One of the great things about my school is Chapel. Chapel is a required 50 minute "class" 2 days a week. The subject?
God.
Speakers come and speak, preachers come and preach, singers come and sing, and the whole thing is about glorifying the One who gave glory it's name. It is for sure one of the best parts of my week.
Today's speaker was Chris Seay, the pastor of a church called Ecclesia in Houston, and translator of the Voice version of the bible.
Chris read us this poem in one part of his talk that I have been thinking about it all day long.
It's called "Totally Like Whatever" by Taylor Mali
In case you hadn’t realised,
it has somehow become uncool
to sound like you know what you’re talking about?
Or believe strongly in what you’re, like, saying?
Invisible question marks and parenthetical you know’s and you know what I’m sayings
have been attaching themselves to the ends of our sentences?
Even when those sentences aren’t, like, questions?
Declarative sentences – so-called
because they used to, like, DECLARE things to be true, ok
as opposed to other things that are, like, totally, you know, not -
they’ve been infected by a this tragically cool
and totally hip interrogative tone?
As if I’m saying,
don’t think I’m a nerd just because I’ve, like, noticed this; ok
I have nothing personally invested in my own opinions,
I’m just, like, inviting you to join me on the band wagon of my own uncertainty
What has happened to our conviction?
Where are the limbs out on which we once walked?
Have they been, like, chopped down
with the rest of the rain forest? you know?
Or do we have, like, nothing to say?
Has society just become so filled with these conflicting feelings of ‘nugh’ . . .
That we’ve just gotten to the point where we’re the most aggressively inarticulate generation
to come along since . . .
you know, a long time ago!
So I implore you, I entreat you and I challenge you
To speak with conviction.
To say what you believe in a manner that bespeaks
the determination with which you believe it.
Because contrary to the wisdom of the bumper sticker,
it is not enough these days to simply QUESTION AUTHORITY.
You’ve got to speak with it, too.
First off, it is one of the most interesting poems that I have ever heard.
Secondly, it made me think about what I am doing here in college. The simple answer is: to receive a higher education to prepare me for an occupation.
But I want to go a little bit
deeper.
Did you know that
only 10% of the world's population gets to go to college?
I am one of 10% that has been given the incredible luxury of four years with which to
think, to
learn, to
challenge, to
dream, to
grow. I have been given four years set apart from the rest of the world to discover who I am and who I am
made to be.
My prayer is that at the end of these four years I speak with
conviction and the
determination to
change the world around me. I pray that at the end of four years I care less about looking cool and more about doing what is right. And I pray that at the end of these four years I am a better version of the girl who began.
