Insufficiently Orientated

School Orientation: noun, 1) an introduction, as to guide one in adjusting to new surroundings, activities and people. 2) a dreaded period of time which all new students must undergo and which will cause said students to find every opportunity to skip events which do not take attendance.

I am starting graduate school tomorrow. In order to help me orientate my life in this new stage, Trinity invited me to a two-day event entitled "New Student Orientation." Over the course of these 16 hours, I imbibed numerous cups of free coffee, consumed rainbow sprinkle-encrusted donut and listened to many jokes interspersed between a modified reading of the student handbook. I laughed, I met new people, I learned a little.

I also thought a lot. I thought about my peers -- who they were, where they were going, what they hoped for. I thought about myself -- who I was, where I was going, what I hoped for. I thought about orientation. I thought about adjustment.

You see, all school orientation is essentially the same. There are mandatory seminars that contain essential information that many students will deem unnecessary for their own lives, even if it is immensely important for them. There are seas of coffee, in order to supress the urge to fall asleep while the faculty is talking. There are jokes, which serve the same purpose. There are name tags which offer others the most vital truths about you: Name, Major.

I am grateful for orientation. I see its intrinsic good in directing me to see what the ethos of a school is and to finding my way around campus. I appreciate the low-stress atmosphere to meet future friends and peers, the chance to start having more conversations about Kierkegaard than Chronicles of Narnia. Yet, at the end of the day, I wonder if it might be ineptly named.

Orientated: adj. to be adjusted with relation to surroundings, circumstances, facts, etc.

How are we to be orientated to seminary? How can 16 hours adjust us to the thousands of pages of theology we will read? How can it adjust us to the yearning of our hearts for God who will sometimes feel unbearably close and yet at times feel so distant as to be unreal? How can 16 hours prepare us to encounter God in new ways with new people and new thoughts in a new place? How can it know the hearts of those of us in the room? How can it speak to the particular experiences each one of us will have?

I was asked today if I had been sufficiently orientated. Besides from the expected -- knowing where my classrooms are, meeting my advisor, etc, I could not say yes. This is no fault of Trinity, in fact, they did everything they could to make me feel loved and prepared and welcomed. However, the task they set in front of them, to orient students to seminary, was doomed from the start.

I am starting to study the book of Jeremiah. I've only gotten as far as chapter 2 (which I warn you, is not a good stopping point), but within those chapters, God is, more or less, orientating Jeremiah. God calls out to him "Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I  consecrated you I appointed you a prophet to the nations... to all whom I send you, you shall go, and whatever I command you, you shall speak... See, I have set you this day over nations and over kingdoms, to pluck up and to break down, to destroy and to overthrow, to build and to plant...They will fight against you, but they shall not prevail against you, for I am with you to deliver you" (Jer 1:5, 7, 10, 19). That's it. That is about as much orientation as Jeremiah receives before going and telling his people that God is going to allow them to be conquered and that God has seen their unfaithfulness -- things which he does not say gently.

What's my point? Jeremiah is not given a lay of the land. He's not given friends. He's not introduced to his peers. He is told three things:
 1) God had called him before he even knew of God. He was given a mission which was not his to reject.
2) He was told, in blunt terms, what lay ahead. It was not handed to him with rice krispie treats and coffee, but bluntly warned that he was to do the will of God to "pluck up and to break down, to destroy and to overthrow." Jeremiah was told how hard it would be, even though those words would never prepare him for the task he had.
3) He was given confidence that even when all seemed to go wrong, God was there for him and would protect him.

Jeremiah's orientation was not nearly as delicious or fun as my own but it was sufficient. May God choose to orient me to what lies ahead both in school, in ministry and in life so that I may know that he has called me, that he knows my path and that he will be my guide.