On Saying Good-Bye
May 9, 2011
For many students, May is a month of mixed emotions.
On the one hand, finals are finished—a cause for great rejoicing. But many of our friends are graduating, moving on, going home, studying abroad, or completing various other summer adventures. Whatever the case, it is a time of splitting up, of saying good-byes—an activity I do not particularly enjoy (of course, I congratulate all of you graduates, but saying good-bye is difficult regardless).
These farewells have made me think. (Some of you insist that I should stop such activity being as its summer and I no longer have any professors demanding I do so. However, my idea of freedom is precisely that—to think and not be forced to think about or remember anything besides that which one pleases. Yet that is a rabbit trail to be followed on another post.).
Here are my thoughts on saying good-bye:
There is One to whom we will never say good-bye. A proverb reads, “A man of many companions may come to ruin, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother” (Proverbs 18:24, ESV). I do not believe this passage insists we should keep only one close friend; rather, I think it refers to someone who was coming—to Christ, the Messiah, who promised, “I will never leave you or forsake you” (Hebrews 13:5, ESV), and elsewhere, “I am with you always, to the end of the age” (Matthew 28:20, ESV). What a powerful truth we have in Christ: We who are in him will never have to say good-bye to the God who saves and fights for us. Our God remains.
Yet because he is our supreme and purest joy, sometimes we will be asked to let go of those things we most enjoy besides—a nice house, a favorite TV show, a good book, a dear friend, a calm summer evening, a little spark of a lightening bug. All of these comforts will slip through our fingers as quickly as melting ice cream on a warm muggy Tennessee afternoon.
Certainly, they are precious blessings, and we are called to be grateful for them. But that which is most important will never be lost; the glory of God will not be diminished, nor will his care for his children defeated. His plans are infinitely wise. To this God we must cling, for he will not let go of us.
