By Kathryna Hoyman · Managing Editor
As the last days of college crawl my way, I recall the restlessness I felt during the last years of high school towards the land I was raised on and the small town that had grown a bit too familiar. I came to describe it as a good book that was too well-read.
I remember craving newness, unfamiliarity, freshness, not of my situation, but of my place.
In finally arriving at Grove City, the whole experience quivered with potential. This campus was the lane that stretched beyond the starting gate, my place in the world for three long years.
But to no one’s surprise, what was so new at this college didn’t stay new for long: Potential friendships became realized, experiences were had or not had and more quickly than I could have guessed, this place became my home.
Now, nearly every square foot of this campus has a memory attached to it. I’ve spent time in each building, run every sidewalk, read under many of the trees and had conversations on nearly every bench. My campus walks have steadily grown heavier with recollections that unwarrantedly abstract me from the present.
I have spent these three years waiting for the inevitable rekindling of the high school restlessness, but as I look out over an exciting, wonderful, anticipated next couple of years I couldn’t have even dreamt up, I feel trepidation at the thought of the expansive newness before me.
In going out from here, I’m realizing that I am a little scared of them both — the monotonous familiar and the isolating unknown.
But I am reminded, by the testimony of older believers more than anything, that Christ’s grace is not hindered by either. The greatest part of my college career has been the continual absorption of a truth I had already recognized – that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners. And this gospel means grace upon grace, over the new ground and the old.
Christ’s gospel means grace in familiar areas, where old habits and old sins feel as much a part of the place and experience as who I am now. These mistakes are not too long-lived, too habituated or too often brought to mind to be seen, forgiven and taken from us “as far as the east is from the west.” Even relationships that have sat in the dirty dishwater of the memories of sin for years are not beyond what the Lord approaches “with healing in his wings,” as a God whose heart is one of reconciliation.
And in the same way, his love and forgiveness and purity stretch even into new situations, where I am equally dazzled by fear and excitement. He goes before me into places that will become my home, where “even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me.”
I will never want for people to love, and I will never want for love from my Lord.
To quote a pastor I heard this week, with this truth of the gospel, we literally do know that everything, on a universal as well as an individual scale, will be okay — it will be brought to goodness and peace and submission to Love himself.
In words that have run through my head nearly incessantly this semester, Psalm 124 begins by saying, “If it had not been the Lord who was on our side…”
I cannot begin to explain all the times and all the places where the Lord saved me from myself during my college years. I came in unconditioned and burnt myself out in the first year, but echoing that same Psalm, “Praise be to the Lord,” who worked in weakness and whose grace gave me the years that I am able to wholeheartedly say were very, very good.
In going out, I take great joy in knowing that the best moments of my time here – belly laughing with friends on bathroom counters, long walks on Pinchalong, dances of every sort, invigorating and enlivening lectures – are a foreshadowing of the coming restored community that will gather in worship at the great supper of the Lamb.
To quote “Every Moment Holy” (the wonderful book of liturgy that certainly deserves a shoutout in terms of getting me through college):
“Run hard, finish well. Let’s gather at the Wedding Feast.”
Now for a cliche, but a beautiful one — there truly are too many people to thank. How do I thank the quite literally hundreds of people on this campus who made these years so rich?
But I can’t write my last Collegian article without a word of appreciation and deep love for the staff here, who made Tower nights a crazy, hazy, wonderful 12-hour-long dream.
And to our dear advisor Nick Hildebrand, who is ever quick to believe in the students and does so thoroughly, calling them up to great standards and great accomplishments.
And of course, to Emily, the queen of our paper, who worked day and night for The Collegian, and through that, loved the Lord and the student body wonderfully and sincerely, was the best boss and remains a truly brilliant, beautiful person. I wish you all the best in your pursuits, journalistic or otherwise.
And to the rest of this college – roommates, professors, executives, mentors, housekeepers, OB kids, campo officers, old friends and new ones – thank you for your love and life and faithfulness. I am, and will remain, overwhelmed with gratitude for this school’s exceptional community made up of truly exceptional people.
It really is with great hope that I finish this season, not in what I will do or be, but in who Christ will be, to me and those I love around me, a Rock higher than ourselves whose footsteps we are blessed to follow.
