Sheep in the Midst of Wolves -- May 30, 1999
Good morning. It is a great privilege for me to address
this congregation, for it is an especially religious group.
Your deep trust in God is evident in the way you drive
in the church parking lots.
When Hardy asked if I would participate in today’s
service, he said I could say whatever was on my mind.
Now, I know he meant no harm by this offer, but inviting
a college president to speak his mind is a dangerous proposition
indeed.
Consider the example of Nicholas Cop, a sixteenth-century
president of the University of Paris who used the occasion of his
inaugural address to reveal what was on his mind, and soon thereafter
found himself fleeing for his life through the streets of the city,
pursued by members of the theology faculty.
I promise not to say anything so incendiary, and
I also pledge to stay within my allotted 45 minutes.
College presidents, you see, are notoriously long
winded.
We tend to be one of two types, the historians
or the ministers—those with long memories and those with long messages.
I was trained as a historian but always yearned to
be a minister. Now’s my chance.
All of this is said by way of warning: when I
give a sermon it is a form of textual harassment. You may not be
any wiser after listening to me, but you will be a great deal older.
This is graduation weekend at Furman as well as at
First Baptist.
Last night I handed diplomas to 596 seniors, and this
morning we are honoring all of those in the congregation who are
graduating from high school and college this spring.
How many of you are graduating from high school? From
a college or university? And finally, a third category—how many
of you admit to being graduates of the Citadel?
You may take some solace in knowing that in the eyes
of the Lord everyone is capable of redemption!
I'll never forget my own high school graduation 30
years ago—in the air, you could feel the sense of accomplishment,
excitement, and the most chilling feeling of all—the absolute fear
that the commencement speech would never end.
But it finally did, and I later had the good fortune
to attend a college that set me free without casting me adrift.
Graduation, of course, is an event that provokes ambivalent
emotions.
On the one hand we are delighted to have gained a
diploma and eager to move on.
On the other hand, it is hard to say goodbye to close
friends, caring teachers and coaches, and loving parents.
An old rabbinical saying reminds us that we "come
into the world with clenched fists, but when we die our hands are
open."
The art of living is knowing when to hold fast and
when to let go.
In preparing to send you off to college or out into
the working world, your parents are wrestling with how best to let
go of you.
Their concerns are well expressed in the Gospel of
Matthew when Jesus says to His disciples, "Behold, I send you
out as sheep in the midst of wolves; so be wise as serpents and
innocent as doves." [Matthew 10:16]
Of course, this seems paradoxical: sheep living in
the midst of wolves?
The image reminds me of a story, and, as we all know,
a story is worth a dozen sermons.
During the 19th century, the Russian exhibition
at the World’s Fair centered on a display entitled "World Peace."
It featured a large cage in which a lamb and a wolf
coexisted peacefully together.
Such a striking exhibit attracted large crowds and
prompted one visitor to ask the Curator, "How in the world
do you do it?"
The Curator replied: "Oh, it’s really very simple:
each morning we replace the lamb."
Parents know all about sending their lambs out to
live among the wolves: we want our children to develop such a strong
foundation of values and virtues that they will be decent adults
in a savage world, that they will be spiritual people who do justice,
love kindness, and walk humbly with God—in the face of all the cruelties
and corruptions of life around them.
I cannot assure parents that your wishes for your
child will be met, but I can guarantee that your child will stay
in touch, sometimes in peculiar ways.
Last year, for instance, a Furman freshman wrote home
to his family, saying: "Dear Mom and Dad, I haven’t heard from
you in nearly a month. Please send a check so I’ll know that you’re
all right."
But enough about parents.
My remarks are intended for the Class of 1999.
Congratulations!
You are our future, our hope, our promise.
You are also the sheep who will be facing the wolfish
challenges that colleges and the so-called real world provide.
As I scan this attractive audience, I see a diverse
group of young graduates who are smart but not infallible, gifted
but far from perfect, uncannily perceptive in some ways but blank
as a rock in others. I will not name names.
Whatever your state of mind, in about three months
you high school graduates will start a chapter of life that has
no equal.
Your freshman experience in college will be one of
the most exciting, interesting, and challenging years of your life.
Upon your arrival on campus, you will be nervous and
excited and scared—all at the same time. That is to be expected.
You will quickly discover that college is not
simply a high school with higher standards.
It is an entirely new way of exercising your mind,
and, of course, an entirely new way of living and dealing with people.
The book of Proverbs speaks directly to the circumstances
you sheep-like graduates find yourselves in when it urges young
people to "leave simpleness, and live, and walk in the way
of insight" and wisdom. (Proverbs 9:1-6; RSV).
In other words, welcome to the real world of complexity
and ambiguity—as well as wolfish competition.
Graduating from high school or college and leaving
home means leaving simpleness behind.
In college and in the working world there will be
no parent to tell you when to go to bed or when to rise.
No parent to wash your clothes or cook your food or
provide cash on the spot.
No parent to remind you of your next test or the deadline
for your term paper. No parent to warn you as you leave the house
to think before you act and to be careful.
Simpleness is having your own bedroom at home. Complexity
is learning to live with roommates and hallmates—and sharing a bathroom
with strangers.
Likewise, those of you who have just graduated from
college are about to encounter new complexities.
Joining the so-called real world means the end of
sleeping in, and weekday naps. The end of spring breaks and long
vacations. The end of delicious dining hall meals.
No more watching General Hospital and Days
of Our Lives. Say goodbye to David Letterman and Late
Night with Conan O’Brian!
No more baseball caps hiding bad hair. You'll trade
your Nikes for wingtips, your backpacks for briefcases, and your
button flys for button downs.
But what you sacrifice in simpleness, you gain in
freedom.
Once in college or once living on your own you will
be freer than ever.
FREEDOM—we all love the word and the images it evokes.
"Let freedom ring!!!"
Freedom is perhaps the most sacred concept in the
western cultural tradition.
We live for it, love it, are prepared to kill others
to preserve it, and to die in defense of it.
In college you will find yourself free to express
the most outrageous opinions and engage in the most outrageous behavior.
Like the children of Israel wandering sheepishly in
the wilderness, full of their new found independence, you will discover
that the essence of freedom is choice.
What sort of choices will you make? What standards
will you use in making such decisions?
These are not simply questions appropriate to rising
college freshmen or to college graduates. These are life questions—relevant
to us all, regardless of age or circumstance.
I can assure you high school seniors that before you
graduate from college, you will discover several important truths
in the process of making choices:
First, parents sometimes do know what they are talking
about; second, intelligent people do not always behave in intelligent
ways; third, you can sometimes learn as much from your failures
as our successes; and fourth, it is not wise to use your Master
Card to pay off your VISA bill.
Some of what colleges ask and expect of you will
be beyond your capabilities.
Higher education is not painless. By its very nature,
it exposes students to new and sometimes discomforting ideas, beliefs,
attitudes, and personalities.
Learning to deal with such differences is the mark
of an educated person.
In stretching yourselves to work through the unknown
and unfamiliar, you will grow stronger and more self-reliant, and
your mind will become more attentive, more agile, and more aware
of its potential.
A healthy level of stress is thus an important
part of a college education.
At some point, many of you will have to deal with
homesickness, social problems, roommate problems, academic problems,
financial problems, and parent problems.
In confronting the temptations of college culture,
I hope you will be bold in what you stand for and careful in what
you fall for.
Maintaining your balance and proportion will depend
in part on the values you take with you to college.
In August, as you are packing up to leave home, make
sure that you take your faith along with you as well.
The text from Proverbs invites us to leave simpleness
and enter into wisdom.
Wisdom is not a word we use often. Wisdom is an intimidating
word, a word used by old people, not teenagers.
We often describe young people as being bright or
clever but rarely wise.
You are bright, talented, ambitious young people.
But do you really want to be wise? That is for old folks, isn’t
it?
But in fact college will give you opportunities to
find wisdom—even if by default.
There are many alternatives to exhaust before we arrive
at wisdom.
Some of you already have sampled a wide array of alternatives,
perhaps too wide. College will only broaden those alternatives.
As the great Jewish statesman Abba Eban once observed,
"History teaches us that people and nations behave wisely once
they have exhausted all other alternatives."
In the process of gaining a diploma, students receive
information that informs their ignorance and leads to knowledge.
Such knowledge may be sufficient to earn you a diploma
and gain you a job, but it may not be sufficient to make life worth
living.
It is at that point that wisdom intrudes upon our
simpleness, and we claim it for our own.
Yet for many of you, wisdom will remain an untried
alternative. Why is it so elusive? In part because its meaning is
so easily misunderstood.
Wisdom, I have decided, consists of knowing how much
we don’t know, and of discovering what we need to know.
The Bible says, "The fear of the Lord is the
beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of the Holy One is insight."
(Proverbs 9:10)
It is no accident that the knowledge of God is called
insight, for it is the knowledge of God that helps us walk and work
in the dark.
Insight, inner knowledge, leads to wisdom. It is the
means to guide us in that slippery transition zone between where
we are and where we need to be.
My great hope for you is that while at college you
will eventually learn what it is to be good and wise.
If you make your selections wisely and make the
most of your opportunities, if you realize early on that your self-esteem
does not depend upon how much you drink or what kind of car you
drive or whether you join a fraternity or sorority, if you realize
the benefits of not majoring in minor things and that you don’t
need to travel with a pack of wolves to feel wanted, then you will
develop a thirst for wisdom and a sense of perspective that will
place you within the select company of the truly educated.
Graduates, we rejoice at your future. We send you
forth with great pride and deep affection. May you thrive, prosper,
and grow.
"Leave simpleness, and live, and walk in the
way of insight." (Proverbs 9:6)
