"First Years" for the Sake of the Gospel

The scene was Friday night of New Student Retreat. It was 10:30. We were starting an hour late. I had spent the previous four hours trying to sort through groceries for each beach villa where the students were staying--it had been a chaotic mess, it was my fault for not organizing it a little bit better, and I was grumpy about it. And tired.

I was trying to kick off the retreat with a high-energy, excited welcome and cheesy get-to-know you intro game. As part of the game, students were to introduce themselves and tell basic info--"even what year in school you are, since not all of you are freshmen."

During the chaos of the game, one of my more liberally-minded upper-class women passed by me and said, "Hey Alex! 'First years!'" She was trying to get me to replace the old-school term "freshmen" with the new, politically-correct word, "first years."

What I wanted to say at that moment of tired grumpiness was, "Screw that politically correct crap! I'm calling them freshmen if I want to!" I think that's what the Scriptures mean by life "in the flesh."

Fortunately the Spirit caught me up and I paused for a moment. Regardless of whether or not I wanted to change my language personally, what if that would actually make a difference for a new student in the community? What if by simply using "first years" in place of "freshmen" I built a bridge of trust for the gospel and for the Lord Jesus to cross into someone's life in a new way?

What if I surrendered my "right" to say whatever the heck I wanted to and instead bent over backward to remove any hindrances to the gospel so that it might be heard and received with great joy? What if this is what it means for me to serve my students, obviously especially the women in my chapter (who comprise something like 65-70% of our community) right now in real-time?

So I'm trying out "first years" for the sake of the gospel. Honestly, sometimes I'm still tempted to be really ticked off about it. My heart is still in the process of changing. But Paul talked about becoming all things to all people in order that some might be saved. For him, he forsake home, traditions, comforts, and ultimately his life. If all it means for me is to swap out one biased-sounding word for a more neutral one, is that so much for me to lay down?