by David Melton
Great is a great word! I particularly like it because depending on how you use it you can change – even reverse – its meaning! You just have to love great.
If a meal is great, everybody is happy. But if somebody calls you a great person … what do they mean? If great is a reference to general persona then smiles all around. But if great means something like great big, well, who among us wants to be great in that sense?
Boston is a great city. Great in populous, great in influence, and for us who live here great even in the sense of desirable. But it is also great as ancient Nineveh was great — with great spiritual issues. Sometimes those challenges seem overwhelming.
The other side of that is to reaffirm just how valuable and needed is a center for ministry education here in this great city. I know this endeavor is a great one — in every sense of the word. But who among us can doubt that our network of churches should have a substantial impact here — an impact in higher education?
It is a great thing what is happening here at Boston Baptist College. I know some talk about Boston as a “regional” school to often imply it is somewhat a lesser enterprise. Truth is, every endeavor is at some level “regional” … impact logically declines the further away you get from the source. That’s why Dr. Fred Donnelson’s famous line, “The light that shines farthest shines brightest at home,” is so wise. I offer a great observation … it is a remarkable not regional matter that from Boston, this great center of history, education, and influence, we wage the battle in our times for the cause of Christ.
There is great cost in this. I don’t write about it all that often, but you have to know that what we do here is very expensive. Compare real estate prices with where you live. Our dedicated staff probably pays two or three times what many of you pay for the modest homes in which they live. It’s a deliberate choice — a great one, as in large in number, significant in impact, difficult to accomplish. Yet, the meaning of what we do here is also great. Who would imagine a thriving Biblically driven education of highest quality in the Athens of America? And who would dream that only the BBFI, among all the conservative Christian movements, can claim such an accomplishment? (I for one think it is okay — I think it is great — that we celebrate great things. Sometimes we talk about our woes too much.)
And who cannot be impressed with the great young men and women from all over the country and the world who are studying in Boston? They laugh in our student commons, they study in our classrooms, they pray under our trees, they sit in our dorm rooms late at night and dream great dreams for God.
These are great times in Boston. I hope you understand exactly what I mean!