To the Graduates of 2022

The 2022 graduation happened at MacGregor Collegiate Institute this past Tuesday. Two students from our church walked the stage, and I was excited to be there at the ceremony, cheering them on.

And so, In what has become a bit of a tradition on this blog, I want to share some biblical wisdom for the graduates of 2022. You can also read what I said in 2020 and 2021, as without a doubt that holds true to this day as well. But for you the graduates of 2022, I have this to say.

Get out there. See the things the world has to offer. Walk among God’s good creation. Meet the people who live in it. Travel as you can, but much more important than that is learn to realize that there is more going on in your backyard than you may know.

The reason I suggest you do this is as follows. You will find as you go through life that many people look at the world in one of two ways; either as a marvel to behold or as something broken. Christians tend to look at the world in one of these two ways as well, as both have some amount of biblical backing. If you look at passages like Genesis 3, you find a picture of creation that is shot through with sin. Men and women are against each other. Children and parents are constantly at odds with one another. Creation itself is pushing against humanity, and everything is distant from God. In this passage and others like it, the picture you find is one of a world in pieces. The picture you get is one of things not as they should be. But at the same time, if you only look two chapters earlier you find what seems like a wholly different world. One in which all things are shown to be lovingly crafted and sustained. One in which all things are said to be made good. You get a picture of a world that it intuitively makes sense that God would say he loves.

Graduates, all too often in this life you are going to come across people, Christians included, who believe the world is wholly one way or the other, and both of these views if taken to their extreme, are problematic. To believe everything is fundamentally broken is to find yourself increasingly hesitant to be a part of it. To believe everything is broken is to not see the point in fixing anything. On the other side, to see all things as hunky-dory as they are is to turn a blind eye to the things in life that do need to be addressed. That do need someone like you to help set them to right.

There is a reason you will find both of these ways of looking at creation in scripture. Far from being wholly opposed to one another, understand them to instead be both at the same time true. The world is made good and is loved by the one who made it. But it is also broken, incomplete and imperfect. There is injustice, there is polution and environmental damage that gets worse by the day. There is inequality and inequity. There is tribalism and hunger, and the righteous anger of those who all things serve to oppress and step upon. There is all of this pain and all of this brokenness. But despite all of that, there is also such beauty out there as to make you cry. There are also people out there who if you only listen to them, if you only let them know that while you are talking to them they are the only person in the world that matters, they will tell you life stories that will leave a different and better person from the sheer experience of it.

Though creation is fallen from what it once was, the fundamental good of what God has made is still there as well. All the sin in all the universe is nowhere near enough to take what our Lord made and said was good and wholly strip it of that.

So graduates of 2022, once again here is my wisdom for you. Get out there. See the things the world has to offer. Walk among God’s good creation. Meet the people who live in it. Travel as you can, but much more important than that, learn to realize that there is more going on in your backyard than you may know. And once you have done this, once you have built up an understanding for why God still loves this creation that he has made and the people in it, then look to address with God’s helping hand the brokenness around you. Because once you understand that there is still beauty there, that there is still the good creation God has made there, then you will know that there is something worth working alongside our Lord and others who are interested like you to set right.

Congratulation to the class of 2022. I look forward with all that I am to seeing where you will go.