‘Faith Beyond’: It can be our challenge for today and tomorrow
By Dean Collins
All across the country a new school year began in the last few weeks. Children, teens, and college students are sitting in classrooms, listening to lectures, accessing digital libraries, and trying to master content in order to make a passing grade and prepare for their futures.
Teachers and professors are intent on teaching what learners need to know in order to prepare them for the next academic year, for life, and hopefully for meaningful careers. As I write this devotional, it is the day before classes begin at Point University. As a Christ-centered university, we choose a spiritual formation theme each school year to help introduce Jesus to students who have yet to experience him or to deepen faith in students who are already followers of Christ. This year’s theme is “Faith Beyond.”
It makes me think of Buzz Lightyear.
Having raised four children in the ‘80s, ‘90s, and the early 2000s, I saw and overheard the Toy Story movies many times. Now, with eight grandchildren, I still occasionally see some of the characters from this series. When I saw the logo and read the words Faith Beyond, I couldn’t help but think of Buzz Lightyear and his epic determination to go to infinity and beyond!
The theme reminds me that we all have a past, we all live in a present, and we all are either preparing for, hoping for, or sometimes dreading what is beyond the moment we live in.
Past and Present
It is sometimes painful to look back in history and read about the many tragic mistakes made by those who came before us. Our world bears the scars of war, slavery, hatred, and selfishness caused by the sins of man. There is value in looking back to learn from our mistakes. But we can’t fix the past.
What about the present? Sometimes we struggle to live in the present because of the pain, the misfortune, and the guilt of our mistakes. But if we stay stuck, then we miss the opportunity given to us today.
A few days ago I watched the movie Lightyear that tells the backstory of Buzz Lightyear. Andy, the boy in Toy Story, watched a movie about Buzz Lightyear that created his love of the toy he possessed by the same name.
In the movie, we discover that Buzz is obsessed with going back to fix a mistake he made that caused members of the space academy to be stuck on earth. Try as he might, he could not fix the past mistakes. Ultimately he had to choose to learn from his past and live in community in the present. This was the only way he could find joy
Present and Future
As I consider “Faith Beyond,” I can’t help but think about those who came before us and laid the foundation for our faith, those who helped form our current moment, and the influencers around us who continue to shape our future. Of course, the writer of Hebrews reminds us that “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.” Jesus was with God at creation and came in the flesh to live with us and die a sinless death so we could be redeemed, forgiven, and restored. And Jesus will be with us in the beyond that we cannot yet see. Paul tells us in 2 Corinthians that we live by faith and not by sight. Faith beyond.
Dean challenged students with the new theme at Point’s 2023 convocation.
What grabbed me as I prepared my message for chapel was to remember that while Point University is only 86 years old, it was 116 years ago that people of faith in Georgia and Alabama began praying for and imagining a Christian university in West Point, Georgia. In the end the college started in North Georgia and closed two times before opening for the final time in 1937 on a farm owned by a Fulton County Judge named T.O. Hathcock. His faith and prayers, along with those of many others, brought about something far beyond what they imagined and actually did. And it took a community of people who prayed, who gave, who planned, and who worked to bring about this moment.
Remember and consider
Maybe today is a good day for you to remember the people who came before you: grandparents, parents, teachers, and pastors, whose faith made them think about what God might do in the future, a future that brought you to faith and shaped you as the person you are today. What about the people who came before and planted the company, the church, maybe even the city where you live? In every situation, God uses community to create community and to transform lives.
I challenged students to consider what prayer, what action, and what dream God might give them today to shape and build the community of tomorrow.
God calls us all to a faith beyond what we can possibly imagine. Thank him for coming before us in creation and redeeming us through the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus. Thank him for being with you today as you face the opportunities and the challenges of life in a world still broken and scarred by sin. And thank him that he will come again and bring the full restoration of all things with a new Heaven and a new earth where we will live with him forever!
Lord, thank you for those who came before us and accepted your call to discipleship. Thank you for the saints of old and the not-too-old saints we know who laid the foundation for our lives. Use us today to imagine how we might exercise our faith to bless a generation yet unborn. In Jesus’ name, amen.
Your time with God’s Word
Hebrews 13:7-8 ESV
