by David Melton
I love Boston. While I don’t know everything — far from it — I am almost obsessed with learning about our city. There is so much amazing history, so many fun idiosyncrasies, so much that makes this world-class city interesting, compelling, and gripping. But this week I learned something really significant about Boston — it has a city motto.
It’s right there on the almost ubiquitous yellow seal, in Latin, rolling across the top, SICUT PATRIBUS, SIT DEUS NOBIS. For us non-Latin readers, it can be translated … “as with our fathers, may God be with us.” My city, the home of the World Champion (again) Red Sox, the city of Paul Revere and Samuel Adams (the man), where you can have a Molasses flood, a Tea Party in a harbor, where two lanterns can become legendary, and seafood is always in the city. Boston has an incredibly serious city motto, pulled from the pages of Scripture.
Maybe it is not an accident that this is a mecca of education. The motto adopted by the city’s founders is a call for a well-informed mind. It requires us to know what God did in the past, and to yearn for that same God to do it again in our times. I’ll never look at Boston’s city seal the same way again. It is a call to task. It is a prayer for help.
Boston Baptist College is filled with students whose fathers have seen the work of God. Some of our students grew in ministry homes — they have lived the work of the church. They have seen what God does on spectacular days, on hard days, or normal days. But even more of our Boston students have a less overt spiritual legacy. So many of our students have seen God “with their fathers,” but without the two necessarily being on the same page. I am blessed to hear their stories. It stirs my soul to let some of the abundant grace run off of their hearts onto mine.
Our city motto is a tribute to our heritage, but it is also a forecast for the future. I am convinced it is educational. Our team here works hard to help students learn and understand what God has done in the past — that means biblical history as well as recent, personal history. But that precious reservoir is not just for curiosity or acquired knowledge — it is a compass. I am glad that students can study the remarkable lives of historic missionaries. But, I am equally, or even more excited that students can experience that which God has done for our fathers — He can do for us! Randall and Rachel Fernandez, BBFI Missionaries to Pakistan, will spend a few weeks this year on campus, here at their alma mater. They are “seal deals.” They, and so many others like them, are proof that God is not finished yet! God showed Himself mighty to our fathers. He is still doing mighty works. Now. For us. And that’s even better than lobster, or baked beans, or even another World Series trophy.