Samford University’s Beeson Divinity School held its fall commencement Dec. 6, celebrating 12 new graduates.
This term’s commencement speaker was Chris Morgan, dean and professor of theology of California Baptist University’s School of Christian Ministries, as well as pastor of Immanuel Baptist Church in Highland, California.
Morgan encouraged graduates to pursue love in their ministries.
Drawing from 1 Corinthians 13, Morgan said love is best defined as genuinely seeking the good of others and sharing ourselves for their good. Love, he said, is defined by God and exemplified by Him.
“God is patient and kind; He is not selfish and forgives,” Morgan said.
While selfishness contracts the heart and confines it to itself, love enlarges the heart and extends it to others.
Love is consistent with Jesus’ teaching for His followers to “deny (themselves) and take up (their) cross daily and follow me,” Morgan said.
And when differences come in the church, it is not the “end of love; they are the occasion for love,” Morgan said, quoting the theologian Francis Schaeffer.
“The way of love is the way of the cross, which is the way of life,” Morgan said.
Morgan reminded graduates not to love the idea of love or the idea of the church, but to love “real people with real problems.”
Eleven students graduated with a Master of Divinity:
- William Francis Aylward Jordan
- Ava Angell Chaney
- Fallon Carder Farley
- Ford Galin
- Elijah Rex Newcomb
- Alexander Joseph Salomon
- Aaron Matthew Schnupp – also earned an Anglican Studies certificate
- Jeremiah Andrew Short – Anglican Studies certificate
- Daniel Sluis
- Josiah David Trombley – Anglican Studies certificate
- Michael Sandon Ward
Dustin Kyle Jernigan received a Doctor of Ministry (DMin), the last recipient of Samford’s DMin.