鈥淧eople of Hope鈥�
By Dr. Lauren Hearit Assistant Professor of Management
Sunday, May 4, 2025
Ray and Sue Smith Stadium Holland, Michigan
People of Hope! Your life is about to get a little more interesting!
I鈥檒l come back to that in a minute. But first:
Thank you, Grace, for your warm introduction, and thank you, Class of 2025, for choosing me as your commencement speaker. I am deeply humbled. Please know this is a wonderful honor that I will cherish in the years to come.
As I reflected on my message to you this afternoon, so many of your faces kept coming to mind: students who are pursuing careers in medicine, higher education administration, marketing, finance, journalism, and social work. I think of Ben, who will start his master鈥檚 degree at Notre Dame; Daniel, who is contemplating a move overseas; Sarah, who will be an accountant at Plante Moran; and Natalie, who will work with Community Action House.
I also think of Avery, who will be a consultant at Plante Moran; Katie, who is moving to Dallas and working at JPMorgan; and Elsie, who will start her master鈥檚 degree at the University of Georgia.
I鈥檓 thinking of Ruthie, Eli, Ethan, Christian, Brooke, Chloe, Al, and so many students that I don鈥檛 have time to name today. I am so excited for each of you before me today. Congratulations, Hope College Class of 2025.
When I think of you, I'm reminded of a phrase we often use: "people of Hope." Not only are you students here at Hope College, in a few minutes you will become alumni of Hope College, and you're going to move into the world as a people of hope.
And this is where I promised to return: your life is about to get a little more interesting!
That鈥檚 because there's a significant change coming in your life. Up to this point, your time and, by extension your life, has been measured in semesters and academic years, by credits, by weekly Chapel services, by final exams. After today, no one is grading you on how well you're doing. There's no syllabus you have to follow. There is freedom in that! You get to set your own structures and rhythms.
And so, the question becomes: How will you manage your life? How will you remain a people of hope?
This is where, if you might indulge me, I'd like to offer one last lecture about building a framework for sustainable hope in a world that often challenges our faith and beliefs.
In a few minutes, your name will be called, and when you walk across this stage, you will be handed your 麻豆视频网站 diploma. Your name will be on that diploma with the seal of the College inscribed on it. Within that seal, you'll see Hope College's motto:
Spera in Deo, meaning 鈥淗ope in God.鈥�
How do you sustain this hope outside of the structure and rhythms of Hope College? How do you live as a person of Hope?
Well, Steven Garber, from the Washington Institute for Faith, Vocation & Culture, found you actually need three things: a worldview, a mentor you can go to for advice, and Christian community.
First, you need a worldview.
If you were a business or economics major, you know we talk a lot about how your worldview informs the set of values you hold, and how the values you hold might lead you to do things differently.
If you've been in class with me, you know I love to take my glasses off and go on and on about how I can't see you once I take my glasses off. I have terrible eyesight. Even if you鈥檙e right in front of me, you're nothing but a blob.
But when I put my glasses back on, your face comes into focus. If I look below or outside the frame of my glasses, I can't see you; I can鈥檛 make sense of you. But through the lens of my glasses, the world comes into focus for me.
A worldview is much like that: a lens through which you view the world. It has to do with what you believe to be true. For me, personally, I see the world through the lens of my Christian faith.
Let me get a little personal here and share my worldview: I believe I live in a world that God created to be good, but that good world has been profoundly impacted by sin. The world is broken. I am an inherently sinful person. Yet Jesus Christ died for my sins. I believe in His resurrection 鈥� that He conquered death, ascended into heaven, and is seated at the right hand of God the Father. And, He will return to dwell with us in a renewed heaven and a new earth.
As you leave Hope College, you're going to encounter people with different worldviews than your own. Some may view your Christian worldview differently 鈥� but, these are opportunities to continue to explore how the worldview of your childhood might become the worldview of your adulthood. That is exciting, but hard work.
And it is work you must do in order to live a life of integrity. We talk a lot in our business courses about living a life of integrity 鈥� or, living an integrated life. Who you are at home, on Sunday morning, is the same person who is at work, presenting in the boardroom, sitting in the school drop off line, or grabbing a coffee with your friends.
So, how will you continue to develop your worldview?
That question leads me to the second point: you need a mentor.
I like to refer to these as my "personal board of directors." When I think about any major life choice, transition, career problem, or question about my faith, I go to dear friends and mentors and ask for their advice, for their prayer, and for them to hold me accountable 鈥� not just for my professional goals, but also in my faith, in my relationship with my husband, and in the type of family we're seeking to cultivate.
When you hear the term "mentor," you might think about someone older than you, but I鈥檝e also found mentorship and guidance in what I鈥檝e heard called providential friendships 鈥� friends that God has placed in my life to walk alongside me. What's important to remember is that who you become is influenced by the five people you spend most of your time with. So be wise about who you surround yourself with.
Who will you choose as mentors to hold you accountable as a Person of Hope? More importantly, for whom will you be a mentor?
Third, you need community.
You need to be in community with other Christians. And what's a great way of doing that? Going to church.
As some of you know, I found this really difficult in my early 20s. I went off to grad school right after college. I focused entirely on my career. I went to the best place I could. I studied with one of the top scholars in my field, and I was competitive. I wanted to be the best of the best, but I did this at the expense of who I knew myself to be. I had a terrible boyfriend who wasn鈥檛 a Christian. I was deeply lonely. I viewed my colleagues only through the lens of competition. To be honest, I was lost.
The result? I experienced several years of profound doubt in my 20s. It wasn't until I was volunteering in my summer church that I heard a sermon on Psalm 1 from Hope College鈥檚 former Dean of the Chapel. I was 25 years old, at one of my lowest points in my faith, and when I heard the line from Psalms how our faith can become deep, like the roots of trees planted along the streams of water, I felt deeply convicted.
When I returned to grad school that fall I returned to church, joined a Bible study, and really leaned into friendship with a dear friend in my grad program that I knew was a Christian. It didn鈥檛 entirely rid me of my doubt, and doubt is something I struggle with even today, but it kept me moving forward.
One year later, I saw Hope College was hiring, and I thought of that sermon on Psalm 1. When I arrived here, surrounded by scholars who are persons of faith, I began to intellectually engage with the faith of my young adulthood in a deeper, richer way. I joined a Campus Ministries reading group. I found a home at Pillar Church. I began to find Christian community, and mentors. For the first time, I realized my faith wasn鈥檛 just a feeling, it was also something to intellectually pursue and wrestle with. My worldview, the values I was trying to hold, the habits I was seeking to cultivate, and the ways in which I wanted to be present in the classroom and as a scholar all came into alignment.
I no longer felt I was living a divided life. I felt I was living an integrated life, as I articulated what my worldview actually was, as I found mentors, and as I found Christian community.
I learned that once you articulate your values, you have to begin thinking about the virtues you practice. Virtues are like habits that are 鈥渃ultivated and grown, practiced and mastered.鈥� I think one of the key virtues that comes from a Christian worldview is that of hope. Jesus's apostle Paul first wrote of hope as an enduring virtue in his letter to the Corinthians, and as The Financial Times put it in an article called, 鈥淚t鈥檚 the hope that saves you,鈥�: 鈥�The resurrection of Jesus Christ shows Christians that, even during the darkest of times, light can suddenly appear, and that new beginnings and even miracles are possible.鈥�
As you experience deep joy over the next 5, 10, 20, 50 years, it might be very easy to practice a habit of hope. But you will almost assuredly face deep sadness, darkness, and evil. You might face cancer, feel betrayed by a loved one, or lose your job. You might experience the death of your parents, a child, or even a close friend, like many of you did in January when Jennifer passed. I say all this not to throw water on your joy today, but to point out that it can be very hard to practice hope as you walk through life.
We have gathered and nurtured you here at Hope over your last four years to try and teach you the habits and practices of cultivating this habit of hope. You're about to walk out into the world to be people of hope. And as Abraham Kuyper says, 鈥�There is not a square inch in the whole domain of our human existence over which Christ, who is Sovereign over all, does not cry: 鈥楳ine!鈥欌�� As you step into your vocation, you can rest in the knowledge that the work you will do is good. Your work is God鈥檚. He鈥檚 already claimed it. Instead, you are called to see the face of Jesus Christ in those you work with, those you live next door to, those you interact with. You鈥檙e called to be a peacemaker. You鈥檙e called to do things differently. You are called to be a People of Hope.
Please understand that the hope I speak of is not mere optimism or naivet茅. As scholar Gregory Spencer reminds us, optimism is a belief that things will work out well, a positive outlook based on favorable circumstances. But true hope鈥擝iblical hope鈥攔uns deeper. Real hope "is not defined by circumstances" and it "frees us from the need to predict the future." While optimism depends on things going well, hope sustains us even when they don't. It is a firm foundation that remains solid even when the ground shifts beneath us, like the wise man who built his house upon the rock.
I asked my husband, who has a classics degree, if he could explain to me the translation of "Spera in Deo." And, like any good wife, I fact-checked my husband with my research assistant Elsie.
She confirmed my husband had not steered me wrong. We often translate Spera in Deo as "Hope in God." Yet, spera is no mere noun. It is an imperative, a command to each of you: 鈥淗ope in God!鈥�
Every time you look at your diploma and see the seal of Hope College, this is your assignment: recall this imperative, this command, to 鈥淗ope in God!鈥�
May your Christian hope that was nurtured here at Hope College remain an anchor throughout your life, in both calm and troubled waters. Do the hard work of continuing to articulate and intellectually pursue your worldview and values. Find close mentors. Be in Christian community. And, as it is written in Hebrews, "may you hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful."
And that, my friends, is how you will remain a People of Hope as you begin this next chapter in your life. I wish you Godspeed in that journey.
Congratulations, Class of 2025.