Christians in the Classroom
As a college student sitting in your classes, you may not be conscious of your posture very often but you’re assuming one all the time. It might be healthy or it might be poor as you slouch down in your chair or hunch over your books. Over time, while you’re not even aware you’re doing anything or that anything harmful is happening, poor posture can lead to complications as wide ranging as neck pain, back and spinal problems, recurring headaches, poor balance, breathing difficulties, incontinence, heartburn, and slowed digestion [1].
Being a Christian in the classroom calls for a particular kind of posture – not a posture of the body but a posture of the heart, the mind, and the spirit. A healthy spiritual posture begins with recognizing that while being a student may be preparation for a long-term vocation, it’s not only that. Being a student is itself a calling [2]. God isn’t simply calling you to be faithful five years from now once you’ve earned your degree and are serving in your chosen field. He’s calling you to be faithful as a student during this current stage of your life.
What does being a faithful student look like? What posture should a Christian assume in the classroom? Let me mention three postures of heart, mind, and spirit to adopt as a Christian student.
1. ADOPT THE POSTURE OF A WORKER
The first thing to do as a Christian student is commit yourself to the hard work of academic study. Being a dedicated student is pleasing to the God who has called you to this season of study and preparation. Letting your studies slide or not working hard to fulfill academic responsibilities because you’re preoccupied with other pursuits, including “spiritual” pursuits like campus ministry activities, is not honoring to the Lord. It’s not honoring to your parents either if they’re paying for your education.
“God isn’t simply calling you to be faithful five years from now once you’ve earned your degree and are serving in your chosen field. He’s calling you to be faithful as a student during this current stage of your life.”
Working hard as a student means attending your classes faithfully, completing course readings and assignments, polishing your papers, and turning in projects on time. Strive to be known as reliable, responsible, and dedicated by your professors and by other students. Your resolve to sustain these practices will be strengthened if you remember that you’re ultimately not doing this for your professors – or even just for yourself – but for God who has appointed you to your current calling as a student. Go to class because you love Jesus. Write papers to please Jesus. Study for exams in faithfulness to Jesus.
Working hard as a Christian student also means pursuing excellence. The work you do as a student is to be seen as an offering to the Lord and an expression of your worship of him. Pursuing excellence doesn’t mean you’re obligated to maintain a certain grade point average. If you don’t have a 4.0, you’re not necessarily being unfaithful. But you are being unfaithful if you’re not working as hard as you can and putting forth your best effort. It might help to keep in mind that your primary aim isn’t to earn a particular grade (which you don’t absolutely control). Nor is it to produce something explicitly Christian. For example, your paper topic doesn’t have to be about the reliability of the New Testament manuscripts; your speech doesn’t have to be an apologetic for the deity of Jesus. Your primary aim is simply to write an excellent paper or deliver an excellent speech. Christian writer and novelist Dorothy Sayers once wrote: “The Church’s approach to an intelligent carpenter is usually confined to exhorting him not to be drunk and disorderly in his leisure hours, and to come to church on Sundays. What the Church should be telling him is this: that the very first demand that his religion makes upon him is that he should make good tables” [3]. And the very first demand that your Christianity makes upon you as a Christian student is that you should aim to submit excellent academic work.
“Your future patients, students, employers, employees, colleagues, and customers are depending on you to be knowledgeable, capable, and skilled. Don’t burden them with your incompetence later because you’re not willing to work hard and take your studies seriously right now.”
Finally, working hard as a student during this season of preparation is a way to serve others well in the future. You may not presently see the beneficiaries of your preparation, but you eventually will. Your future patients, students, employers, employees, colleagues, and customers are depending on you to be knowledgeable, capable, and skilled. Don’t burden them with your incompetence later because you’re not willing to work hard and take your studies seriously right now.
2. ADOPT THE POSTURE OF A LEARNER
Another thing for a Christian student to do is adopt the posture of a learner. This demands humility. You may think you know a lot about the world and about what’s true – and perhaps you do. But you’re in a class to learn, not to teach. Of course, you should aim to enhance the learning experiencing for everyone in the classroom by participating appropriately, but your role is not to dominate class discussions or to steer the course content in the direction you think most important. Most of your professors have dedicated significant amounts of time to their discipline – much more than you have – so be willing to listen. Even if they’re not very skilled at teaching (sadly, this happens) and even if it appears that they’re not as knowledgeable and educated as they should be (sadly, this also happens), they’re still in a position of authority so should be shown a degree of deference and proper respect. When you adopt the posture of learner, you’ll resist the temptation to complain about how hard a class is. Being a student and growing in competence is supposed to be difficult, so accept the challenges and ask for God’s help in humble prayer.
Additionally, be open to learning from unbelieving professors – even ones who are hostile to Christianity and in disciplines that are increasingly antithetical to Christianity, such as anthropology and cultural studies. All truth is God’s truth and this is his world, so in every discipline there will be subject matter that verifies and substantiates the teaching of God’s word. You don’t need to fear content as long as you’re committed to obeying the practice commanded in 1 Thessalonians 5:21: “test everything; hold fast what is good.” And where you may, as a Christian, have strong moral disagreements with course content or with something your professor is teaching, be sure to voice your concerns politely and humbly, if at all.
“Since God has left the fingerprints of his wisdom everywhere, since there is no place where God does not furnish us with raw materials for godly thinking, Christians should be seized with a rambunctious curiosity to ponder his works, both the majestic and the mundane.” – Dale Ralph Davis
Be humble because there’s a lot you don’t know. But because there’s a lot you don’t know – and because you live in God’s world – adopting the posture of a learner means staying inquisitive and teachable. Consider what 1 Kings 4:32-34 says about King Solomon’s scope of learning: “He also spoke 3,000 proverbs, and his songs were 1,005. He spoke of trees, from the cedar that is in Lebanon to the hyssop that grows out of the wall. He spoke also of beasts, and of birds, and of reptiles, and of fish. And people of all nations came to hear the wisdom of Solomon, and from all the kings of the earth, who had heard of his wisdom.” In light of this, Dale Ralph Davis suggests: “Since God has left the fingerprints of
his wisdom everywhere, since there is no place where God does not furnish us with raw materials for godly thinking, Christians should be seized with a rambunctious curiosity to ponder his works, both the majestic and the mundane” [4]. There will be endless opportunities to exercise this “rambunctious curiosity” throughout college (and life) if you remember that, as a Christian student, you are a learner [5].
3. ADOPT THE POSTURE OF A WITNESS
Finally, as a Christian student, embrace the posture of a witness in heart, mind, and spirit. There will be times you’ll feel compelled to speak up in defense of the truth of Scripture and the gospel of Jesus Christ. We should, as Christians, be ready to contend for the faith and confront falsehood. But it’s important to consider not only what we say as witnesses but also how we say it. When Peter charges believers to “always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you,” he immediately adds: “yet do it with gentleness and respect” [6]. Peter is concerned not only with what we say but how we say it.
This concern about the manner and tone of our speech is found in other passages as well. Titus 3:2 instructs us “to speak evil of no one, to avoid quarreling, to be gentle, and to show perfect courtesy toward all people.” Paul tells Timothy in 2 Timothy 2:24-25 that “the Lord’s servant must not be quarrelsome but kind to everyone, able to teach, patiently enduring evil, correcting his opponents with gentleness.” According to 1 Peter 2:23, we’re to follow this example of Jesus: “when he was reviled, he did not revile in return.” Paul also, in Romans 12:17-18, 21 writes: “Repay no one evil for evil, but give thought to do what is honorable in the sight of all. If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all … Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.” All of these passage have important implications for our witness in the classroom: don’t be argumentative, don’t return insult for insult, be gentle and respectful, and seek to bless others.
“Being a college student is a great privilege. Many people throughout history and across the globe have longed to pursue higher education but lacked the resources or the opportunity. You’ve been given a gift: don’t waste it.”
It’s also important to expect that there will be times when you’re compelled to speak up in class but you won’t know exactly what to say or how to respond. It’s usually best to remain quiet in those moments and humbly admit to yourself (and others) that you don’t have all the answers. Plus, it doesn’t honor God when Christians give simplistic, poorly thought out answers to complex questions. When you’re confronted with questions you’re not sure how to answer, one thing you can do is devote yourself to researching the topic in order to discover some answers. In practically every academic field there are committed, Bible-believing Christians who have worked through and addressed the very questions you’re facing in class or from fellow students. Go find them and read them. You may not get another opportunity to respond in the class that raised the question, that’s true, but you can be better prepared to respond the next time it surfaces by doing some additional study on the matter from a Christian perspective.
Another option in the moment, rather than saying nothing, is to employ the art of formulating and asking good questions [7]. You may not be able to make a convincing biblical case to your professor or classmates, but a good question can expose unsupported assumptions, self-refuting ideas, and the folly and irrational bases of certain materialistic and atheistic claims. Asking good questions puts you in good company. Jesus asked over 300 questions in the gospels. And when his parents accidently left him in Jerusalem and returned to find him in the temple, we’re told that 12-year-old Jesus was not only “sitting among the teachers, listening to them” but was also “asking them questions” [8].
CONCLUSION
Being a college student is a great privilege. Many people throughout history and across the globe have longed to pursue higher education but lacked the resources or the opportunity. You’ve been given a gift: don’t waste it.
And recognize that being a college student is a calling from God that comes with responsibilities. As you aim to fulfill them, assume the posture of a hard worker pursuing excellence, a humble and dedicated learner, and a respectful and faithful witness.
One final exhortation: try to avoid doing homework on Sundays. Being a student is an important calling in your life, but not the only one. There is more to your life than studying and being a student. Take time to worship and enjoy Sabbath rest in faithfulness to the God who is faithful to you.
[1] https://www.health.harvard.edu/healthy-aging-and-longevity/3-surprising-risks-of-poor-posture
[2] My interest in this topic stems from being a student myself over the course of earning three degrees and also from teaching in the college classroom for over a decade. I served as an instructor in Physiology and Health Science at Ball State University for 9 years and as an adjunct professor of New Testament Greek at Mid-America Reformed Seminary for 2 years.
[3] This quote comes from Sayers’ essay entitled Why Work? You can read the entire essay by visiting the C. S. Lewis Institute online at https://www.cslewisinstitute.org/resources/why-work/
[4] See Dale Ralph Davis, 1 Kings: The Wisdom and the Folly (Great Britain: Christian Focus Publications, 2022), 49.
[5] Being a disciple of Jesus involves learning (see Matthew 11:29). The Greek word for “disciple” (μαθητής) is related to the Greek verb “to learn” (μανθάνω).
[6] See 1 Peter 3:15-16.
[7] Most professors will weigh a question more heavily or be more thoughtful in responding if the question is raised by a student who is serious and succeeding academically. The importance of pursuing excellence, mentioned earlier, can bear fruit in unexpected places and is not to be undervalued.
[8] See Luke 2:46.