I greet you all this morning in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. This is a glorious day and I just want you to pause with me for a moment and take a look round at what is taking place here. Look at these graduates and representing so many nations, so many states, so many places, so many families, so many hopes; the realization of so many of those hopes on this day and the launching of even greater and further hopes on this day; the faculty and administration and trustees of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary and behind us, so many Christians in the Southern Baptist Convention and in the larger Christian world. They know what is taking place here and celebrate what is taking place here. I welcome family and friends and all those gathered on this occasion.

This is the day, as we said, that the Lord is made and we are going to rejoice and be glad in it and I want you to note something: you don’t get to hear this in an indoor commencement. I want you to hear the birds and the creatures around us and recognize that they too, in their own way, are rejoicing in the day that the Lord has made. They have no understanding of what is going on here and are probably perplexed. I don’t think we’re interrupting them all that much, but we do know what is taking place here. We do know the significance of this. We can’t look at these graduates without seeing promise. We also can’t commemorate this day without thinking God for accomplishment.

We need our thoughts to be guided by Scripture. I would direct our thoughts this morning to the end of Romans chapter 11 and the beginnings of chapter 12. Just a few verses. Beginning in Romans chapter 11, verse 33: “Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways! ‘For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been his counselor?’ ‘Or who has given a gift to him that he might be repaid?’ For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen. I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.”

My mind is drawn to this passage when I think of this day, when I look at these graduates, when I consider this assembly. My thoughts are drawn to this passage, this hinge passage in Paul’s letter to the Romans. It begins with a testimony to why we are here in the first place. How is it that such a school as Boyce College would exist? What is the warrant? What is the charter? What’s the constitution? What’s the charge? What’s the stewardship? Well, it all begins in the conveyance of truth from one generation to another. This is the perpetual mission of the Christian Church until Jesus comes, we are to pass on the faith once for all delivered, but it’s not just a matter of some kind of neutralized, autotomized transmission of the truth. It is through the consecrated process of Christian teaching and we find this already in Scripture.

Paul here is teaching the Romans. In his apostolic ministry to the Romans, he is defining the Christian faith and thus not only for the church at Rome but for the church until Jesus comes. And these truths are eternal and unshaken. Paul comes to this transition in the book of Romans. He’s going to turn to more practical affairs. The background of the first 10 chapters going into the 11th chapter have to do with the weightiest matters of the gospel of Jesus Christ and in chapter one, Paul declares, “I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God unto salvation for all who believe to the Jew first and also to the Gentile.” He’s not ashamed of this gospel. He’s been defining this gospel. He’s been offering expositions of this gospel, detailed teachings of this gospel. But at the end of all of this, as he’s transitioning to more practical matters of concern to the church, he offers what is here a doxology, a statement of praise to God.

It is so apt for our consideration this morning, “Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways!” There’s absolutely no purpose for this college, but for the fact that truth is real, that truth is objective, that truth is substantial, that truth is eternal. That truth can be transmitted from one heart to another, from one mind to another, but the source of all truth is not this faculty. The source of all truth is no human authority at all. Riches and wisdom, the knowledge of God are his alone. It is by his grace and mercy that he shares his riches of wisdom with us. He loves us. His grace towards us is shown not only in the fact that when we were yet sinners, Christ died for us, but that from the very beginning God loves us to reveal himself to us. He speaks to us in His word and in His word are revealed true wisdom, true riches, the true knowledge of God. His judgments are unsearchable. And an acknowledgement from the apostle Paul. His ways are inscrutable.

It’s not a word we use every day. When you see a word like inscrutable, it implies scrutable. Let me just put it this way. It is not our business to figure God’s ways out. We have no independent standpoint from which we judge the ways of God. He is not obligated to reveal all things to us. He rather gives us, which by his grace he would have us to know. His ways are inscrutable. And then questions, rhetorical questions from the Old Testament that Paul recites here for “Who has known the mind of the Lord?” Obvious answer to that question. “Or who has been his counselor or who has first given a gift to him that it might be repaid?” Our position is made very clear. We are the recipient by God’s grace of all that he gives to us and of all that he reveals to us, including the wisdom that he has imparted to us. We have nothing to give to him. He owes us nothing. He does this out of his grace and mercy.

“Who has been his advisor?” Around every earthly court, around every White House, around every premier’s or prime minister’s office, there is a retinue of advisors and their job is to advise. There is no such body of advisors around the throne of God. No one has ever given something to him in order that he is indebted to them and then in the hinge verse here, we have one of the most classic, one of the most crystallized and clear statements of the comprehensiveness of the Christian worldview. What is it that we teach on? What authority have we taught? What kind of education has been conveyed at Boyce College? What is the authority for any of these things? Look at verse 36: “For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen.”

We’ve been about the business of teaching Christian truth. We’ve been about the business of considering all things on the basis of the authority of Scripture. We’ve been seeking to weigh all and, in the classroom, and in the totality of the student experience at Boyce College, we have sought to bring all things captive to Christ. But behind all of this is the reality that all that should be known, all that is true, all that is revealed to us comes from him and it is through him. We didn’t search him out. He revealed himself to us. It is not our initiative that leads to learning. It is his initiative that leads to learning and at the end of all things, the conclusion, the promise of all things, the fulfillment of all things is of Him, from him and through him and to him are all things. Not most things. Not some things. The world wants to at least at its greatest moment of concession, perhaps admit, “Well, there are secular things and there are holy things.” But what does the Scripture say? We are told that there is no distinction. “From him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen.”

Four years of study and a baccalaureate degree. We didn’t invent that. It’s been around since the emergence of the medieval university and that university emerged out of the church and that university was based upon the unity of the universals—the good, the beautiful, the true, the real. And the university in its beginning was established upon the fact that there is one from whom all these things come. The Giver of all that is true. The Giver of all that is beautiful. The Giver of all that is good. The modern university has lost the “uni” part of the university. What is left is a glory of secular learning devoid from any kind of unifying vision. Our task in this college has been to present a unified vision, a comprehensive vision based upon not only the reality of the one true and living God, not only in the worship of the one true God—Father, Son, and Holy Ghost—but also in the promise of the gospel and in the unity of all things in the comprehensive revelation of God.

The audacity of this educational mission is that the graduates of this institution would know the will of God, would know the truth of God. Now, of course, we as human beings can know only in part. But we can know in part. Four years is a big part. The whole point of Boyce College is that there will be a faithful transmission of this part. It’s an urgent part. It’s a very timely part, the period of life generally in which you have young people in college. It is in itself a turning point—childhood behind, adulthood ahead. I think it’s fair to say that in the experience of almost every graduate, and there are parents and loved ones here to witness to this, there are faculty to witness to this, there are peers to witness to this. There’s been an enormous amount of growth just over the course of the last four years. The graduates of this college are the same as when they came and not it’s an awful lot of work. If they’re absolutely in every way the same as when they came, it’s been a waste of time. They’re not the same as when they came. By God’s grace we pray, they have been well armed for the calling ahead, the battles ahead, the challenges ahead, the joys ahead. Even the sorrows ahead.

This transition in the passage “From him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever.” It leads to the first two verses of chapter 12. Paul writes to the Romans saying, “I appeal to you therefore brothers, by the mercies of God to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship.” Alright? We watch our language carefully. Here we are here this day to celebrate lives sacrificed to the glory of God. That’s not my language. I don’t think, if it were just left to me, I would even think of that language.

Brothers and sisters, and I speak particularly to the graduates, is that not shocking language? Believers in the Lord Jesus Christ, Paul appeals to us by the mercies of God to present our bodies as a living sacrifice wholly and acceptable to God, which is our spiritual worship. The great promise of this class, the great promise of every one of these graduates, and we look out at you and we’re not ready to say goodbye. That is nonetheless in one sense what is happening here. We want you to think of this campus always as a home for you. We hope that when you remember your years on this campus, you not only remember them with thankfulness but commend the same to others. We look forward to seeing you come back. We look forward to seeing what the Lord does in your life. We look forward to hearing how the Lord is using you in mission and work and ministry and to the glory of God and the church. We look forward to seeing future classes of Boyce College brought in your arms and pushed in your strollers. We look forward to hearing how the glory of God is being manifested in your lives and in your work, in your marriages, in your homes, and your calling in your careers.

This morning I’m not urging you to sacrifice all that and yet I guess I am. And this text is addressed to every one of us at every point in our life, to every Christian. We are to live lives as a living sacrifice. Our discipleship is as a living sacrifice unto God and thus everything that we have, everything that we are given, everything entrusted to us is a temporary stewardship to be exercised by a living sacrifice, dead to self and alive to God. That’s all. If we weren’t a Christian assembly, this text would seem absolutely bizarre. But we are a Christian assembly and that is how we are gathered here.

Finally in this passage, even as we are told that these living sacrifices must be holy and acceptable to God, we have the exhortation Paul gives to the church: “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.” My charge to you is the graduates of Boyce College of 2025 is that you be not conformed to this world, but show the world what it means to be transformed by the wisdom of Christ.

Paul straightforwardly speaks here of being transformed by the renewing of your mind. We certainly hope and pray that your years spent in study at Boyce College has prepared you for an even greater transformation of your mind to the glory of God as a living sacrifice. We hope and pray that all that has been invested in you and all the toil you have put into this degree—this is a moment of real accomplishment. You should feel the glory of this. You should feel the stewardship of this. You should understand this as also a day not only of accomplishment, but of commitment and also stewardship. You have received much. Now, it is your task to transmit much to others and furthermore to have a mind that is not conformed to this world, but transformed by the power of God, transformed by the gospel, transformed by the Scripture, transformed by truth.

Quite honestly, I think some people look at higher education and they say, “Well, okay, they’re just different kinds of higher education and that’s not entirely wrong. I mean, you have public universities, you have private colleges, you have universities that have different traditions and they come from different commitments.” There are some people that say, “Well over here is secular education and over here is Christian education.” They do see that Christian education must be different. I mean, after all, we’re pretty serious about this. We are here as the inheritors of a very serious commitment to this calling over. Well more than a century, but the thing is they really have no idea how different this is. They really have no idea how subversive we intend to be. They really have no idea how ambitious you are for the gospel of Jesus Christ. They really have no idea how your education is so different than their education and we’re not here today to confirm ourselves in institutional pride.

We are here today to remind ourselves of the stewardship entrusted to this school—it’s a stewardship we take very seriously. This faculty has taught faithfully this faculty has taught passionately. This faculty has taught personally, as you know in the classroom and elsewhere. You have also learned a great deal, but you have also taught each other and that’s a part of the college experience as well. You’re not just graduating as individual units of accomplishment. You’re graduating as a class together and there’s something very sweet about that. But even as my charge is that you be not conformed to this world but transformed by the renewing of your mind throughout the entirety of your lives, I want to tell you that this is no small moment for Boyce College, for this faculty and administration and for all those who are gathered here, including parents and families and friends.

For us, this is a day yes of the recognition of accomplishment and for that we are thankful. It is the day, yes, for an exercise in gratitude for there are many who would wish for this opportunity who will never have it. But it is also a moment in which we recognize that some of the most wonderful faithful Christian young people on planet Earth are about to be dispersed into the world, to the glory of God and to the glory of God. We just need to look at this day and look at these graduates and have a picture in our mind, not only of what has been done, but what God is about to do. To God be the glory, great things he has done.

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