Convocation Address at the Tyndale University College and Seminary’s University College Graduation, May 25, 2019
Graduating class of 2019, parents, family and friends who have supported these students, Chancellor Dr. John Wilkinson, Board Chair Steve Holmes, Dr. Gary Nelson, Dr. Barry Smith, and faculty colleagues.
Congratulations graduates – one season ends! Your hard work, passion and dedication has been richly rewarded.
Convocations are rituals that initiate graduating students into adulthood and the responsibilities of life. There is a sincere desire among most graduates to not repeat the mistakes of their parents’ generation and to make the world a better place. This passion that is undergirded with a certain degree of refreshing naiveness will allow you the graduates to try new things and have breakthroughs where others have been stuck in traditional ways of doing things. Tyndale has provided you with a professional education and a biblical framework and values to make sense of this world and the issues it faces.
Harvard professor Steven Pinker writes in his book The Better Angels of Our Nature, that since 1945 and the end of WWII there has been a decline in inter-state wars, military coups, and deadly ethnic riots, and that the average number of deaths per conflict have been significantly reduced. Along with other statistics, Pinker contends that the world is becoming a better and less violent place. There is hard evidence that deadly diseases such as polio have been eradicated, global hunger and the percentage of people living in poverty have declined, and that child and maternal mortality rates have decreased. These are the results of stable governments, progress in human rights, new instruments of international humanitarian law, and the use of science and technology.
As we are confronted with 24-hour news cycles and social media, there are days we wonder if Pinker’s assertions are true – whether we do indeed live in a better world. The one thing that Pinker does not comment on is that today we live in a deeply polarized world. Something fundamental seems to have changed in the last few years. There is a resurgence of the nationalism, the racial discrimination, and the identity politics that had characterized the world up to World War II. A person’s different religion, ethnicity, race, and nationality are no longer celebrated for the diversity and the richness of culture that it brings, but is seen as a threat – a threat to one’s faith, one’s identity, one’s understanding of who we are as a country, and our prospects for a comfortable life.
We spent a number of years working in Europe, living in the Netherlands. As the refugees flooded into Europe, our Dutch friends told us of conversations in their offices and churches as to what does it mean to be Dutch – can one be a Muslim or a visible minority and truly be Dutch? The fears are deep and very real. I remember a number of years ago speaking to a group at a church in Calgary. After I had spoken of how God was moving in powerful ways in the Muslim world drawing people to Christ, one dear old lady during the question period said – “Rupen I just can’t relate to what you are saying. When I see a woman wearing a hijab walking down the street, I cross the street because I am scared that she will kill me.” I was stunned – wondering, where does this irrational fear come from?
Unfortunately, there is a lack of decency and grace among political leaders across the world today and we are confronted daily by bullying, sarcasm, insults, and lies. As we listen to them, they poison and corrupt our very own souls. We have forgotten how to speak with each other on issues we disagree on. We are only too ready to believe anything that fits into our preconceived notions of what is true without verifying the facts. While in Canada we have till now been spared the worst of these tendencies, our innate sense of decency and tolerance as Canadians is starting to fray at the edges.
As you step into this world of adults, is there another way of being, of relating to each other, of living life?
As we read the biblical narrative and listen to the teachings of Christ, we quickly realize that there is something beyond this life and the physical world as we experience it. The ancient Hebrews often referred to God’s Kingdom, and the Kingdom of God was central to the teachings of Jesus. There is another reality – the Kingdom of God – whose King, the living God we pledge our allegiance to. The Early Christians were often confronted with the choice of having to worship Caesar or worship the living God revealed in the Person of Jesus Christ. For them the choice was whether to live according to the perverse social and religious values of the Roman world or according to the values of the God whose Kingdom stretches from eternity to eternity and will outlast any kingdom, government, or sociopolitical system in this world.
Eugene Peterson, who died recently, was a writer I found deeply insightful. Peterson writes about how through our daily actions we reveal a hidden world – the Kingdom of God.[1] Every time Christians meet together for prayer and worship, every time they show compassion to the poor, every time they forgive someone, every time they include someone who is different rather than exclude them, by these very acts they are demonstrating and proclaiming that there is another reality, another world, another Kingdom by whose values we live by, another King whom we worship.
What we have come to realize is that the world today is definitely not the way God the Creator intended it to be. Jürgen Moltmann the German theologian refers to the pathos of God. This pathos is not what he calls “irrational human emotions”, but describes a God who is deeply affected by events, human actions and suffering in history.[2] The pathos of God is seen in the compassion of Christ when he healed the sick, fed the thousands, delivered the demonized, and proclaimed forgiveness for those caught in the entanglements of sin. This compassion of Christ was not merely sympathy and feeling bad but was a gut-wrenching response to human need and suffering. The Gospel writer John quotes Jesus as saying, “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full”.
This is what we are called to do – to be witnesses to the reality of this life that Christ offers, to be witnesses through what we do and what we say – in the way we behave and the way we relate to others. In a world that is deeply cynical and disillusioned because of the promises of politicians and other leaders, what people are looking for is a reality that gives them meaning. They do not want to hear more words. If there is a God, they want to experience Him. If we talk about our Christian faith, they don’t want to only hear what we believe, but rather want to know how does it make a difference in the midst of the challenges we face daily. As you step into this adult world, God is calling you to be countercultural and show that there is another way to live, to demonstrate through your actions and speech that the Kingdom of God is real.
Let me end with a story from the Russian novelist Fyodor Dostoyevsky. Dostoyevsky was an Orthodox Christian and would often weave biblical themes and the Gospel into his stories and novels. He tells the story of Prince Myshkin, a descendant of an old Russian noble family, who suffered from epilepsy and other supposed mental weaknesses. He had been away from Russia for a number of years undergoing medical treatment in Switzerland. As he returns home from his treatment in Switzerland, he is immersed into a society that is obsessed with power and greed. Human relationships are scarred by manipulation and abuse in every way possible. Maybe, because of his mental challenges, Myshkin is very trusting and in a sense very naïve. His goodness and his compassion for people he knows have no place in the midst of the ugliness of such a society. One writer describes Myshkin, “At every turn Myshkin’s inclination is to help rather than to harm, to give mercy rather than show malice, forgiving again and again, though surrounded by people who do not.”[3] Myshkin refuses to participate in the disparaging and destructive ugliness of the people around him but instead takes what is cruel and repulsive in them and dispels it. In the midst of such a perverse society, he demonstrates compassion for people. Such a life is countercultural and demonstrates an alternative to ugliness, manipulation, cruelty, and revenge. Dostoyevsky summarized the central moral of the story. He writes, “Compassion was the most important, perhaps the sole law of human existence.”[4]
The story of Myshkin is a parable for us to be the kind of people God wants us to be in this world. As you step into this world of adults, may your words and life be countercultural – that in the face of greed and selfish interest you would be compassionate, when misunderstood and taken advantage of you would learn to forgive, that your words would be life giving, and that you would welcome those who are different than you. To be able to live this way and have compassion is not humanly possible. It requires a transformed life that only followers of Christ can experience.
The poet in the Book of Psalm proclaims the promise of God for people who live such lives. He writes, “Even in darkness light dawns for the upright, for those who are gracious and compassionate and righteous.” (112:4). May this be your reality. God be with you.
[1] Eugene Peterson, Living the Resurrection: The Risen Christ in Everyday Life (Colorado Spring, CO: Nav Press, 2006).
[2] Jürgen Moltmann, The Crucified God (London: SCM Press Ltd., 1974), 270.
[3] Jill Carattini, “The True and Beautiful,” A Slice of Eternity, July 4, 2011, http://www.rzim.org/a-slice-of-infinity/the-true-and-the-beautiful/ , accessed August 4, 2011.
[4] Fyodor Dostoevsky, The Idiot, trans. Alan Myers (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998), 242.
Compassion and the Mission of God 