A Home for Christian Life, Thought, and Formation
A Christian study center and hospitality house serving college students and young adults alongside Anderson University.
Who We Are
Real Life House is a Christian Study Center serving students at Anderson University and the surrounding college community.
We exist to help students know Christ more deeply, become more like Him, and make Him known—bringing the truth of the Christian faith into conversation with the questions, relationships, studies, decisions, and callings that shape their lives.
The House is a place for study, friendship, hospitality, thoughtful conversation, Christian formation, and life together. Students can come to study, share a meal, ask difficult questions, meet with a mentor, open the Scriptures, or simply find a place to belong.
We want students to discover that following Jesus is not one part of life among many. Jesus Christ is Lord over the whole of life—what we believe, what we love, how we think, how we live, and who we are becoming.
Real Life House seeks to serve alongside and strengthen the ministry of local churches, partnering with churches and campus ministries to help young men and women grow toward mature, thoughtful, faithful Christian lives.
Why a Christian Study Center?
College is about more than earning a degree.
The university years shape more than what students know. They shape how students think, what they love, who they become, and how they understand their place in the world.
These are years filled with important questions:
What is true? Who am I? What makes a life worth living? What should I believe? What am I called to do? How does my faith relate to my studies, relationships, work, and future? And what does it actually mean to follow Jesus in all of it?
A Christian Study Center creates a place where those questions do not have to be separated from Christian faith.
Real Life House exists alongside the university as a place where Christian faith can engage the whole of life—Scripture and theology, learning and ideas, friendships and questions, calling and vocation, service and mission, meals and ordinary life together.
We believe the Christian faith is not something students must set aside when they enter the classroom or something reserved for Sunday morning. All truth belongs to God, and all of life is lived before Him.
That is why the House exists.
Know Christ. Become Like Him. Make Him Known.
Real Life House exists to help students know Christ more deeply, become more like Him, and make Him known.
We pursue that mission through biblical and theological study, Christian formation, mentoring, hospitality, meaningful community, thoughtful engagement with the life of the mind, and opportunities to serve others.
Our hope is not simply that students will know more about Christianity, but that the truth and grace of Jesus Christ will increasingly shape the people they are becoming and the lives they are learning to live.
A place where Christian faith shapes the whole of life.
We envision Real Life House as a welcoming Christian community alongside Anderson University where students can think deeply, belong genuinely, grow spiritually, and discover what faithful Christian life looks like in the university and beyond.
We want to see students leave college with more than a degree.
We want them to leave with a deepening love for Christ, confidence in the truth of Scripture, habits of lifelong learning and discipleship, meaningful relationships with the church and other believers, and a growing understanding of how their gifts, work, and calling participate in God's purposes in the world.
Our Commitments
These commitments shape the life of Real Life House—what we teach, how we welcome people, how we learn together, and the kind of people we hope students are becoming.
Christianity begins and ends with Jesus Christ.
We want students to know Him—not merely know about Him—and increasingly understand the whole of life in light of who Jesus is, what He has done, and what it means to follow Him.
Christ is at the center of our teaching, our community, our formation, our hope, and our mission.
We believe the Bible is God's Word and that Christian faith invites serious thought rather than requiring us to avoid it.
We encourage students to read carefully, ask honest questions, think deeply, and pursue truth with humility and confidence.
Because all truth belongs to God, Christian learning extends beyond Bible study into the classroom, the arts and sciences, culture, work, relationships, and the questions confronting the world around us.
College does not merely shape what we know. It shapes who we are becoming.
Christian formation involves the whole person—our minds, loves, habits, relationships, character, worship, and way of life.
Through Scripture, prayer, worship, mentoring, study, friendship, service, and life together, we encourage students not simply to understand the Christian faith but increasingly to live as faithful followers of Jesus Christ.
The House is meant to feel like a house.
We want Real Life House to be a place where students can come in, sit down, study, eat, talk, rest, ask questions, pray, laugh, and be known.
Christian hospitality is more than providing a room or serving a meal. It is making space in our lives for one another.
We therefore seek to cultivate genuine friendship and community across churches, campus ministries, backgrounds, and fields of study—a place where students can experience something of the welcome and grace of Christ.
Students are preparing for more than jobs. They are preparing for lives of faithful service to God and neighbor.
We help students consider how their gifts, studies, work, relationships, responsibilities, and opportunities fit within God's larger purposes.
Whether God leads someone into business, education, medicine, engineering, ministry, the arts, public service, family life, or somewhere unexpected, we want students asking a larger question than simply, “What career do I want?”
We want them asking:
“How can I faithfully follow Christ and serve others with the life God has given me?”
Explore What We Believe & Meet Our Team
Learn more about the theological foundations that shape Real Life House or get to know our leadership team.