It hasn’t fully sunk in yet that, in less than two weeks, I’ll have graduated from Ball State. Peaks and valleys have abounded and several of you are not yet ready to leave the land of Beneficence, several of you already have—and several of you may have never stepped foot on its terrain to begin with. So with all that being said, as I pack my belongings and get ready for the “real world,” here’s a list of forty-seven things I’ve learned from my college experience.
1. I have a predilection for words in my thesaurus (such as “predilection”) and for prime numbers (such as 47).
2. We should love each other as, to quote a friend of mine, “all-weather friends.” Whether sunshine or snowstorm, we should weather life together.
3. Oswald Chambers: “The remarkable thing about fearing God is that when you fear God, you fear nothing else, whereas if you do not fear God, you fear everything else.” (Reading the challenging My Utmost for His Highest is highly recommended).
4. Even doing math problems (will you cosine my loan?—sorry, I went off on a tangent) can be worshipful. 1 Corinthians 10:31: “So whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.”
5. Capturing the flag can be painful, courtesy of that infamous metal fence, but it can be a great opportunity for fellowship.
6. Your head should be hard and your heart should be soft—not the other way around.
7. Another friend cameo: “If you think something is going in the wrong direction, pushing that in the completely opposite direction doesn’t necessarily make it right.”
8. Failing a test is not the end of the world—just the end of our false world that we can never make mistakes.
9. 1 Corinthians 13:1: “Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal.” Love is the foundation on which every house must be built.
10. The Christian road can be a hard road—but it’s the only road that leads to life.
11. Cite your sources! Give credit where credit is due (#10 was yet another friend cameo as well!).
12. We can’t always offer proof that God exists—but we can offer proof at how He’s worked in our lives and transformed us forever. And “God is not a secret to be kept” (from Matthew 5:14, MSG).
13. When in doubt, guess C, a European capital, or a fraction greater than 1/4 but less than 5/7 whose numerator and denominator are relatively prime and sum to a perfect square.
14. Jesus doesn’t just want to nail my sin to the cross but my guilt as well. I don’t think I’ve ever known anything quite as beautiful as raw, unwavering forgiveness. (Apropos song recommendation: Don Henley’s “The Heart of the Matter”).
15. Proverbs 19:17: “Mercy to the needy is a loan to God—and God pays back those loans in full.”
16. An all-nighter is officially an all-nighter if a) you can see the sliver of sunlight break upon the horizon, b) your alarm goes off but you haven’t gone to bed yet, c) you decide to feed your goldfish before realizing you don’t have any goldfish, or d) you’re eating a breakfast burrito for dessert.
17. Probabilities can be conditional. Love shouldn’t be.
18. Hebrews 13:2: “Be not forgetful to entertain strangers: for thereby some have entertained angels unawares” (a book of the Bible near and dear to my heart—check it out!).
19. Jesus fights for us when we’re too exhausted to do so.
20. If you gorge on every worldly feast imaginable, you will starve.
21. Home doesn’t have four walls, just the heart of a cherished person.
22. I’ll admit I don’t always know who’s a sheep and who’s a wolf. I don’t have all the answers. I don’t always understand what the future’s going to bring. And that’s OK. I’m not God.
23. T.S. Eliot’s “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” just keeps getting better with age.
24. Often I feel I am the most tired when I trying to overact my faith. It’s the inanity of “-ianity,” Christianity without Christ. I am meant to worship God, not the other way around.
25. Sometimes, tuna salad, a bowl of grapes, and a diet Snapple can be gourmet cuisine. Whether the meal is an audacious T-bone steak or a humble ham salad sandwich, God still blesses the food and makes it holy.
26. Psalm 4:8: “In peace, I will lay down and sleep, for You alone, O Lord, will keep me safe.” You might still be exposed to tremors—but you will also be simultaneously exposed to God.
27. The present-value of an annuity of 1 for n years at i% can be calculated by dividing the quantity of 1 minus the vn factor by interest rate i, where v is the discount rate, equal to the reciprocal of 1 + i.
28. The devil may encourage you—but it’s out of hate. God may rebuke you—but it’s out of love.
29. John 11:35: “Jesus wept.” This can be the shortest verse—because the tears already speak thousands of words.
30. Even if you get lost in the library the first time you go there, it doesn’t mean you have to wait another six months before venturing inside its doors again (I speak from experience there).
31. We need food, faith, fellowship, and fun—and need to be ready to relax with your Creator. As a friend I know says: If you’re too busy to spend time with God, then you’re too busy.
32. The greatest telescopes not only locate the faintest stars but do their best to help them shine a little more brightly.
33. Psalm 63:1: “O God, You are my God; earnestly, I seek You. My soul thirsts for You—my body longs for You—in a dry and weary land where this is no water.” Sometimes God will let us thirst so He can show us He can give us the rivers we need.
34. Alliteration adds absolutely amazing allure to almost any account or anecdote.
35. Another good friend’s teacher: “Every person you meet has something to teach you and you have something to teach everyone you meet.” (Turns out you can learn stuff from other people’s classes as well!).
36. God doesn’t criticize you for facing the storm; He gladly provides you with shelter.
37. Using the word “inexplicability” in any context probably raises your IQ by at least ten points.
38. Galatians 6:2 (it’s one of my all-time favorite verses, I know): “Share each other’s troubles and problems and in this way obey the law of Christ.” If we can’t open up, then we close down.
39. Evelyn Underhill: “If God were small enough to be understood, then He wouldn’t be big enough to be worshiped.”
40. The hardest scavenger hunts are those that require us to search inside ourselves.
41. Matthew 6:27: “Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit unto his stature?” The only thing worrying adds to your life is, unsurprisingly, your worries.
42. The world doesn’t need to know that I’m a Christian. The world needs to know Christ.
43. If Cinderella ever loses her glass slippers, I’m sure a pair of sneakers will fit just fine.
44. We disobey the Lord when we sin—but in a similar way, we do the same thing when we resist His the grace that He so desperately longs to give us.
45. If you’re looking to have an intimate retreat with just you and God, all you need is just you and God.
46. I’ve waded through a lot of swamplands since August 2006—we all probably have. And here’s the test to see if some situation will permanently separate you from God. 1. Do you think this situation will permanently separate you from God? 2. Disregard question 1 altogether because the answer is an emphatic “Absolutely not!” (Romans 8:38-39!).
47. God is good. Sometimes, it is that simple.
48. So we should keep your eyes open for signs of God’s wonderful grace, because it overflows just like this list. Indeed, we’ll always learn more than we might first think.
So I’ve learned a lot, true—but I’ve still got a lot left to learn. That’s how it always goes. In fact, quite possibly the most outrageous lie I can possibly tell is that I have it all figured out. I don’t. And may God be praised for that. The journey for myself—and for all of you—continues. It might be uncertain, yes. But what is certain is that God will be with you, no matter what you do or where you go. You are His. He wouldn’t have it any other way.
–Mike
