John Walkup
Emeritus Professor
Texas Tech University
Do your fears ever keep you from identifying yourself as a follower of Christ on your campus?
I was recently talking with a professor at Cal-Berkeley who noted that in an environment where a high premium is placed on self confidence and self sufficiency, admitting that you’re a believer is frequently seen as a sign of weakness. A fear of appearing vulnerable can even discourage some Christian faculty from sharing prayer requests while on campus.
Given that as believers our sufficiency is in Christ, and not in our gifts and talents, this situation strikes me as tragic. Satan frequently uses such fears to keep us from sharing our faith in Christ. And yet, what are we really afraid of—a raised eyebrow?
My Own Anxiety
I vividly recall my anxiety when I was preparing to introduce myself to each new class the first day of the semester. I knew that my department chairman was concerned about how vocal I might be about my faith. He had previously known one or two professors who had, as he expressed it, “preached to their classes” about their faith and then embarrassed themselves with poor teaching and/or inadequate research productivity.
His comments added to my natural fears about mentioning my faith in class. I found myself driven to stop and pray for the Lord’s peace. In class, during a five-minute introduction, I shared that the biggest thing in my life had happened in high school when I became a Christian, and that I would be happy to discuss my faith with them outside of class. Over many years of giving these brief words in class I did, in fact, see a few raised eyebrows (or frowns), but I don’t recall my chairman ever rebuking me—at least not for that!
At times I wondered if my words had any effect. Two years before my retirement I had the privilege of seeing the Lord “lift the veil” a bit and show me that my efforts were not in vain. Three of my former students were on campus recruiting for their companies. Without any prompting on my part, each of them mentioned that they could still remember their first day in my class when I mentioned my faith in Christ, and how meaningful that had been to each of them.
Take Some Small Steps
Hearing those comments were emotional moments for me. They convinced me that our students really are interested in knowing who we are, and not just what we can teach them about our disciplines. They are looking for personal role models, and want to know about our personal core values.
While some of my students–and colleagues—may have raised their eyebrows when I identified myself as a believer, I don’t recall losing any blood in the process. Some Christian professors, I’m sure, have suffered persecution for their faith, so I don’t want to make light of the potential risks. But this was what God led me to do.
Perhaps God will use my own experiences to help you personally take some small steps of faith in reaching out to your students and colleagues this year. I’ll be praying for you as you ask God to help you find creative and appropriate ways to give a testimony to the power of Christ in your life.
© 2006 John Walkup