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By ANDREW SIMONSON | Sports Editor

VESTAVIA HILLS – After the notes of “Amazing Grace” rang out of a bagpipe, the Briarwood Christian School Class of 2025 processed down the center aisle of Briarwood Presbyterian Church to a piano rendition of “Pomp and Circumstance,” not just to celebrate their own achievements but the people who made them possible.

Thursday, May 22’s graduation ceremony gave students and speakers a chance to shine the light on their supporters before walking across the stage to receive their upper school diplomas and become the 53rd graduating class in BCS history.

The theme rang true from the very beginning of the graduation program. After a moment of thanks to God with a corporate singing of “A Mighty Fortress is Our God,” salutatorian Bella Herring started her speech by sharing her main feeling when reflecting on her time at BCS–gratitude.

“Each of us is here because of the people who have poured into us, our families, our friends, our teachers and our mentors,” Herring said.

As she took time to thank her mom, family, friends, teachers and God, she encouraged others to thank the people around them.

Valedictorian Hayes McKell continued the sentiment, thanking numerous groups of people even while keeping his speech short as advertised.

He expressed gratitude to God for all His blessings, his parents for setting him up for success, his teachers and tennis coaches for holding him to the highest standard possible and friends and classmates for making school fun.

“Despite our reputation in elementary school, I think we turned out alright,” McKell wise-cracked.

Briarwood’s choir then offered its own thanks with a two-pronged performance thanking both the graduates and God.

Accompanied by a piano, the choir first performed “For Good,” one of the climatic songs from the second act of “Wicked.” The song reflects on the relationship between friends, culminating in the chorus’ line, “Who can say if I’ve changed for the better? Because I knew you, I have been changed for good.”

The second song saw the choir move into a moment of worship with “Satisfied,” a deep cut from CCM artist Jordan Feliz that offers a full, unconditional surrender to God, saying “in only you may my soul be satisfied.”

Superintendent Gus Martin took time in the middle of his commencement speech to share his regret that he never properly thanked his high school teachers. He then encouraged the Class of 2025 to do so, and the graduates spent multiple minutes going over to the faculty section and embracing the teachers who made the greatest impact on them.

In the midst of the gratitude and reflection though, each speaker turned to what comes next–college and the world beyond.

Martin used a social experiment to illustrate his advice. One of the greatest violinists in the world took a $3.5-million-dollar violin and played an incredibly complex piece in the middle of a Washington, D.C. subway station.

Despite his fame within the classical music realm, passersby treated him as just an ordinary busker and went along their day, leaving him with $32 in his case and no applause when he finished.

He said the experiment posed a provoking question: if presented with beauty when we are not looking for it, will we even recognize it?

Martin urged the graduates to never be too busy to listen for the voice of God and what He has placed on their hearts.

“Busyness is the enemy of these very core things,” Martin said. “Create genuine opportunities to listen to what God places upon your heart.”

McKell made a similar plea to his classmates to seek the voice of God in their lives. He focused on their spiritual and physical gifts that each of them had been given and urged his peers to seek opportunities to use them to glorify God.

“My charge to you is to continue working hard in everything you do,” McKell said. “Each and every one of you has been given a unique gift, blessed by God, so as you go out into the world, use these gifts, not to glorify yourself but to glorify the one who gave you those gifts.”

Herring acknowledged to her classmates that the future to come was full of unknowns and uncertainties, but she harkened back to Romans 8:28 and its promise that “in all things God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to His purpose.”

“As we step into this next chapter, let’s do so with confidence not because we have all the answers but because we serve a God who does,” Herring said.

With that in mind, Briarwood’s Class of 2025 stepped across the platform to receive their diplomas and stepped out of the church doors to toss their caps, ready to embrace what comes next with those who have always been there for them.