Welcoming students to Ohio Christian University’s 2018 Academic Year Convocation, Provost Hank Kelly opened the first chapel gathering with a prayer of anointing for President Kulaga and the faculty to make this a great academic year for students who will be forming spiritual character, drawing closer to Christ, identifying life missions, and preparing to serve church and society. Praying that each student learns their course subject matter, he prayed they also learn the life skills of critical thinking, speaking, writing, perseverance, discipline, getting along with others, while experiencing both Christ’s love and the love of faculty and staff.
Academic department heads Dr. Valerie Jones and Dr. Monty Lobb read Scriptures, then Michelle Martin and student musicians lead staff, faculty, and students in song. Dr. Kulaga’s inspiring sermon ‘Finder’s Seekers’ focused on the purpose of study at the University. Highlighting the excitement on the first day of class and expressing humor that raised applause and laughter, Kulaga shared that the faculty’s duty and joy in their work of teaching, shaping, and informing students is a source of great encouragement. The student-faculty relationship is symbiotic—beneficial and enriching to both parties.
Applying analogies of deer hunting and trout fishing, Kulaga proposed that the true purpose of study is not the thrill or passion it may engender, not in seeking and finding relative truth, but in discovering Biblical truth. Truth is not found in opinion. It is found in Biblical truth, the bedrock foundational principals of Christian faith. God is all knowing, all loving, all powerful. He is the creator, and only through His son Jesus do we enter Heaven. He gives the capacity to learn to do His will. Students don’t need to seek truth when He has already revealed it, but appreciate it and be led by Him.
“Christianity provides the answers to the big questions. God provides life’s meaning, purpose, and comfort,” Kulaga explained. “Whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is praiseworthy, anything of excellence, let your mind dwell on these things. Answers to the big questions determine where we derive and place our energies. It’s what gives the courage to face life. It becomes the object of our supreme devotions. It’s our heroism when at last we face death. God says, ‘I am the way, the truth, and the life.’”
