Guest speakers encourage graduates to use degrees to transform the world
The Adventist University of Africa (AUA) recently celebrated their seventh graduation weekend June 8-10. Sixty-seven graduates marched down the aisle to receive their honorable degrees.
In his commencement speech, Ganoune Diop, PhD, the director of Public Affairs and Religious Liberty at the General Conference of Seventh-day Adventists (GC), stated “Degrees are just tools to proclaim the most excellent one—Jesus Christ . . . Our real calling is connected to love. Without it, any excellence is an illusion." He then quoted from 1 Corinthians 13. He urged the graduates and audience to look to Jesus—the epitome of excellence.
During the Baccalaureate service, Ademola Tayo, PhD, the president/vice chancellor of Babcock University, asked “Where in the midst of existence does our training have relevance for the society today?” He responded profoundly by stating, “Your training has prepared you to serve the world; to transform the world. Existence is not meaningful by living to be served but to serve.”
Samuel Makori, DMin, the East Kenya Union Conference president, reminded the audience of Christ’s attitude of humility without which “the most talented and gifted people are the most dangerous people in the world.” He amused the audience when he shared how he rode on a motorcycle—something he had never experienced—from the city to make it on time for the graduation program. He challenged the graduates to live above mediocrity and to be “excellent in all things, even in the least of things.”
The Vice Chancellor, Delbert Baker, PhD, charged the graduates to “Go on, Go on, Go on . . . Go on!”
Tributes from the graduates included gratitude to God for the strength to endure academic trials and tribulations; tributes to families—spouses and children—who sacrificed and denied themselves; and tributes to the University administration, faculty, staff and sponsors. John Njagi, one of the graduates, saluted the Adventist Churchhe Adventist Church’s world headquarters for bringing Adventist education within the reach of most Africans by establishing the Advenitst University of Africa.
During the same graduation weekend, the Adventist Church in Africa launched the African Seventh-day Adventist History website. The website, created and operated by the University, is a one-stop shop for free information, documents and material on the history of the Seventh-day Adventist Church in Sub-Saharan Africa. The website was born out of a partnership with the three African regions of the Adventist Church: East-Central Africa Division, West-Central Africa Division and Southern Africa-Indian Ocean Division.