A Peculiar People

Have you met Steven and Sydney, our two student leadership team co-presidents for 2019-20?  They’re a peculiar pair.  How about Ella, Zoe, Wade, Samantha, Jacinta, or Kira – the other members of our student leadership team?  They make a peculiar party. 
Have you met Mr. Ellens?  He’s on the SLT, and he’s pretty peculiar too.  Come to think of it, there are a lot of peculiar people on staff.  Miss Petrusma is my peculiar principal partner. 
This fall, I’ve gotten to know our incoming Grade 9 students in my art class.  There are a lot of peculiar people in Grade 9.  I’ve known the students in Grades 10-12 for a while longer; there are lots of peculiar pupils in those grades too. 
In my six years at Providence, I’ve gotten to know a lot of parents and grandparents.  Lots of peculiar parents and peculiar predecessors. 
This past spring, I attended a workshop on the topic of peculiar people and Christian schools.  The workshop leader read to us 1 Peter 2:9 from the KJV, which reads:
“But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light.”
The presenter talked about how this peculiar people were part of God’s story – the story of God’s covenant and peculiar people that we find in Scripture.  This story won’t be complete until Christ returns, and God’s covenant promises to His peculiar people are completely fulfilled.  And so, as God’s people today, we are called to be peculiar. 
What makes us peculiar?
It’s that we are God’s people, called to be His ambassadors and image-bearers to the world today.  This unique identity should make us peculiar in all sorts of ways.  We should be unique in who we worship.  Unique in how we build community, pursue understanding and wisdom, play in athletics, participate in the arts, seek entertainment.  We’re unique because we have new life in Christ – we have the gospel.  It’s our unique identity that makes us peculiar in the eyes of the world.
Someone wrote, “The primary goal of Christian education is the formation of a peculiar people – a people who desire the Kingdom of God and thus undertake their life’s expression of that desire.”  We want to invite students to explore their role in God’s Kingdom story, we want to nurture them to desire to be a peculiar person, and we want to empower them to practice their life’s expression of that desire. 
It’s my deep hope for each student this year that they will wholeheartedly embrace their peculiarity in Christ.  Let’s pray for that. 

• Mr. Vander Deen

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