Before I left for college, I heard countless adults tell me that “college will be the best four years of your life.” While I appreciated their genuine excitement for me, that statement… Stressed. Me. Out. I was about to leave my family and move to a state where I did not know anyone. If college was really going to be the best four years of my life, then it had a lot to live up to. Maybe you have had a similar experience, had similar thoughts, or were left asking the same question I was: How do I guarantee that college will be the best four years of my life?
Going to college creates a lot of new variables. Whether you move away for school, attend a local college and live on campus, or are commuting from home, your life changes. At minimum, you are taking on different responsibilities as you begin college-level course work and make new friends in your new stage of life. My point is that as you establish this new life, there are a lot of variables that are outside of your control.
Put simply, you cannot guarantee that college will be the best four years of your life, but the answer to our question does not stop there.
First, we need to take a step back and remember how we were created. In the beginning of Genesis, we see that God made man to be in relationship with him. He is our Creator. Just as with any human who creates something, God made us to serve a purpose. We are relational beings who were created to glorify God and enjoy him forever and he has given us everything we need to know in order to do just that which is found in his Word. Instead of leaving us to fumble around trying to figure out how we function best, he has laid it out for us like an instruction manual. He not only gives us the instructions, but he gives us his Spirit to enable us to follow these instructions because we cannot do it on our own. I am not saying that we are simply machines and it is all about works, but I do want you to hear that we are programmed to function best when we follow God’s instructions for our lives. It is out of love that he provides us instructions because his desire is for our flourishing. The instructions allow us to function in the way we were designed to function.
Due to the Fall, we often think we know better than God. We don’t always see all of God’s instructions as helpful or necessary. The temptation in college, like any life stage, is to turn in a different direction and follow our own instruction manual. You choose to be impatient with your roommate when she leaves the room a mess because what you want matters most. Or you decide that sex within the confines of marriage is more of a suggestion that does not need to be followed all too closely. Or you choose to cheat on an exam because the image of success is more important than honesty. This follows your own design and not God’s.
When we choose to make our own rules, we are like the Israelites in the Old Testament. Over the course of Exodus 12-31 God delivers them from slavery in Egypt, parts the Red Sea, provides manna from the sky, provides water from a rock, and gives them the law all while he leads them to the land he promised to the Israelites, a land flowing with milk and honey (Exod 3:8). And how do the Israelites respond time and time again? They complain. They even made a golden calf to worship in place of God because they decided to make their own instruction manual (Exod 32). They did not trust that God’s plan was for their flourishing.
When we choose to follow our own instruction manual, we, like the Israelites, worship something of our own creation.
Despite the oppression the Israelites faced in Egypt, they complain about where God has brought them and express their desire to return to Egypt because they believe that they know best and that returning would be better than following God’s instruction. Yet what do they want to return to? To pain, misery, and oppression. That is what they believed to be best for them and allowed their current state of discomfort to guide them.
When we choose our own instructions, we choose pain, misery, and oppression. However, when we seek a relationship with our Creator and to live according to his instructions, we grow to be marked by love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control (Gal 5:22-23). We are able to experience the fullness of joy when we live in relationship with the One who created us and live in the way that he designed us to function (Ps 16:11).
We are not able to guarantee that college will be the best four years of your life – we don’t know how all of the variables in your life will play out during that time. However, no matter the circumstances you find yourself in, there is a God who desires to be in relationship with you and see you flourish. There is nothing better than getting to know the One who created you and living according to the way he designed you to function best. As you walk with our God, you will see the ways he is changing you and the work he is doing through you in the lives of others. Do not try to force your time in college to be “the best years of your life” because that statement greatly limits what God can do throughout the entirety of your life. It is my hope that when these four years come to an end, you will be able to give thanks to God for your time in college, no matter what came to pass, and will be living out his design in the years to come.