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DO NOT BE TRUE TO YOURSELF: Countercultural Advice for the Rest of Your Life
Kevin DeYoung
Countercultural Yet Biblical Advice for High School and College Students, Ideal for Graduation and Birthday Gifts
Most speeches addressed to high school and college students follow a similar theme: march to the beat of your own drum. This may sound encouraging on the surface, but Scripture exhorts believers to submit their lives to the will of God, not their own desires. Christian students need gospel-centered truth to guide them on their journey toward independence.
In this collection of inspiring sermons and graduation speeches, Kevin DeYoung delivers a motivational, biblical call to young people: serve God faithfully—and if necessary, counter-culturally—in the next season of your life. Do Not Be True to Yourself includes practical advice for cultivating a Christ-centered worldview in every area of adult life, including relationships, work, church participation, and spiritual growth, making it a transformational resource for mentoring students.
Written by Kevin DeYoung: Pastor and bestselling author shares relevant wisdom from past commencement speeches and sermons
Concise, Engaging Chapters of Counter-Cultural Advice: Christ-centered guidance that includes developing spiritual habits, prioritizing church attendance, fighting sexual sin, and temptation, and making godly decisions.
Includes Reading Guide: DeYoung suggests 12 classic Christian books every person should read, from writers including John Calvin, G. K. Chesterton, and R. C. Sproul
Perfect for graduation gifts, birthdays, or small group discussion
INTRODUCTION by the Author
"In May 2022, I had the privilege of giving the commencement address at Geneva College (Beaver Falls, PA). I didn’t want to recycle the usual commencement fare: “Follow your dreams! Be all that you can be! Go out and change the world!” Instead, I decided to give the opposite sort of advice, as you’ll see when you read the first chapter of this book. A few weeks later, I gave the same basic message at the baccalaureate service for Covenant Day School (the school associated with my church). I then posted the Geneva commencement address online. To my pleasant surprise, the message seemed to resonate with a lot of people. Besides getting a good following online, I heard from pastors and friends and Christians in various places who appreciated the countercultural sentiment. About a month later, Justin Taylor from Crossway asked if I would consider publishing that talk in a little booklet. The plan for a little booklet then morphed into this little book.
Over the years I’ve preached at a number of baccalaureate services and commencement services. I’ve also preached targeted sermons to high school or college students just beginning or just ending their studies. I’ve collected some of those messages here, retaining much of the spoken style so you can “hear” the message as well as read it. If there is a theme that holds the chapters together it is the simple exhortation to serve God faithfully and counterculturally in the next season of your life. Obviously, if you have just finished high school or college or some other milestone as a young adult, these messages will speak to your situation. This book is especially for you. But insofar as the counsel in these pages is biblical, I think Christians (and maybe even non-Christians) of all ages can read the book with profit. May God help us to live by his Spirit, according to his word, and for his glory—as young people, as middle-agers like me, and every stage of Christian discipleship."
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Introduction
Chapter 1: Don’t Be True to Yourself
Chapter 2: Choose for Yourselves
Chapter 3: The First Day of the Next Chapter of Your Life
Chapter 4: Two Ways to Live
Chapter 5: Horseshoes, Hand Grenades, and the Kingdom of God
Appendix: Twelve Old(ish) Books to Read When You Are Young
Notes
Scripture Index
ENDORSEMENTS
“Kevin DeYoung writes with inspiring clarity and pastoral love as he summons a generation of Christians to courage and nerve. As he puts it, ‘The choice that matters most is actually a lifetime of choices.’ This will be the book to give to your graduating high school and college students. But please don’t pigeonhole this book. Do Not Be True to Yourself is a brilliant and succinct call to all Christians to reject the spirit of the age in favor of the courageous Christian faith.” -Rosaria Butterfield, Former Professor of English, Syracuse University; author, 'Five Lies of Our Anti-Christian Age'
“Kevin DeYoung’s Do Not Be True to Yourself is a helpful antidote to a culture of self-obsession. If we’re learning anything about human nature in the age in which we live, it is that outsized focus on oneself produces disabling anxiety, disorienting ‘identities,’ and dizzying confusion about man’s ultimate end. It turns out, secular man’s chief end of glorifying himself is producing the very opposite of joy. This book shows why and shows a better, godward way forward.” -Andrew T. Walker, Associate Professor of Christian Ethics, The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary; Fellow, The Ethics and Public Policy Center
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