Chosen to Take Risks

I have loved you even as the Father has loved me. Remain in my love. When you obey my commandments, you remain in my love, just as I obey my Father's commandments and remain in his love. I have told you these things so that you will be filled with my joy. Yes, your joy will overflow! This is my commandment: Love each other in the same way I have loved you. There is no greater love than to lay down one's life for one's friends. You are my friends if you do what I command. I no longer call you slaves, because a master doesn't confide in his slaves. Now you are my friends, since I have told you everything the Father told me. You didn't choose me. I chose you. I appointed you to go and produce lasting fruit, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask for, using my name. This is my command: Love each other. –John 15:9-17

Ms. Grace Buckner, BTA alumnae ('16) and recipient of the 2016 Barbara Foote Shingleton Award, opened her Chapel address last Wednesday by telling of her arrival at BTA as a sophomore in 2013, what it was like for her to transition from Java, Indonesia, and a few highlights of her years as a student.

Grace said that when asked to give the Alumni Chapel address, she reflected on what she needed to hear as a student at BTA. She told the students, "You have been chosen to take risks together for the sake of others, now." Not sometime in the future, she said, but now.

The Apostle John, in chapters 13 – 17 of his gospel, recorded Jesus' last words to his followers. "If you are a Christian," Grace stated, "you have been invited to follow Jesus and be a disciple. This is what Jesus really wanted His disciples to understand."

'Stay in My love,' Jesus said. How does one do that? 'By obeying My commands.' What is His command? 'Love each other.' What does that look like? 'Lay down one's life for one's friends.'

"Why should you do this?" Grace asked, and then provided the answer: "Because Jesus chose you and appointed you to bear fruit. Jesus said to do this because He was about to do it Himself. Jesus, innocent Son of God, paid the price that our sin deserved – death – so that we could have eternal life, knowing God and His Son, Jesus."

"If you are a Christian, I have great news for you," Grace declared. "You are chosen. Jesus commands you to stop living a life of self-preservation and self-advancement, and to love each other by laying down your life for each other. What could that look like at BTA?" Perhaps like these examples:

Don't participate in gossip. "It is a risk to not partake in gossip," Grace said. "You get left out. But by not participating in gossip you are loving the person being talked about."

Encourage someone who has a dream. "If you have a friend with an idea or dream to serve," Grace continued, "join in with them. Be a friend that says, 'I believe in you. Let's do this together.'"

Have lunch with someone who is different from you. "Look for two or three people who are different from you in significant ways – maybe from another grade, or a different neighborhood, or a different faith. Have lunch with them consistently."

"Maybe you don't think you have been noticed," Grace said. "Maybe you feel misunderstood. But that doesn't matter. You have already been chosen. You are empowered to take risks for the sake of others, now."

As she concluded, Grace acknowledged the pressure of the high academic challenges at Boston Trinity. "But at some point when you ask yourself, 'Who am I? Who am I apart from my academic or athletic accomplishments, or my goals, or my family's hope for me?' ...when you ask yourself [these questions], I want you to know there is a holy, good, and just God who made you with extreme precision, who loved you so much He sent His one and only Son to lay down His life so that you could have eternal life, not death. He is inviting you to a wonderful adventure to do the same thing."

"I challenge you to do one thing," Grace said in closing. "Ask someone else what they can do for the sake of others that feels risky. What is the risk you want to take for someone else? Remember, you have been chosen. You don't have to wait until you are older. You can take risks for the sake of others, NOW."