carried a deeply Christian commitment at their core.

But many of those universities have walked away from that founding conviction, abandoning the belief that truth could be revealed by God at all. Today, whatever Christian identity remains at most of them is at best ceremonial — a name on a seal, a chapel repurposed for other uses. The commitment that built them is, in most cases, simply gone.

Ouachita – a Christ-Centered Learning Community

But that’s not the Ouachita story.

We’re not opposed to symbols like this mace, but we want our symbols to point to ongoing realities.  We want them to point us forward as well as remind us of our history. A group of churches in our state, known as Arkansas Baptists, started this university in September 1886.

Through all our history, we’ve remained a university that’s also distinctly Christian. Our mission statement names it plainly: We are a “Christ-centered learning community.” That’s also our theme this academic year.

At Ouachita, “Christ-centered” should not be a mere marketing slogan. It needs to be our center of gravity, the anchor of our souls, and what we aim, however imperfectly, to live out daily. Let me offer you my summary of what that looks like, drawing from Scripture:

“He (Jesus) is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For and by him all things were created in heaven and on earth. All things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things and in him all things hold together.” (Colossians 1:15-17)

I want to suggest that there are three insights from this passage that help describe what it means to be a Christ-centered learning community.

First, Christ created all things and holds all things together.

Image means the perfect manifestation. God is invisible, but Jesus is God who took on flesh and dwelt among us. Paul calls him the “firstborn of all creation,” establishing that Jesus holds the deed to the entire universe, including every square inch of this campus.

All things were created through him and for him. Because everything was made through him:

• He holds our curriculum together, teaching us that critical thinking is also a spiritual endeavor.
• He authored the laws of nature studied in natural sciences.
• He is the source of the human dignity we study in the social sciences.
• In humanities, every great story we study is echoing his story.

And because everything was made for him:

• In business, we learn to manage financial resources for his kingdom.
• In education, we learn from the Master Teacher.
• In Christian studies, we anchor our lives on his Word.
• And in performing arts, every note and script is an offering of praise to the one who gave us voices.

“In him all things hold together.” Remove Christ from the center of a campus community, and the pieces scatter. Academics can curdle into pride and athletics into idolatry. From classrooms to labs and the library; to courts and fields; from residence halls to the Caf and the Stu — all this campus is sacred ground because it has been set aside to be Christ-centered.

Second, Christ makes your education whole.

Students, when you give it your best, shaped by what happens inside and outside the classroom and multiplied by the personal investment of faculty and staff, your Ouachita education will be the best in this state and beyond.

I believe this because recent graduates tell me, again and again, that they walked into their jobs and graduate programs feeling better prepared than their peers from other universities.

But please tune your ear to this: If your education only reflects what I just described — that you’re better prepared than others — but you leave here not drawn closer to Jesus Christ, then your education will be incomplete.

A secular education can teach you how things work but not why you exist. It can give you a career but not help you understand your calling. A truly complete education requires a unifying confessional starting point. One where faith and learning are never compartmentalized, so that as you grow academically, you grow personally, emotionally and spiritually too.

Without Christ at the center, knowledge fractures into human arrogance. Christ alone makes your education whole.

Third, Christ works through our people.

Ouachita has remained Christ-centered because our trustees, faculty and staff aim to be Christ-centered people.

The professors grading your papers, the coaches running your drills and the residence directors living with you are doing so much more than simply working a 9-to-5 job. They are shepherds, following Jesus with an active faith of their own.

They don’t just teach subjects — they pray with you and for you. They don’t just clock in — they invest in your spiritual formation. In them, you can see the gospel lived out, walking alongside you, investing their lives in yours for your good and God’s glory. We don’t always do this perfectly, but we do it sincerely.

Conclusion

Many of you chose Ouachita so your faith could grow deeper here. My hope is that this year, through every challenge and victory, your relationship with Christ grows and increasingly becomes the bedrock of your life.

But I know this room. Some of you came here for other reasons and you’re not sure what to make of our faith tradition. If that’s you, please know we are so glad you’re here. You belong here.

My prayer isn’t that we’d force a lifeless religion on you but that during your time here, you would honestly consider the truth and beauty of Jesus, encountering him in a way that leads you to make him the center of your life.

In 1984, I was a college senior at a university much like this one. I had my own plans, my own ambitions, my own center of gravity.

But that year, through the quiet power of the Holy Spirit, a guest speaker, the witness of professors and the fellowship of peers who truly loved Jesus, I made a decision: I stopped giving Jesus just a part of my life and committed to make him the center of it.

That moment changed my trajectory. I can testify that in every high and low since, the best life is a Christ-centered one. That’s my deepest hope and prayer for you.

Photo courtesy of Ouachita Baptist University.