Graduation Season (Joe Widick)

Today, Joe ponders graduation. (I'll be back in seventeen days!)

While traveling on vacation, I listen to different CDs while Elaine reads. On our recent vacation I was listening to the Best Hits of the Staler Brothers. One of those hits was a song entitled “The class of 57.” The song goes through and tells what the members of the class did and were currently doing with their lives. The chorus goes like this; “And the class of ’57 had its dreams, Oh, we all thought we’d change the world with our great works and deeds. Or maybe we just thought the world would change to fit our needs, the class of 57 had its dreams.” Do you remember graduation? Do you reflect on what you have or have not accomplished since that time? Do you ever think what it would be like to go back in time to that moment, knowing what you now know?

Last Sunday night I looked at the senior video that Nick had put together. I saw pictures of little babies that are no longer little babies. I saw mothers and dad’s holding their children or playing with them. I think you could almost see in the eyes of the parents the dreams they have for their children. In a few short weeks all of the graduation ceremonies will have come and gone. Graduation speeches will be given and probably forgotten, diplomas will be handed out and a new phase of life begins. Mothers and Daddy’s make adjustments on the home front and the graduates begin to dream dreams of what the world is going to be like as they gain more and more freedom. Of all the hopes and dreams that one has, there is none as important as that of the hope of an eternal home with God. The apostle Paul told Titus; “…while we wait for the blessed hope—the glorious appearing of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ.” (Titus 2:13). Of all the dreams we have this is the one that we need to constantly keep before us. It is the one that we long for each and every day. I guess an important question to ask is, how do I make this dream a reality, how do I make this hope become actuality? Maybe a good place to look is a couple of verses before Paul talks of this hope. Listen to the help that we can receive “For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men. It teaches us to say No to ungodliness and worldly passions and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age…” (Titus 2:11-12). It seems to me that God wants to help you and I make our dreams, hopes aspiration of a home in heaven, a reality. I imagine that the class of 09 has its dreams. May the most important part of that dream be that of heaven.

Prayer Thought: Be with each one that graduates this year to be able to accomplish those things that are good and right.