Jessi Barnes

“For what are you thankful?”

When asked the question, “for what are you thankful?”, my first thought is how thankful I
am that I am loved by the Lord. That “neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons,
neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor
anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in
Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:38-39). Not only that truth, but also that I get to go to
a college where my love for my God is not ridiculed, mocked, or judged. And I feel like
oftentimes we forget how countercultural Taylor truly is. I grew up with a group of friends
that stuck since kindergarten and watched almost every single one of them fall away
from the Lord as we grew up together. I felt so alone in my faith and my personal
convictions. What I believed and how I felt I should live as a result of that faith was
countercultural. The Lord calls us to live in the world, but not be of the world. As I tried
to navigate this, it became difficult to maintain my friends who pushed me to indulge the
things of this world. As I began to try to speak in a way that honored the Lord, dress in a
way that would honor the Lord, and surrender my thoughts that they would be pure
before the Lord and not bring others down, I felt my friends grow distant. They started to
leave me out of their weekend plans or not talk about certain things because I was a
Christian. At the peak of all this, I got to Taylor my freshman year and I was shocked to
say the least. All the girls on my wing were just so genuinely kind; the upperclassmen
took us freshman under their wings and mentored us like older sisters–taking us out to
coffee, leading small groups, helping me when I was drowning in Accounting. Our
brother wing felt like real brothers; especially when my roommate and I were stranded
at a McDonalds at midnight after my car broke down and three cars of brothers showed
up to help…some more helpful than others. My professors opened class with Scripture
on the board and prayer…which would never have flown at my high school. And my
calculus prof prayed Scripture over every single student, for me praying Colossians
2:6-7: “So then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live your lives in
him, rooted and built up in him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught, and
overflowing with thankfulness.” I feel like we forget that this is not normal. This does not
happen outside the Taylor bubble. The one thing that shocked me the most coming here
was that the students here truly had the joy of the Lord. I had never seen anything like it
and I feel like that is the reason why Taylor is so special…is because the students know
how the Lord sees them–with complete and utter love–causing them to overflow with
joy. I can attest to exactly this now being a junior at Taylor University. My heart overflows
with joy and thankfulness for this school. A school where the weekends aren’t spent
partying or drinking but going to dans, watching movies with brosis, playing pickleball, or
getting sick from taco bell. A school where our feet were washed as Jesus did to His
disciples. A school where I got to preach for the first time on that very passage in John
13 at our Met By Love ministry. A school where as a girl, I never have to open my own
door…chivalry is still alive at Taylor. A school where coffee dates and discipleship is so
normalized. A school where we pray on the spot for our friends in the middle of the
stu.A school where chapel and worship is cool and everyone gets so excited to give
glory to our Lord. And I’m not just trying to hype up Taylor because I work for
admissions. I am genuinely so so thankful to be attending a university that is so
countercultural and marked by the joy of the Lord.