mikao's world

Reflections of a Graduate

A year ago this past weekend, I graduated and finished seminary, walking across the stage to receive my Master of Arts in Christian Ministry with an Emphasis in Youth and Family.

This weekend I spent some time thinking about that graduation, about friends who are graduating this year, and friends who had graduated with me and before me and what they are all up to now.

I sent a few friends who were graduating this year a fun card and a mix CD of songs and people singing them that remind me of my years at school in a little town in the middle of nowhere. I tried to be encouraging of the future, and especially of the future of unknown. It’s hard to leave a place that you learned in, changed in, grew in, grew closer to God in, and somehow came to love so much.

People always talk about how fast or how slow time passes… and the past year has been a little bit of both.

The last few months before graduation people had started to ask me if I was going to go for my doctorate. I said no. No, I’m done school.

I still have no plans or desires to do my doctorate. But I miss the opportunity to study full-time. I miss the freedom of full-time research. I miss the quest for knowledge and the time to accomplish it in.

I haven’t read much on paper since graduation. I did read part of a book for a Bible study I was involved in. But I sort of unintentionally took a break from reading novels and printed research material. I do however read a lot online, both blogs and otherwise (I love Bloglines). I follow endless links and find new things to do online. I search after blogging and online research studies. Unfortunately I haven’t been very good at keeping Dialog up to date. I need to be better at that.

Time passes. Things change. Change brings perspective.

This past year has been one of learning, even though it has been outside the traditional walls of education. I’ve learned more of life. I’ve experience so much change and coming to live the day-to-day in a fulltime job and a bill-paying life. I struggle day-to-day in paying back the seven years of education that I cherished so much.

Some day, perhaps, I shall return. It’s highly unlikely, but I like to live with that hope, that maybe perhaps I’ll have the opportunity to learn more of what I would like to know. For now, I continue in a self-directed pace. I learn in this new environment, in this new land, through these new experiences as part of this journey that God is leading me on.

To me, thankfully, His faithfulness is evident in each new day and with each new breath.