Jericho Walk

My first year of teaching I was fortunate to have a room at Selma Jr. High, next door to Wayne Dixon. Ask any teacher and they will tell you that no matter how good your education is, there is nothing that can prepare you for that first day (or year) of teaching, and nothing is more reassuring than a kind veteran teacher that can help you through the experience. Wayne was that teacher for me and I am eternally grateful.

Wayne was a kind, gentle, Christian man that loved his students, and loved his job. As I was preparing my room the Saturday before moving in, Wayne stopped by and simply said, "Come with me." When you are a rookie summoned by the most experienced and respected teacher in the building, you don't ask questions, you just go. So I walked with him. At a fairly leisurely pace we started making our way around the perimeter of the school grounds. As we walked, Wayne started explaining. "This is my Jericho walk," he said. "I do this every year before the kids come to school. I walk the perimeter of the school and I pray for the students who will be coming here, that God will protect them and bless them. I pray that God will use me to be an encouragement and a blessing. I call it my Jericho walk because I pray that the walls that try to keep God out, will fall down and God will come in. Today I wanted to share my Jericho walk with you."

I can't imagine a better way to start not only my year, but my career. We walked, we talked, and we prayed out loud as we walked. When we got back to my room, I was ready to take on the world. I was honored to be asked to walk alongside a spiritual warrior, and to join in the battle with him. By the time the next year rolled around, I was looking forward to another walk with Wayne and he obliged. I was no less honored the second year than I was the first.

Year three, however, found me in another school, Wawona Middle School, and there was no Wayne. I remembered his example though, and I did my Jericho Walk by myself, because I knew I needed it even more because Wayne wasn't there. With year four came school number three, Cooper Middle School, and again I did my Jericho Walk on my own. I stayed put for awhile, but I never found another Wayne. In fact I was having a hard time finding another Christian teacher at all, at least not one that would join me on my pre-school walk. For a couple years I continued the tradition, but somewhere along the way I stopped, until I changed schools once again.

Our family made a major move from California to Washington just before my 12th year of teaching. Change has a way of producing fear, and fear has a way of reminding us of our need for God's intervention, so before my first year at Salk Middle School, I took a walk around perimeter and prayed for the walls to come down. While I did, I remembered and thanked God for Wayne. But familiarity breeds comfort and forgetfulness, and over time, again, I forgot about my Jericho Walk, until I changed schools again. Just like before, I started my new beginning with a walk around the perimeter, but, just like before, my comfort bred forgetfulness, and in the years since, my Jericho Walk has been sporadic.

In the book I'm reading (Dare to Drop the Pose by Craig Groeschel) I just finished a chapter on prayer. It was not at all a fluffy chapter, it was actually a little too real. I find that in most good books I read about living out my faith, there is a nice combination of encouragement along with some good kicks to the seat of my pants. This was one of those chapters. It got me thinking about aspects of my own personal prayer life, but also about the Jericho Walk (which is why I am writing all this now) that I have not carried on faithfully. As I finished the chapter I found myself lamenting that I have let this tradition fade away, and even worse, unlike Wayne, I have not passed the tradition on to others. 

Sometimes God is annoying. 

It is now the middle of August and school starts in just a couple weeks. At the start of vacation I had a stack of books to choose from for my summer reading. I knew the stack was bigger than I could get through in two months, but I like looking at a variety and having lots to choose from. I sort of wish I would have chosen one of the other books. Reading this book in September would have given me an "out" - I could have rationalized that it was too late to make amends for the current school year and I would have had a good eight months to let the whole thing drift to the back of my brain. Instead, as it is, I have two weeks to actually do something about my guilt, my sense that I have let Wayne down. 

Doing the Jericho Walk myself is a certainty at this point, but Wayne’s legacy was about more than an individual walk around the school grounds talking to God. Wayne’s legacy was about developing an awareness that we are in a spiritual battle that we can’t win on our own - we need God and we need our Christian colleagues to join us in the fight. It would be a dishonor to Wayne if I failed to pass on the Jericho Walk to my younger, Christian colleagues who I am so blessed to work with. But I am more hopeful than merely easing my guilt and starting something new at my own school.

So here it is - an invitation to all who have been willing to read this far. First of all, this is the first invitation to my colleagues to do a Jericho Walk of your own. I would love to join you on your walk (but I know, for some, that could be awkward) and I will happily participate in as many walks as I am asked to go on. If it is more comfortable to go on a walk with someone else, that would be awesome, and I would gladly pray for you, from the comfort of my air conditioned room, as you walk. If you want to go on your own, that is great too - alone time with God is a wonderful thing! 

If you are not a teacher, but love the idea of doing a Jericho Walk, there is nothing that says you can’t do one as well, and I am certain that there are dozens of school staff that would love to know that others took the time to pray for God’s intervention in the work that we do. I challenge parents, students and all friends of our schools, to do your own version of a Jericho Walk for whatever school you are connected with (or even some you’re not) and if you invite me, I will make every effort to join you. If you do it without me, (I certainly won’t be offended!) I would love to hear about it! 

Lastly, to my friends who are literally all over the world, I challenge you to do a Jericho Walk of your own, whether you are a teacher, a parent, a student, or just care about God being at work in the schools in your community, and to include others who might be willing to participate. If your school year already started, it doesn’t matter, just do it as soon as possible and include as many people as you can. There are no rules, just longing and asking for God to be involved for the sake of our students.

Wayne taught me much about teaching, but more importantly he reminded me that my teaching is worthless if I don’t include the love of Christ in what I do. He taught me to ask the Holy Spirit to work through me to impact those around me. I have not always done justice to the lessons Wayne Dixon taught me, but I hope I can finish strong and make him proud. More importantly, I want to make God proud and include him in my work, more than I have, and trust him to make a difference that I can’t make on my own. I hope some of you will consider helping/joining me in that endeavor and/or want the same for yourself.