Gathering to Express Gratitude at Calvin University
President Greg Elzinga visits with faculty and staff during a Thanksgiving lunch held at the Prince Conference Center on campus.
On Thursday, November 14, the President's Cabinet hosted a Thanksgiving meal for faculty and staff of Calvin University. More than 300 people joined together in the Great Hall of the Prince Conference Center to fellowship with colleagues, to enjoy a full Thanksgiving meal served by members of the president’s cabinet, and then to publicly express what they are grateful for. President Elzinga kicked things off.
I will start. I am deeply grateful for this community. I’ve said it multiple times, but this community means the world to me,” said Elzinga. “I was just in New York and New Jersey meeting with some alumni and recruiting students and some donors and some pastors and I said ‘if you get to the point in your life when you love what you do, you love why you do what you do—the purpose, and you love the people you do it with, that’s a great place and I have that here.’
Over the course of the next 15 minutes as dozens of pre-written expressions of gratitude from the community were shared on large screens throughout the Great Hall, a number of faculty and staff added to the list.
“I’m grateful for my team in the Career Center. My team is phenomenal, they make me want to be here. They are absolutely amazing. They’re family. I tell them I love them,” said LaShone Manuel, a career coach.
“Those of us who are working in the classroom we are so grateful for all of you who come around us and help us when we don’t know what we’re doing with our budgets or with our staffing or whatever it is,” said Jennifer Holberg, professor of English. “I just always feel surrounded by such good support people who care about me, who are my friends, but who are so good at their jobs. So, from the faculty I just want to say to the staff we just appreciate you so much, and thank you.”
Whether working at Calvin for months or decades, the common thread was clear: gratitude for the community.
“I want to say I’m very thankful for how welcoming everyone has been. It’s a community that I’m not used to,” said Lydia Henry, who joined Calvin’s events team nine months ago. “I worked in hotels before this in hospitality and it’s very different being in a community that puts God first and is just so warm and welcoming. I’ve never been able to go to a Thanksgiving lunch with everyone that I work with, so that’s a really neat experience. I really feel that God brought me here.”
“I’m in my final and 40th year at Calvin,” said Lori Keen, lab services manager. “So, I’m thankful for 39-plus years of just a fantastic place to work, for my colleagues in biology, and I’m thankful that I get to retire in June.”
“This is my 17th year and I just want to give thanks for many answered prayers over the course of those 17 years,” said Jason Stansbury, professor of business. Whether for enrollments, whether for successful conferences, whether for new colleagues, whether for capable leaders, whether for donors, whether for publications, over and over and over again this has been a community of prayer and God has listened and God has answered and I think all of us can think of the ways that God has answered prayers. And so, I’m thankful for mine that He’s answered and I’m thankful for yours that He’s answered as well.”
Colleagues continued to share testimony of God’s faithfulness and then Elzinga closed the time in prayer:
“Heavenly Father, we come before you with hearts of gratitude. We just heard so many ways Lord that you are working in and through this community and families and the lives of individuals and families, and we are so grateful for your goodness and your graciousness in our lives. Lord, we heard many stories about how people are grateful for this community, for colleagues, for a mission that unites us, for a purpose and a work that you have called us to. So, thank you for the privilege of carrying out this work. And I thank you for each and every person who makes up this community, what a great beautiful example of the body of Christ here at Calvin, unique gifts each person complimenting the body and serving and encouraging in different ways. So, we thank you for that.”
“… We pray for the leading and guiding of your Holy Spirit as we move forward as a community … And as we leave this place today, we pray that we will carry out the work that you’ve given to us with excellence, serving our students well. We pray for all of our students, faculty as a busy time of the semester is coming up, just pray for perseverance, for energy, for health and that you will continue to work in and through our mission so that you will be glorified. Father, we ask all of this in the name of your son, our Lord and Savior, and in Jesus Christ we pray, Amen.”