Legacy Arena in Birmingham is currently filled with about 13,000 people for the three-day Motion student conference that began Thursday.

Zoe Church Pastor Chad Veach of Los Angeles, who officiated the wedding of Kourtney Kardashian and Travis Barker last year and has had celebrities such as actor Chris Pratt attend his church, was the speaker on Friday morning.

“This is the coolest thing going on in America today,” Veach told the Motion audience. “This is the coolest thing going on in the whole country.”

Veach asked how many people were good at memorizing song lyrics and how many “Swifties” memorized all the lyrics to Taylor Swift songs. “What if you put the same energy into memorizing scripture as you do in memorizing songs?” he said.

Veach said as a teen he had his walls covered with Michael Jordan posters and was a fanatical basketball fan. “I don’t want us to be more passionate about a sport than we are about Jesus,” Veach said.

This year marked the 15th year of the Motion conference, which started as an event for students who attend the Church of the Highlands, Alabama’s largest church. It was the tenth year it has been held at the BJCC Arena, now Legacy Arena.

This year’s Motion conference seems larger and more intense than previous years, said Skye Ellis, 17, of Beulah High School near Opelika. “It’s more packed,” said Ellis. “You can see a lot more emotion.”

Mary Chappell Register, 17, of Vestavia Hills said she and her friends came to the conference for spiritual guidance in their lives.

“It’s fun to be here with everyone who loves Jesus just like us,” said Bentley Brewer, 18, who grew up in Mountain Brook and now attends St. Mary’s School in Raleigh, N.C.

Students from as far away as Montana, Nebraska and Indiana are in attendance at the Motion conference, which concludes Saturday at 4 p.m.

More than 230 churches from 31 states and six countries have sent more than 11,200 students and youth leaders to the event. That’s an 18 percent higher attendance than last year’s conference. The Church of the Highlands has staffed the event with more than 1,800 volunteers.

Of the 11,200 registered, 5,830 were students from the Church of the Highlands and its 24 branch campuses. Tickets for the event were $149 a person, but students who could not afford the tickets were awarded $200,000 worth of scholarships, church officials said. Middle school, high school and college students attended the event.

Inside Legacy Arena, Motion had the vibe of a rock concert, but with bands performing Christian music in between sermons by evangelists.

Three-time Grammy Award-nominated singer Cody Carnes, known for his No. 1 Christian radio hit “Ain’t Nobody,” performed on Saturday.

At one point students in the audience began chanting, “Cody! Cody! Cody!”

Carnes said, “Don’t shout out for me, shout out for Jesus.”

The chants changed to “Jesus! Jesus! Jesus!”

The Motion conference came two weeks after the Church of the Highlands held its annual Serve Day on July 15, during which more than 23,000 volunteers including many students from the 24 campuses engaged in community service projects in Alabama and Georgia. Each campus also has Serve outreach teams that engage in monthly service projects.

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