Your calendar is full with parties and ceremonies. Cap-and-gown pictures top your social media feed. When you walk the stage, a chapter will close. Ready or not, your graduation season is here.
Recently, I spoke to graduates at my church and told them about a paradox I’ve observed: having an idyllic high school or college experience can sometimes make it extra difficult to adjust to the next stage of life. No graduate wants to peak in high school or college, but it happens. Leaving your family and closest community to take on new responsibilities and challenges can be jarring.
During graduation season, it’s tempting to make an idol of past accomplishments and memories, to let them distract you from what’s most important. I call it glory-days syndrome. But the reality is that the glory days for those of us in Christ are ahead of us, not behind us. We want to “run with endurance the race that is set before us” (Heb. 12:1). So how do we avoid peaking in high school or college? How can a graduate navigate commencement season with biblical wisdom? Consider four ways.
1. Show honor.
Romans 12:10 says, “Outdo one another in showing honor.” I’ve noticed that honor during graduation usually flows one way: from caring adults to graduates. Ceremonies, parties, banquets, and gifts are all wonderful, but graduates must take this verse to heart. Respond in kind to all the honor you receive, and do so with the goal of competitively outdoing those who honor you.
Respond in kind to all the honor you receive, and do so with the goal of competitively outdoing those who honor you.
Set aside several hours to write personal thank-you notes or letters to the people who’ve poured into you. You might also buy a meal or coffee for individuals you want to honor. Thank them for how you’ve seen Christ in them. Remind them their labor in the Lord isn’t in vain (1 Cor. 15:58). Before you move out with anticipation and ambition, look back with gratitude for the parents, coaches, teachers, and pastors who’ve invested in you. Don’t assume they’re aware of how God used them in your life. Take the time to honor them.
2. Testify to Christ.
After graduation, friends scatter in every direction. People who’ve been together for years depart and rarely see each other again. How should a Christian treat these precious last days or weeks? In Acts 20, Paul departs Asia and says goodbye to the Ephesian elders. His farewell can be instructive for our farewells.
Paul takes great comfort in knowing he held nothing back: “I did not shrink from declaring to you the whole counsel of God” (v. 27). I’ll never forget when my high school friend Adam read out a handwritten letter during the last gathering of our friend group. Ten of my friends had gathered at a lake for one last night together before scattering across the country. Adam wanted to bear witness to the gospel before we went our separate ways. He was a recent convert to the faith, and many of those friends weren’t believers. His words that night were magnified by the farewell moment, and they bore lasting spiritual fruit in my life and the lives of many friends.
In the days before and after your graduation, pray for opportunities to “testify to the gospel of the grace of God” (v. 24). Don’t approach your witness with anxiety. It’s not up to you to make sure your unbelieving friends pray the sinner’s prayer before you all head to what’s next, but you are responsible to be a witness. When we courageously testify to the good news, God is faithful and will often “open . . . a door for the word, to declare the mystery of Christ” (Col. 4:3).
3. Number your days.
A preacher at my public school’s interfaith baccalaureate ceremony preached on James 4:14: “What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes.” He chose a great text for the event, because few occasions make us “number our days” like graduation does.
Our days on this side of eternity are short, and remembering this makes us wise. Transitions like high school and college graduation remind us that all worldly achievements are written in pencil. Our GPAs, sports records, and social status will be erased. May we remember it, Lord. “Teach us to number our days that we may get a heart of wisdom” (Ps. 90:12).
You may soon experience the hollow feeling of being forgotten. It could be when you return to your high school for the homecoming football game and sit in the bleachers while your old teammates play without you. Perhaps you’ll return to your college’s crowded student union, walk through the building, and discover that no one recognizes you. Maybe you’ll come home one summer and find your old high school bulldozed, well on its way to being turned into condos.
When you feel forgotten, it can be clarifying. It helps you to “look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise but as wise, making the best use of the time, because the days are evil” (Eph. 5:15–16). But when we’re forgotten on this earth, God still remembers. He writes the stories of his children in pen, not pencil. He never leaves or forgets us. He prepares a place for us, and he won’t let the smallest thing done in his name go unrewarded: “Whoever gives one of these little ones even a cup of cold water because he is a disciple, truly, I say to you, he will by no means lose his reward” (Matt. 10:42). Though our days are numbered, he makes them count.
4. Savor this season.
There’s a reason we mark graduation with pomp, circumstance, and parties. It’s an occasion to celebrate. Don’t forget to savor it. God gives good gifts to his children, and your time in high school or college was truly a gift. So savor these last days with the people who made this season of your life so special. In Psalm 16:3, David writes, “As for the saints in the land, they are the excellent ones, in whom is all my delight.” As you make this big transition, don’t be afraid to delight in the excellent ones.
After graduation, friends scatter in every direction. People who’ve been together for years depart and rarely see each other again. How should a Christian treat these precious last days or weeks?
Make dinner reservations. Plan a trip. Order pizza. Don’t be so focused on what you’re headed to next that you forget to rejoice and be glad. Thank God for the opportunity to learn and grow and for the grace to endure and accomplish. Hasn’t he been so kind to carry you through it? Embrace this season with joy in the Lord (Ps. 32:11).
Here’s what it looks like to navigate commencement season wisely. Here’s how you can close this chapter without regrets and start your next chapter with momentum. Show honor. Savor the moment. Count the days. And testify to Christ Jesus. Your glory days are not behind you. They are in front of you, with your Savior in glory.
The Gospel Coalition