On 12 November 2021, the Dean of the Faculty of Theology and Religion, Prof Jerry Pillay, hosted his annual Merit Awards Ceremony at the Netherdutch Reformed Church of Africa's Philadelphia congregation, near the University of Pretoria’s Hatfield Campus.

A total of 20 undergraduate and postgraduate students were recognised during the event for their outstanding academic achievement.  In his role as head of Teaching and Learning for the Faculty, as well as Master of Ceremonies on the day, Prof Jaco Beyers congratulated all the awardees, likening them to birds that fly at the front of migrant formations, pointing the way for others in the flock to follow.

Prof Pillay then delivered the keynote address, using the story of Joseph from the Old Testament of the Bible as his central illustration. Like Joseph, who overcame great obstacles in life on his way to leadership and community service, the Dean acknowledged that the past year presented unique challenges because of the pandemic, but those recipients of merit awards had demonstrated their resilience by overcoming such challenges. They made the most of their circumstances and, with the help of personal support networks, pursued an unshakable vision for their preferred futures.

Before the certificates were finally presented and guests were invited to a reception thereafter, Ms Amber-Leigh Gordon, the highest achiever amongst all the top-achievers duly recognised, blessed everyone with the speech below, as a word of encouragement to her Faculty family.

Good morning everyone. To the Dean (Prof Pillay), to all our lecturers and Professors, to all the faculty members, to all the parents and those who are here in support of the award winners and to all my fellow students – dumelang, sanbonani, molweni – I greet you.

It is an extreme honour and a privilege for me to be standing in front of you today, not only, in receiving this award but also to address you and share a bit of my experience at the University of Pretoria’s Faculty of Theology and Religion.

As I stand before you, I will admit, this came as an absolute surprise. The day Mr. Dana Mahan contacted me to inform me that I have received this award – I very nearly asked him if he was speaking to the right person. With that being said, all the honour and glory goes to the Almighty God, because you see without Him, I would not even closely be where I am today.

To give you an indication of my experience, like a typical minister doing an exegesis before a sermon, let me begin by telling you a little bit about my Theological journey thus far – in other words, as we have been told so many times in class before, start with the background.

Now, something you might not readily know about Theology students, especially those who “stick-it-out” and complete their courses or degrees, is that they all have different reasons and happenings behind why and how they end-up in the Faculty of Theology and Religion. Some begin their journey’s wanting to go to another field but instead “fall-in-love” with Theology and they remain, others come with a set purpose of becoming ministers and many times there are those who do not know where they belong, and they eventually find a home among all the Theologians.

For me, let’s just say God works in mysterious ways and has a really good sense of humour. I belong to the Uniting Presbyterian Church in Southern Africa (or UPCSA for short), my father is a minister as well, and as a result, I literally grew up among theologians and in the Church. As a little girl, I grew up in the University of Stellenbosch’s Faculty of Theology, still to this day recognising some of the different Professors, such as Prof Punt and Prof Jonker.

And low and behold, at the UPCSA’s Call Discernment Conference, Rev. Sipho Ncapyi, who sadly is no longer with us, looked at me (and I will never forget this) and said, in this accent, “aah Amber, we see a calling on your life, but, we don’t want you to be in the shadow of your father, so you can’t study at home, and we don’t want to send you to Stellenbosch either, cause that’s like sending you home … so… we are throwing you in the deep end, you are going to Pretoria, we want to see if you can swim”. You see, I knew nothing of Pretoria, and was completely terrified, even more so because at this time we were living in Kimberley, a small town in the Northern Cape, that funnily enough Prof Essias Meyer knows a lot about.

Whether Rev. Ncapyi knew this or not, that day, when the Ministry Committee made that decision, they sent me to my new home, a place where I grew the most of all. A place where I saw God working in, among and through the people – whether they knew it or not.

For the duration of my Bachelor’s degree in Theology, I resided in the UPCSA’s Sedibeng House of Studies, where theology students, predominantly from the Presbyterian denomination, live and work together. I will never forget waking up at 05:00 in the morning, just to be on time for our first lecture of the day, that began at 07:30 (and it was usually New Testament studies) – and the day only ending at around 21:00 in the evening (because you see someone had to find the research for all the Old Testament debates with Prof Geyser Fouche), however, come rain or sunshine, the Sedibeng House students were always in class – we were part of the furniture eventually. And on the very tough days – because contrary to the beliefs of many, Theology is not as “easy” as it seems – we would sing our “anthem”, the well-known Xhosa hymn of “Hosanna enyangweni” (which when translated to English means “Hosanna in the Highest!) as we would walk into class – essentially you could hear us coming from a mile away.

In many ways, my experience at the University of Pretoria’s Faculty of Theology and Religion, dare I say, has been rather different from many other students who study at this University. Now, for those who have either come into contact with me, or who have gotten to know me, know full well that I absolutely adore asking questions, and unfortunately my Professors bore the brunt of this trait – especially Prof van Eck who would receive a plethora of questions after almost every New Testament lecture, and would graciously and patiently answer them all as best he could and Prof Duncan who received many questions on existentialism both during our lectures and the UPCSA formation classes held at the Faculty.

You see, if you never ask, you will, most probably, never know.  

And like St. Augustine of Hippo – who is one of Prof Wim Dreyer’s favourite characters to teach about – purported so many years ago, one can never know enough. Here at the Faculty of Theology and Religion, my knowledge, and overall life, was enriched tremendously, not only because our lecturers and Professors are of the highest calibre in the world, but also because, like the Prophet Jeremiah in the Bible, here we have a fire in our bones – or as Prof Boesak likes to put it a Holy Rage, that drives us forward to know more, to encourage more, to love more (as the ‘Feast of the Clowns’ has humbly taught us) and to try to be exactly who God wants us to be.

The Faculty of Theology and Religion, at the University of Pretoria, is not your “average” or “everyday” Faculty, it is a place where you are given the platform to explore, to question, to argue and debate – something that Theology students are well-known for, might I add, and tend to frighten the Music students just across from our Faculty – but most of all (it is a place where we are given the platform) to grow.  More than this, however, it is a place where, if you are willing to open yourself, you will gain a family for life.

As theology students, we always used to joke about how “you knew, you were in the University of Pretoria’s Faculty of Theology and Religion, when you had various group assignments lined up and due very shortly”. In doing our group assignments, and in completing our Community Engagement to the best of our ability, my group members and I grew so close that we became a family within our Faculty. And of course, there were a few days that we looked forward to most of all – and two of these days were and still are unique to our Faculty. The first one, was the day, held at the beginning of the year, when our Faculty has its annual service in the ‘Musaion’ to start-off the year. And the second day, we looked forward to, was when our Dean would cancel classes for a short period of time, so that the students, lecturers and other staff members could spend some time getting to know one another – a day that many other students from other faculties were very jealous of.

As part of my “testimonial” for today, I was asked to give a bit of advice and encouragement to those listening. Now, I have never particularly been the best at advice, however, one thing that has always “stuck” with me throughout my studies, are the words of my High-School Mathematics teacher Mr. Owen du Plooy, who recently became the Principal of Northern Cape High-School. He said these words to me moments before climbing on an aeroplane and starting my Theological journey, here at the University of Pretoria. And his words were, “never say “if” I achieve it, miss Gordon, but “when” I achieve it…”

Theology is perhaps one of the most intimidating fields of study, not only are we faced with a very large mountain to climb, while we are studying – and do not be fooled, it does not get easier at post-graduate level – but so too are we as theologians put in the spotlight outside of the University, when real life situations come knocking on our doors. The “answer” in this situation, is to never give-up – or as my grandfather used to say “never say die”. We all know the strain, pressure and complete fatigue that comes with studying theology, but no matter how tired you are – and now I am going to sound like a preacher – grab onto God, ask Him to strengthen you – for after all, whether you know it or not, whether you care to acknowledge it or not, it is Him who placed you here, and He did so with a purpose.

As I end-off, I would like to leave you with a verse that one of my good friends, who was also one of my group members (Pastor Nomuhle Masiya), and I adopted in our first year – now, this verse has kept us going, not only, in our studies but in all facets of our lives – and that is Philippians 1:6, and bear with me because the Good News translation puts this in the most meaningful way, and it says, “… I am certain that God, who began the good work within you, will continue His work until it is finally finished…” (Ph. 1:6;GNB).

THANK YOU!