The Time I Gave a Commencement Address

Four years later, I'm dusting it off to remind myself of a few things.

Four years ago, I gave the commencement address at the Sioux Falls Christian class of 2020 high school graduation. I recently happened upon the speech in a stack of papers on my desk and, after reading it over, thought I’d share it here.

Many of the seniors I addressed in 2020 are now graduating from college this month. As it happens, I myself am preparing to graduate with an M.F.A. in Creative Writing from Seattle Pacific University in a couple months. The timing felt right.

Given it was 2020, I wrote this after our first semester of “online learning.” But I didn’t want COVID to steal the moment, so I only mention it toward the end. The rest, I hope, holds up.

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I. Just Getting Started

After the dance at our wedding reception, my wife and I made our way around the hall to say thank yous and goodbyes to the many guests who had spent the day celebrating our new marriage. The evening was fading, the lights were low, the cake was eaten, and we were exhausted. Somehow it had been the longest and the shortest day of my life. When we finally reached my parents, I remember saying to my Dad through a deep breath: “And just like that… it’s all over.”

“Over?” he replied, laughing, “It’s just getting started!”

Five years later, I think I now understand what he meant. While I was focused on surviving that day, he was imagining the years to come. I thought we were celebrating a wedding; my dad was celebrating a marriage.

Graduating from high school is another one of those special turning points in life. Seniors, today we celebrate your accomplishments and growth over the last four years. We remember how far you’ve come by the grace of God. It is a day for reflection and thanksgiving and praise. Today we look back—but we also look forward. Because if this moment marks an ending of sorts, it is equally a new beginning, the beginning of the rest of your life. And that’s the biggest question of all, isn’t it? What will you do with the rest of your life?

II. Four Great Empty Boxes of Nothing

I recently read a book by the journalist David Brooks (no relation) in which he explains why today's graduates struggle with this question. He notes that part of the problem is the pathetic advice you’re often given by graduation speakers who try to answer it for you. Brooks imagines speakers offering graduates what he calls “four great empty boxes of nothing.” These boxes are called Freedom, Possibility, Authenticity, and Autonomy.

• Freedom: “Enjoy your new liberated life!”

• Possibility: “Your future is limitless!”

• Authenticity: “Follow your passion!”

• Autonomy: “Find your truth!”

Well, after months of social distancing and online learning, some of you are probably thinking that a little freedom doesn’t sound so bad! The problem, as David Brooks sees it, is that these four words have lost their meaning in our society, which is continually unhinging itself from God’s Word and God’s world. They are empty boxes, promising what they can never deliver.

What do graduates really need? Wisdom and direction. And for those you’ll need more than a graduation speaker; you need the Word of God. So, Seniors, today I offer you two bits of wisdom and direction from Scripture, two gifts for the journey ahead.

III. A Box of Dust

First, a box of dust. As you are by now well-aware, the opening pages of Genesis make two interesting claims about the origins of humanity: First, that God created us in his image, and second, that God formed us from the dust of the ground. We seem to prefer to think of ourselves as image-bearers, perhaps because it’s more flattering. But what does it mean that we were made from dirt? At bottom, it means that humans are not God. God is Creator; we are creatures. God is infinite, we need 8 hours of sleep every night. God is perfectly wise; we text and drive. God has always existed in an eternal dance of Triune love; you and me? We’re just earthlings.

What does all this mean? Humans have limitations. You have limitations. While society encourages young graduates to pursue unlimited freedom, possibility, authenticity, and autonomy, Scripture reminds us of our smallness and mortality before God. We are all limited by our minds, our bodies, our personalities, our education and various giftings, our families of origin, our socioeconomic background, and so on.

If you attend Bethel, you cannot also attend Dordt. If you become a marine biologist, you cannot simultaneously be a lawyer. They say students must choose two of three options during college: good grades, a social life, or sleep. If you manage all three, you must be skipping meals or something. If you choose to marry that one cute guy on the soccer team, you must say “no” to all the other cute guys on campus—and every other cute guy on the face of the earth!

Every “yes” is a million “no’s.” You cannot do it all. You cannot be it all. You cannot see, have, or know it all. But that’s okay. You’re just dust, remember?

As it turns out, the box of dust is you—your life and all its limits. None of this should terrify you, however, since you’re not God. Your job is to learn to live faithfully within the scope of your finite God-given life. Much like the last four years, the years ahead will stress and stretch each of you in new ways. I hope that you will grow by facing your fears and taking on new responsibilities, by pushing yourself. But there is wisdom in acknowledging and even embracing your limitations as clues to God’s calling on your life.

Unfortunately, we have all failed that job miserably, which gets to my second point and your second box—the gift of grace.

IV. The Gift of Grace

Multiple times this school year I had the privilege of listening to my friend and colleague Mr. Ephron Poyer share his testimony. Each time, he began with a rather audacious confession: “There was a time in my life when I wanted to be my own god.” That line has stuck with me, I think because it describes human sin in the sharpest terms.

It was not enough that Adam and Eve were created like God; they wanted to be Him, to live life on their own terms. It’s insane isn’t it? Creatures rejecting their Creator. And yet it’s the same insanity, the same sin, we're all guilty of. Just like freedom without God leads to misery, life without God is not life at all; it’s death. And that’s one limitation no human can face alone.

But the good news of Christianity—the good news of the Gospel—is that God has not left us in our sin, but has given us grace and the hope of new life through Jesus Christ. For your theme verse this year, you chose Ephesians 2:10: “For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.” To put it in context, I’ll read it with the preceding verses:

But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.  For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God,  not a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.

What is the gift of grace? Life with Jesus Christ. New life! True life! Life that never ends because Jesus has overcome the grave through his death and resurrection. Verse 10 says that we are God’s “workmanship.” You were created from the dust, yes, but in Jesus Christ God re-creates you into something new.

1 Corinthians 15:49 puts it like this: “Just as we have borne the image of the man of dust, we shall also bear the image of the man of heaven.” Jesus is the man of heaven, and because you are God’s workmanship you will be conformed to the image of Jesus, as well.

Lest we start to congratulate ourselves, Paul is quick to remind us that none of this is our doing; we were dead in our sins. Salvation is not based on our good works, much less our good GPA or good looks or good mood. Salvation is a gift. And gifts, by definition, are undeserved. So we receive this new life by simple faith in Christ.

Dust. Grace.

But notice the last bit of verse 10 (and I’ll end with this). Paul says: “For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.” In other words, we are not saved by good words; we are saved for good works—for loving God and our neighbor in all we do. And even these good works are a gift from God, sovereignly penned into the poem of your life.

When COVID-19 began to spread fear across the globe this spring, people began frantically searching for comfort in the form of guarantees—I’m talking about the guarantees of knowing you have enough canned goods, hand sanitizer, and toilet paper to survive a pandemic. But these are silly distractions from the deeper reality we’ve all had to face: that no human runs this show, that God is history’s ultimate author. My point is this, Dear Graduates: God does not promise you an easy life, or a 6-digit salary, or even, tragically, a senior prom—but he has promised you something infinitely better: new life with Jesus Christ, and good works to walk in.

While preparing for this address, I discovered that our English words “degree” and “graduate” derive from the Latin word gradus, which can be translated as “step” or even “walk.” In a moment each of you will “walk” across the stage and graduate from Sioux Falls Christian High School. No doubt, many of you feel the sadness of something special coming to an end. “And just like that… it’s all over.” Just remember the words of my Father: “Over? It’s just getting started.”

And what about our initial question? What will you do with the rest of your new life? Just remember the wisdom of Paul: Keep walking.