by Dr. Russell Dawn
Around the middle of the 18th century, the French Enlightenment philosopher Voltaire wrote a thin but highly influential book called Candide. In it, the protagonist abandons his optimistic view of life and comes to the conclusion that the only reasonable way for him to live is to retreat to a secluded place and tend his own garden. He rejects the world as irredeemably filled with natural and human evil, and chooses to mind his own business and see only to his own needs.
Sadly, there can be something appealing about this image. Don’t bother me, just let me tend my own garden. I’ll take care of myself and won’t trouble you; all I ask is that you also not trouble me. As we face the obstacles of moral and societal corruption, intellectual decay, abandonment of the faith, and rejection of basic and obvious truths about human nature, the Lutheran educator might face the temptation just to tend his or her own garden. That is certainly the easier path of life, the path of least resistance. Moreover, if there were no God, no Christ who died to redeem the world and rose in victory over death, it might indeed be the most reasonable path.
Thankfully, there is God who loves the world enough to send His only Son for us. That all-merciful God calls us to a very different approach to the world around us. Christ explicitly rejects the path of loving and preserving our own lives—of tending only our own gardens. Instead, God calls us to tend gardens all around us. We call those gardens, our neighbors.
Without denying the profound brokenness and evil of this fallen world, we are called to the more difficult path of loving and serving our neighbors. Faithfully and with the deepest care, we must tend to our neighbors and cherish their well-being. That is, at its core, the call of the Lutheran educator: to tend the gardens we call our students, and by extension, their families and communities. We tend the mind, soul, character, and heart of each and every student. We water and enrich their soil with love, learning, and the Word of God. We weed their hearts, knowing them to be fallen but redeemed. We ground them in truths they will use for a lifetime, and in The Truth who will never leave them or forsake them. What an honor to be called to such a ministry!
Admittedly, not all students make use of what we provide them, and some parents take their children’s teachers for granted. In some young people and their families, the work of a succession of Lutheran educators is barely visible and even seems utterly lost. Put simply, not all gardens flourish, regardless of the care they receive. Perhaps that seems to be the case increasingly, as the poisons of secularism, hedonism, and nihilism find their way to young people despite our best efforts. These realities, however, only make our gardening work more crucial, not less. We cannot know the full use to which God will put our labors, the full fruit they will bear. In addition, the more society rejects God and His ways, the more precious every kernel of truth (and Truth) becomes. It is also clear that the gardens that do flourish will stand out all the more.
Let us therefore take full encouragement in Christ. His call upon us never falters. Tending the gardens of our students is good work that He prepared for us (cf. Eph. 2.10). We walk in that work together.
Dr. Russell Dawn
Dr. Russell Dawn is the President of Concordia University Chicago. He can be reached at russell.dawn@cuchicago.edu.