St Mark's Lutheran Primary School Graduation Address [Joshua 1:9] (10-Dec-2014)

This address was given at Cornerstone College, 7pm.

I’d like to read a little verse this evening from the book of Joshua. Normally, in school chapels this year, I’ve often read readings from one of the four gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke or John. But tonight I’m going to read from the Book of Joshua. And Joshua is the 6^th book in the bible. It talks about things that happened long before the life of Jesus. So let’s read:

Be strong and courageous. Do not be frightened, and do not be dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.

This is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God.

Let’s pray: Dear Lord Jesus, come and be with us tonight on this wonderful occasion of our school’s graduation. We thank you for the year just past, and we thank you for all those students who are now about to finish their time at primary school, the year 6s, and are about to go on to the next stage of their life. Bless us all tonight with your Holy Spirit—help me to speak well, and help everyone to hear well. Open my lips, and open all our ears and our hearts. Amen.

I’d like to say what I have to say tonight particularly to the year 6s who are about to leave our school. And I’d like to say what I’m going to say to strengthen you and encourage you. And I’d like to say that it’s been a real pleasure and a joy and privilege to spend some time with you in the year 6 classroom this year and talk about different things, and I personally am going to miss you at the school.

As we journey through life—you know—we can’t be everything. We have to go with one or two things and stick with it. God says: Be strong and courageous. Here God tells us something that we should be: he doesn’t give us a huge list. He just gives us two things: be strong and be courageous. Sometimes we feel quite weak—all of us adults often pretend to be stronger than we really are. We like you kids to think that we’re strong, but in actual fact there are many things that we all need help with. And when God says: be strong, he wants to let you borrow his strength. The strength doesn’t come from you, the strength comes from him, and he wants you to borrow it from him. And he also says: Be courageous. Courageous means to have courage. To be brave.

So isn’t this interesting that God wants to give you two things—he wants to give you strength, and also he wants to give you courage. And he wants to let you borrow these things from him.

But he also says: Do not be frightened, and do not be dismayed. Now God picks two things and he says: I know that sometimes in the future, you might be scared and frightened of something. You might worry about what’s going to happen to you in the future. He also says, Do not be dismayed. What’s it mean, “dismayed”? Dismayed is when we want to give up, and we don’t think something’s worth doing any more. And so, here God wants us to borrow strength from him, and courage from him. But now, he wants to borrow something from you—he wants to take away the fear, and says: Do not be frightened. And he also says: Do not be dismayed. When you feel like you want to give up, then I promise to come and take that from you, says God.

But let’s listen to our little bible verse once again: Be strong and courageous. Do not be frightened, and do not be dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.

God says: I want you to be strong and courageous. And I don’t want you to be frightened, and I don’t want you to give up. But now I’m going to tell you the reason why: for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.

Isn’t that a wonderful thing? Sure—God is with you, wherever you go. God the Father made you, and so he wants to look after you and protect you, because he loves everything that he has made. But also, Jesus Christ, who is also God, died for you and rose from the dead for you, and always prays for you—he will also be with you, right next to you, wherever you go. And also, the Holy Spirit, who is also God, offers his forgiveness, and his peace, his help, his strength, eternal life, wherever we go. So can you see? The Father, Son and the Holy Spirit is with us always wherever we go, and that’s the reason why we can be strong and have courage. That’s the reason why we don’t need to be frightened, and don’t need to be dismayed and give up.

So let’s remember these words tonight from this graduation. Be strong and courageous. Do not be frightened and do not be dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go. As we finish up our school year, let’s remember that the Father, Son and Holy Spirit are always with us, tonight, tomorrow, next week, next year, and throughout our whole lives.

Let’s pray: Dear Jesus, we thank you that you want to encourage us and strengthen us. Help us in all our fears and bless us now and into the future. We place our year 6s into your hands as they leave our school, and all our students and all of the staff and teachers, and we thank you that you promise to be with us wherever we go. Amen.