The Blue
Tribune
The Blue Tribune is your place to learn about all things Covenant and keep up with stories from campus and beyond. By guiding you through the different aspects of Covenant, we'll help you decide if you want to pursue your very own Covenant experience.
From Texas to Georgia: My Journey to Covenant
From Fear to Faith
Trying to decide what college to go to is many highschooler’s biggest life decisions. I knew I wanted two things: to leave Texas and to follow God’s plan for my life. My greatest fear was that those would not be the same thing. Was choosing what I wanted bad?
As I was wrestling with this fear, my father shared a Bible verse with me that shaped how I handled making big decisions. Proverbs 19:9 says, “We can make our plans, but the LORD determines our steps” (NLV). This verse gave me so much peace as I made college decisions. It completely flipped my expectations for how God worked in my life; I used to think that God had an end goal for me, and it was my job to get there. But this verse said the complete opposite, I could make big life-changing decisions because God was guiding each of my smaller steps. My final destination was firmly in His hands.
New Challenges
I heard about Covenant through an online conference with Worldview Academy. At the end, they shared a list of christian colleges that are worth considering, and Covenant College found its way onto my list of colleges to visit! I visited campus on spring break of junior year, and as we left the mountain and drove back home I remember saying, “This is my dream school.” It was the first college visit that made me excited for this next stage in life. Rather than being afraid, I became passionate about studying English and excited to learn more about the Lord with my peers. After a lot of prayer with my parents, I submitted my application and got accepted. That next fall, I moved to the mountain without knowing a soul here.
Nothing could have prepared me for how challenging it would be to leave Texas nor how much I’d grow. I have another friend who also moved across the country for college, and we talked about our shared experience of feeling “orphaned.” In the first few months that I lived at Covenant, it would hit me that I was in an unfamiliar place surrounded by strangers. Whereas my friends would leave to go home on weekends or have their parents come up to visit, I found phone calls from home to be increasingly more rare and life events to keep happening at home without me.
Finding Joy in the Uncomfortable
My early college life could have been a very isolating experience, but through my homesickness I found a strong community at Covenant. Not having any connections drove me to pursue and develop stronger relationships on campus. I had to learn to advocate for my needs and relied on my friends in more ways than I expected.
But even though I was alone, I felt at home praising God with other believers and I found joy in looking for a new church community. Experiencing the different faith traditions around Chattanooga was instrumental in my spiritual growth. I also savored the worship during chapel mornings.
The more I did life with my new community, the more I grew sure that God had planned this step in my life. I am so glad I had the boldness to leave my comfort for such a great joy.