my brother Jay Renfro's graduation speech = words to live by!

My brother, Roy James Renfro III, delivered this speech at Brentwood Academy's graduation today. I am so proud of him. He bestowed words to live by that I will treasure always.


Greetings family, friends, faculty, and the class of 2009. We can all agree, the past few weeks have been a blur, and I can only imagine the rest of life will be this way. In not too long, we will be at our 20 year reunion wondering what happened to all those young and "special" high school goofballs. We will all have families and responsibilities then. And beards too. And regardless of whether you are rich or poor, whether you have changed the world or established yourself as the town idiot, I hope you will be happy. For those who do not know me well, I have a reputation of being a happy person. Sometimes to the extent that it probably weirds some of you out. And so today, I would like to share with you all a little bit about what happiness means to me.

Society tells us that in order to succeed in life, we must relentlessly pursue a career until we are important or wealthy. While this sounds logical and is not complete treachery to the college bound child, it is lacking in one vital part: you can live for yourself your entire life, and you can make your life all about you, but as we have all learned in the scriptures, if you are without love, it is all in vain. You don't always have to feed yourself in order to be full. Great beauty lies in service and in those who take extra care to do something that brightens the world of another person. You all know this, and I have seen it in action throughout the year. I saw it when our class performed B.A.'s own edition of Extreme Makeover yard edition for a teacher who needed a lift in spirit. I saw it in dozens who allowed their blood to be taken in the gymnasium during the blood drive so that a complete stranger would be able to live. And I saw it in the countless hours invested in the service project to be a difference maker on an international scale. B.A. shines with the love of Christ. And this has made me a happy person over the years.

But don't get the wrong idea. You can't force people to be happy any more than you can convince the whole school that turtlenecks are a good idea. As cheesy as it may sound, happiness is a personal choice. It's what Charles Dickens means when he said, "I am resolved to be happy." Your attitude is the only thing that separates an inconvenience from an adventure. You will encounter your fair share of storms, so you have to learn to be content with the rain on your face.

So, class of 2009, I ask you, what makes you happy? What makes you come alive? Each one of you has a heart that beats and so each one of you has a deep passion for something, and it could be waiting to be unleashed. So unless you get your thrills from lighting other people on fire, find whatever this passion is and do it. This world does not merely need doctors or teachers or missionaries. It needs people who are alive. It needs people who are passionate. It needs people who have discovered how to live happily with themselves and with one another.

So class of 2009 I bid you to make other people happy, to dare to choose to come to life with the unexplainable love of Christ, and to discover the grand adventure that awaits you.