Theology teacher Jonathan Ott has started an auxiliary faith-based exercise program around the SLUH building. What has been an international program for the past ten years is now becoming a school-wide opportunity to not only strengthen your biceps, but your faith and fellowship as well. 

Ott has been involved in the program and has attended periodic Fitness | Fellowship | Faith (F3) workouts with his various workout partners. He was recently introduced to the program by his childhood friends. The F3 program has three main parts and thus three main components during the program. 

A workout is conducted to start off the program and followed by a faith sharing circle; there are sporadic fellowship events placed throughout the year for the formal F3 program.  

Now coming to SLUH, F3 will provide an outlet for anyone wanting to find a place to exercise and find a good group of guys to hang out with.  

“I know a lot of guys have had a hard time latching onto something,” stated Ott. 

One fun thing about the F3 program at SLUH is that all lifting exercises are completed using a cinder block. This cheap workout accessory is perfect for beginning lifters due to its versatility and accessibility. “It’s accessible, anybody can get a cinderblock for a dollar and 75 cents, and I give every participant one for free,” adds Ott. 

The pandemic has made exercise and being a healthy individual a challenge with all of the closings of gyms and the demotivating feelings that come with the territory in a pandemic. 

“I know there’s a lot of lasting impact from the lack of physical activity and exercise,'' said Ott. 

After the exercise is completed, the students will gather in a faith circle.

“Each workout ends with a reflection that the leader gives that's something positive, some way that they can reflect on something that’s bigger than themselves,” described Ott.

In between their normal meetings, they will also participate in fellowship events.

“I haven't really built out any fellowship specific events for the SLUH group yet. With the wider F3 group, each month, there'll be a fellowship event,” said Ott. “These fellowship events could range from bowling to simply hanging out somewhere.”

Anytime people hang out, either with friends or classmates, the easiest way to spark a conversation is to have an icebreaker. In terms of the fellowship events, the icebreaker is an actual event the students will do together. 

“With a lot of men, they struggle with sitting down and talking with somebody face to face, but if you're doing something together, that tends to organically sprout some chatter and some bonding that happens,” said Ott.

The F3 program, which has quickly grown within SLUH, Ott hopes it will continue to grow and prosper in the future. The hope being that every one of F3’s goals will be achieved.

“Our goal is to plant, grow, and serve community workout groups, and the purpose of those is to develop male community leadership,” stated Ott.