This service is an SEBTS commencement service. The service begins with prayer (00:00-13:38). Douglas H. Pruden was recognized as the representative from this graduating senior class (13:39-14:29). President Stealey offers warm words of thanks and congratulations to this graduating class (14:30-19:02). He then introduces the speaker, Carl Elkanah Bates, who was pastor of First Baptist Church in Charlotte, NC (19:03-20:45). Special music and singing occurs before he begins to speak (20:46-26:17). His subject for the message is “Nineteen Years From Now,” relating his own life with the lives of those who are graduating and hoping to impart something helpful for them to carry into their futures, namely that God will be with them day after day, until the end of the age. He also encourages them to be fervent in prayer, humilty, and endurance, which are provided in God’s plan through His grace and love (26:18-50:21). The service ends in prayer (50:22-51:27).
On Friday, May 16, 1958, the graduation program was given in the SEBTS Chapel. The audio begins with the conferring of awards and degrees by Dr. Sydnor Stealey, the President of SEBTS (start-19:14). Dr. Olin Trivette Binkley, Professor of Christian Sociology and Ethics and Academic Dean of SEBTS, then gave the charge to the graduates (19:15-33:02). [The recording ends at this point due to the rest having being inadvertently overwritten at some point before digitization.]
On Thursday, May 15, 1958, the commencement sermon was given in the SEBTS Chapel. After the prelude and processional (start-0:34), Dr. Sydnor Stealey, the President of SEBTS, gave an invocation (0:35-2:40). After a few more songs, prayer, Scripture reading, and the graduates’ gift to the seminary (2:41-22:20), Dr. Dotson McGinnis Nelson, Jr., the pastor at First Baptist Church of Greenville, SC, gave the main address entitled, “Truth Incarnate” (22:21-1:07:15). The service concluded with a hymn, a benediction from Dr. Stealey, and the recessional (1:07:16-end).