Convocation 2016: God Is Bigger

Every year, the LDS community at Stanford starts off the year with a religious Convocation. It is an opportunity for us to call upon God as we start the school year, and reflect upon what it means to be both disciples and scholars. I am just beginning my senior year, and I was asked to speak about the intersection of my academic and spiritual development in my time here at Stanford. I loved the chance to reflect on my college journey thus far, and now hope to use my remarks from yesterday's Convocation to kick off another journey I've been hoping to start: entering the blogging world. I hope this post and every post here can help others to find hope in their futures and in the future of our church. My faith journey has been the most joyful when I look for the good, so this blog is about seeking after the silver linings.

God Is Bigger

Three years and several weeks ago, I found myself crying on the way to Zumba. You should know, I don't ordinarily cry on the way to Zumba -- I typically have an emotional distribution that hovers around 70% thrilled to be going dancing and 30% stressed that someone might beat me to my spot on the dance floor. But on that particular day I was a few weeks away from leaving home for college, and I was both impatiently ready and anxiously not-ready-yet. The months of not-knowing what college would be like had gotten to me, and I was ready to know. Hands on the wheel, I prayed aloud and begged my Heavenly Father for college to be my everything -- to make the best friends, to choose great classes and do well in them, and maybe even to fall in love. And so long as I didn't know how or when or if those things would happen, I was scared. I wanted answers.

As you may have guessed, God did not give me a play-by-play on how my college years would look that day. But now, with 3 years of experience living those questions I asked, I wish I could ride passenger-side with my 18-year-old self and share with her a few of the lessons I have learned in my time here at Stanford.

If I could ride with her, I'd first warn her that Zumba didn't start at 7 on Wednesdays but actually finished at 7, and suggest we talk over ice cream instead. And then, I'd tell her what I wish I would have known that day:

I know you're scared, and I know that fear feels like a weakness. But your concerns about the future are a sign of your strength -- you care about the life ahead of you, and want it to be one that will make God proud. Your desire for God to comfort you tonight is also a strength -- you know to turn to Him in times of trial. But even though you are seeking after and hoping for good things, your questions are not ones that God will -- or even perhaps can -- answer. Let me explain:

We often say that God is the Gardener. This model is a good one, and reminds us that God will guide, teach, and nurture us as we grow to become like Him. But don't forget what our Sophomore year chemistry teacher always said: all models are wrong, even though some are helpful. In so many ways, God is a gardener. But you are no simple plant. You are created in the likeness of God and you are a co-creator with Him. He gave you this capacity to create not just to create others' lives, but to create your own. 

He cannot answer your questions today about what your experience at Stanford will bring, because those experiences have not yet been created. The two of you will build your life together, with the help of countless guardian angels in the form of friends, family, teachers, and leaders.

Now, this idea of creating your life may still sound scary, because I know you are concerned about creating the *right* life. But your life is not a math test -- God did not give you the ability to choose and create so that you could create one right thing. Consider the brother of Jared in the scriptures. He was asked to build barges in order for his people to cross an ocean, but when he finished them he noticed some problems and turned to God for help with two questions. First, he asked how they would have air to breathe in the airtight vessels, and God guided him to create air holes that could be tightly covered in times of storm. He then asked how they would have light in the vessels. This time, God did not guide him to any particular answer, but instead asked him to create his own solution, with the promise that He would provide the miracles necessary to make that solution work.

In that moment, God was bigger than any one solution to the question of how to put light in the vessels. He was not testing the brother of Jared's ability to "get it right," but rather teaching him that He trusted in his creative capacity to solve that problem.

Similarly, God is bigger than any one answer to your questions about college. You needn't fear that He has only one life planned for you. Instead, He has reserved space for you that you might co-create your life with Him. So long as you seek after goodness and commune with Him often, God will support you in your own creative solutions.

It would be hard for me to not tell that 18-year-old self more concrete things I have learned during my years at Stanford. But I know that my opportunities for growth here have all been a result of questions to which I did not have the answer, which then gave me the opportunity to live the questions and create my own answers.

Today, I still have questions. But because of the experiences I have had and the people I have met at Stanford, I know that my future is a place for hope rather than fear. God is not waiting for me to mess up, nor is He expecting me to create one right thing. He is Bigger than that. He is the most open-minded being in the universe, because He created and loves every bit of diversity that has ever existed and will ever exist in our world.

This life is our opportunity to learn to love and create in the same way that He does. We are His hands. To fear our future, to think He only loves some creations, to worry we have chosen the wrong path and can no longer access Him -- all of these are attempts to put an eternal and omnipotent being into a box. Please, never put God into a box.

As we allow ourselves to see Him as He truly is, He will help us to see our potentials for what they truly are. Wide open, eternal, and glorious.

I know this to be true, and testify that God lives and loves each and every one of us.

I say this in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.