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High school reunions are proof that God has a sense of humor. The class clown is now a judge, the quiet kid runs a Fortune 500 company, and the prom queen teaches Bible study in her spare time. Time changes our waistlines, hairlines, and headlines, but God never loses sight of who we truly are. Find out what class reunions have to do with your relationship with God in today’s message.
There’s something about a high school reunion that stirs up every emotion imaginable—anticipation, nostalgia, excitement, and, for some, dread. Hollywood has capitalized on this dynamic for years with humorous stories of former classmates awkwardly reuniting after decades apart. These stories work because they’re rooted in something we all recognize: the strange tension between who we were and who we’ve become.
Life has a way of reshaping all of us. And the reality is—our classmates knew us, but only in part. They knew the version of us that existed before life really got hold of us. They knew us before we were fully formed by time, struggle, grace, and growth.
I recently attended my 50th high school reunion. I graduated from St. Paul’s Catholic School in Norwalk, Ohio. Ours was a small class—around 97 students. Sadly 15 classmates have passed away. Of the remaining classmates, a very high percentage of them made it to the reunion. We were small-town kids, many of us having gone through all 12 years of school together. Now, we are almost 70 years old. We shared stories of our lives, our children and grandchildren, our joys and our hardships, our illnesses and our losses. We laughed. We remembered. And we looked at each other, trying to match faces with the memories we once had.
What struck me most was how much had changed, and yet, how much hadn’t. Some faces were familiar, and others were harder to place. Some names sparked a wave of old memories. Others had slipped away until stories brought them back. In every conversation, I felt the reality of time: how it humbles us, heals us, and transforms us.
And yet, despite all the changes, we were still the same in one way, we were still beloved children of God.
Scripture reminds us that God has known us from the very beginning: “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I dedicated you” (Jeremiah 1:5). Unlike classmates who knew us partially or briefly, God knows the whole of who we are. He knew us before we were. Not just before we were graduates, or before we became parents or grandparents, but even before we took our first breath.
He knows us in our best moments, and in our worst. He sees the dreams we never spoke aloud, the regrets we carry, the ways we’ve been hurt, and the ways we’ve hurt others. And, here’s the miracle, He loves us through it all. Not the “highlight reel” version of ourselves, but our full selves. The parts we proudly share and the parts we hide even from those closest to us.
Reunions make us reflect. They remind us how quickly time passes. They expose the illusion of perfection and the beauty of shared humanity. In the end, none of us escapes aging. None of us escapes loss. None of us escapes the shaping hand of life. But as Christians, we are not left in the dark. We have hope, not only because God knew us before we were, but because God is still shaping who we will become.
God is not finished with us. Whether we’re approaching seventy or just stepping into adulthood, our lives still carry meaning and purpose. We are still being formed, not just by years but by grace. The Holy Spirit continues to work in us, slowly conforming us to Christ, inviting us not only to remember the past but to press on toward the future.
As we reflect on the people we’ve been and the people we’re becoming, perhaps the most important reunion is the one we’re moving toward, the reunion with our Creator, the One who has always known us and always loved us.
Let’s be gentle with ourselves and with one another. Let’s honor the changes we’ve undergone. Let’s forgive who we were and embrace who we are becoming. And most of all, let’s trust that the God who knew us before we were, is still calling us, shaping us, and loving us, now and forever.
Heavenly Father, thank you for memories and lifelong friendships. Thank you for the opportunities you give us to reminisce. Thank you for shaping us over the years like clay in the potter’s hands. Thank you for loving us at all times. And, above all else, thank you for the gift of Your Son Jesus and the mercy He grants us each time we make a mistake, or fall short of your calling to live holy lives. Amen!
AMDG
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Please take a moment to share your thoughts about today’s message below.
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Brian, this is great. We had 26 in my graduating class and my Mother was proud of the fact that I finished in the top 25. We have lived in the best of times and I am very grateful. Thank you, Gayden.
Gayden
Thank you for your post. No doubt your mother was very proud of you to make that elite group.
Brian
Excellent!
Every Tuesday, Brian, your message is exactly what I need. What I will read again. Thank you.
Let us forgive who we were and embrace who we are becoming what’s beautiful sentence. Thanks Brian. God bless!