SARAH MAYERCHAK COLE RETURNS TO GIVE THE 2025 STATE OF THE SCHOOL ADDRESS

Good evening, everyone! My name is Sarah, and I attended Faith Christian School from fourth grade until senior year when I graduated in 2019. I am so humbled to have an opportunity to come back and reflect on my 10 years of schooling here. Now, if there’s anything my time at FCS has taught me, it’s that to start any good speech, your audience needs a hook—so here’s mine. I’m going to take you back to my freshman year of college to my Introduction to German class:

Any time you learn a new language, you are going to have to go back to the basics: subject, verb, prepositional phrases—you get the idea. In one particular class, my teacher asked if any of us could explain the concept of an indirect object. No one budged. I raised my hand hesitantly and took my best shot at the answer. Safe to say, my teacher was surprised I could articulate a decent definition.

Now, I don’t tell you this to applaud my own knowledge of grammar or stand up here and claim to be the smartest one in a given room. I tell you this because it was the first time I realized how grateful I was for the base of knowledge I gained here at FCS. If my German teacher had asked that same question to my 5th-grade English class with Mrs. Pendleton or my 8th-grade Latin class with Mr. Riggs, so many more hands would have shot up.

The second spiritual discipline I learned at faith was working as unto the Lord. This idea of hard work and discipline is rooted in Colossians 3:23: “Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men.” My favorite example of this from my time at Faith Christian School was playing high school basketball. Before each practice and each game, the entire team would go through a devotional together. At each game, we were reminded what truly mattered, win or lose. Though we knew our worth was not tied up in the result of the game, we were still instructed by the Lord to give our best at the tasks he had set before us. When you couple this biblical concept with coaches who believe in you and are willing to invest in you, true growth happens. Believe me, 9th-grade Sarah was the opposite of a star on the basketball court. However, by 12^th grade, I did not look like the beginner I once was. Looking back, this time playing sports at Faith has helped me to realize that nothing in this life is purely physical. Each experience is an opportunity for us to grow in faith as well. When I would push myself to run extra hard that last lap during cross country practice or get up early to get to the basketball gym, I was cultivating spiritual disciplines as well. Praise the Lord, He has created us with drives and passions with which we can glorify Him!

The third spiritual lesson I was taught at Faith was to think deeply. In a culture where 7- 7-secondsecond entertainment and endless scrolling reign supreme, it is becoming increasingly harder to meditate on that which is good, true, and beautiful. God urges us to a life of meditation on the Word in Psalm 1:1-2: “Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers; but his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law, he meditates day and night.” The biggest way I was pushed to think deeply at Faith was twofold: first was reading books like the Iliad or the Divine Comedy in 9^th and 10^th grade, and the second was researching for my senior thesis. First, many of the books we read, like the Divine Comedy or the Iliad, are inundated with poetic verse from long ago, not the most intuitive to a 15-year-old. However, when we were given writing assignments based on these books, I was forced not just to read the difficult literature, but to understand it. Furthermore, while researching for my senior thesis, I had to not only understand my resources but also figure out which sources were reputable. Each effort was completed alongside teachers who had our best interests at heart (shout out to Mrs. Hopkins and Mrs. Knight!). My practical use of this spiritual discipline meets me every time I study the Word. If we desire to go forth boldly for the sake of the gospel and not be conformed to the patterns of this world, we must each know what the Bible says. This requires not just a reading, but a study of Scripture. When, with the help of the Holy Spirit, the Word is able to sink into our hearts, our lives begin to reflect the actions of a disciple of Christ. Though I still need much grace from the Lord as I engage with Scripture, I am so grateful I was encouraged to wrestle with difficult texts during my time at Faith. Praise the Lord, we can never stop learning from His Word!

In closing, as I was writing this address, I began to think of what I would have wanted my own parents to hear during my lower, middle, and upper school education here. To that end, I would encourage you all to pray for your kids that the things they learn here will take root and grow their spiritual walks. Pray that the Holy Spirit will work in their hearts to recall the verses they are instructed to memorize and the apologetics they are taught to articulate because, truly, the most important thing they do will not be getting a 4.0 GPA or making the all-tournament basketball team. The most important thing they will do is accept Jesus and walk with Him their whole lives. I am so grateful FCS, its staff, and its students were a part of my walk. Thank you again for the opportunity to stand here and share part of my journey with you. May the Lord continue to grow us all in discipleship, hard work, and deep thought as we seek to become more like Christ.