Students in the Real World, 2-1

Many professing Christians lose their zeal or apostatize from the faith when major transitions occur in their lives. One reason for this is that when a person enters a new situation that demands his time and attention, and in which he wishes to excel, he must reassess his priorities. New items are added to his daily routine, and some old ones are abandoned. For some, if God makes the list at all, sometimes he is relegated to an appendix at the bottom. Christians often deceive themselves into thinking that they can get everything else done first so that they can then turn to give their faith quality time without distraction.

However, the Lord admonishes us to think in the opposite direction (Matthew 6:33). Thus one of the first principles that any believer in any phase of his life must enforce is to honor God as the center of his daily living and to make communion with God the foundation for all his other activities. You are not a student who is struggling to remain a Christian on the side, but you are a Christian who happens to be a student at this time.

This sounds cliché, but it is a true teaching that must be implemented. Just because you have heard it many times does not mean that you are doing it. We are talking about more than an attitude, since it requires you to arrange all your activities around your faith. It should affect every decision regarding how you will spend your time and energy. We are talking about a way of thinking that governs your life and produces concrete results. You actually have to do something and make changes, and it should be obvious when you are not doing it.

For example, your academic schedule should be built around your faith and make way for it. Signing up for several demanding courses might make an impressive transcript, and taking on several more might even ensure an early graduation. However, if it means that it will take time away from the things of God – such as study, prayer, fellowship, and ministry – then you must curb your academic ambitions. As long as you have the attitude that you will "make room" for your faith in your schedule, you will keep on piling up sports, clubs, parties, and so on, so that even on a good day you might have only ten minutes left at the end of the night for prayer, right before you fall fast asleep.

Speaking of sleep, how about waking up an hour early every morning for prayer? When I was in high school, I woke up at 5:30 every morning so that I could pray for forty-five to ninety minutes before breakfast. There is no more appropriate way to start a day. But there is no need to imitate someone else or to become legalistic about this – the point is that you will always have more than enough time for the things of God if you make time for them first.

As a Christian, I never crammed for an exam in high school and the university. In fact, I never lost sleep over any type of school work. I never worked past bedtime. Even when I had a paper due or an exam the following day, after spending a limited amount of time on it, I would stop everything and return to my biblical studies and ministry work. This is not to say that every person must follow this pattern or that it is wrong to cram for exams. Occasional exceptions that take time away from prayer and ministry might be acceptable (although I did not permit that for myself), but the believer must make sure that he does not make a habit out of it, and habits are built on repeated exceptions until they are no longer exceptions.

In any case, I did not neglect my school work and my grades. Academic performance was part of my Christian witness, not only before men, but mainly before God, since a believer must diligently labor at the tasks given to him. I maintained a high GPA all through my years in high school and university, and graduated with honors. It is always possible to put your faith first and still obtain above average grades; however, depending on various factors, such as your academic abilities, you might have to design a more manageable course load and social life than you would otherwise prefer. And if you mind your faith, it will improve your performance in other areas. God is able to grant wisdom to his people not only when it comes to spiritual things, but also in "all kinds of literature and learning" (Daniel 1:17).

Faith is not entirely a private matter. There is also the matter of church fellowship. If your school is close to home, then there is no need to change anything. But if you are a boarding student, you will have to find a new place for corporate worship and ministry. Although Christian groups and churches abound on and around many campuses, many of them are apathetic in spirit, confused in doctrine, and thus dangerous for new and untaught believers. They will not do much to sustain or further your spiritual progress. So unless you happen to find one of the better ones, the sole reason for attending is often to offer your assistance and encouragement, and as you do so God shall energize your faith and teach you his ways.

It is often said that believers require constant fellowship to even survive, let alone to thrive in the faith. Here is another cliché, but this time it is false. In his providence, God sometimes ordains that a person should stand alone. The key is in learning that a believer is never truly alone, for God is with him. Before they abandoned him, Jesus said to his disciples, "But a time is coming, and has come, when you will be scattered, each to his own home. You will leave me all alone. Yet I am not alone, for my Father is with me" (John 16:32). Are we to pattern ourselves after Christ in every way but this?

Sometimes it is argued that even Christ surrounded himself with disciples to help him in his work. However, it is obvious from the Gospels that except for helping him with some practical chores, the disciples were more of a burden to him than anything else. He was repeatedly annoyed by them and rebuked them for their lack of faith and understanding. He gathered these disciples not because he needed them, but because they needed him to teach them, so that they could become his witnesses and enter their own ministries after his ascension.

Then, people are fond of talking about "team ministry" and the "apostolic company," using Paul as the prime example. Of course Paul preferred to work together with other faithful believers, and so should we, but he also realized that people were not always dependable. He wrote, "At my first defense, no one came to my support, but everyone deserted me. May it not be held against them. But the Lord stood at my side and gave me strength, so that through me the message might be fully proclaimed and all the Gentiles might hear it. And I was delivered from the lion's mouth" (2 Timothy 4:16-17). Against what many teach nowadays, Paul rejected the idea that a believer will surely fall if he stands alone.

Here is the difference between a leader and a follower. It is not that a leader prefers to stand alone, but that through faith in God he can stand alone, and he can function very well as he does so. In fact, sometimes you are most "alone" when there are believers all around you — consider the three thousand men from Judah who betrayed Samson to the Philistines (Judges 15:11). If in God's providence you must stand alone, then also know that you are able to do it, because he is faithful to keep you from falling.