Let There Be One

For thirty-one years I started my work-day walking into a classroom anticipating what the day would hold. I would visualize the students that would be sitting at desks waiting for me to deliver the lesson for the day or hoping I wouldn’t. As the school year progressed, I could see each student in their desks before they arrived. I knew which ones would need some extra help, which ones would need extra attention, which ones would be an extra challenge to keep in the room. I could picture the class before they arrived and when I prayed each morning and I could visualize each individual student. I generally knew what to expect and could pray accordingly.

This year is different.

For the first time in my career, from the first day of school and each day since, I walk into an office instead of a classroom. There are no desks to look at and no picture in my mind of the students who will sit there. There is no bell telling me when the students will be pouring in and when they will leave. I can’t picture the classroom that I will encounter on any given day or the students that will come my way. Each day brings a different combination of students in classrooms of one. Instead of kneeling at their desk to help them, I am talking on the phone and sharing a computer screen. I am no longer in charge of the lesson of the day. Each student works at their own pace in any of the 12 courses that I oversee. When I receive a request for help, it could be anywhere along the continuum of any course and I need to be ready to help where they are.

It is not only students that call, it is parents. I spend as much time talking to parents as I do to students. Sometimes the parent wants help, and sometimes we just need to talk about how things are going. Sometimes the parent and student need reassurance, or encouragement, or a verbal kick in the seat of the pants, or to vent about how much more difficult homeschooling is than they thought it would be. I find that my role is often equal parts teacher, coach, counselor and tech support. Finding the right words is often difficult, but sometimes it is surprisingly easy. My 31 years in the classroom has served me well for this moment, as has raising two kids who have turned out pretty good. I have been able to draw from a deep well of experiences as a teacher and parent, to speak into the lives of both parents and students, which has become more rewarding than I ever thought it could be.

Not every conversation has a great result, however. Some parents don’t want what I have to offer, they want to be left alone. Some listen, but they simply can’t bring themselves to do the things that need to be done to be successful. There are some that I can’t reach, and conversations are awkward and uncomfortable. Some families just never make it in this alternative system. Sometimes the family drops out or they are asked to leave because of their unwillingness or inability to play by the rules. While I love the positive interactions and struggle with those that don’t go so well, I have come to accept that this is just the reality of this job. With each day comes success and failure. In that way it is not much different from the traditional classroom.

This difference in what to expect from day to day, though, has caused me to think about how I pray each morning. It is definitely not the same. I never know what parent and/or student I might talk to during the day. It might be a family that is rocking homeschooling, or it could be a family that is sinking fast. Some families are in our program because of physical or emotional trauma, some because of religious conviction, some because they can’t go anywhere else, and some because of strong disagreement with the traditional school model. Most speak English well, but some speak Spanish or Russian or something else. Some are parents who are well educated and some never graduated from high school. Each need me in a different way and to a different extent. Very early in the year I began to wonder, “How do I pray each morning for a day and for students, not to mention parents, when I can’t anticipate needs like I did before?”

I was at a church event on a Wednesday evening watching a video on prayer. The video led me to thoughts about my job and my daily desire to impact the families that I interact with. I am always a little reluctant to claim special dispensation from God, but that evening a phrase formed in my mind – “Let there be one” – and it immediately made sense to me and it has become a daily prayer – “I don’t know who it is, and I don’t know what they need, but God, let there be one person today that receives your grace, your love, your whatever they need, through me.”

It has changed the way I approach my job each day. Instead of having anxiety about meeting needs or trying to help with math over the phone and on a computer screen, I anticipate the one (and I always hope that there will be more). Each phone call I make or receive, I start with anticipation that this person, or this family, could be the one for today. Maybe the one is a colleague or even one of my administrators. “Let there be one” has changed the way I view my day and my interactions with others. I have the phrase posted at the base of one of my computer monitors to remind me when I am working that I am anticipating “the one” throughout my day. I also have it posted on the bookshelf that shows prominently between my other two monitors, so that I can’t miss it when I talk on the phone. Throughout my day, whether I am talking to a student, a parent, or even a colleague, I am asking myself, “Could this be the one for today?”

Let There Be One.

The more the phrase has rolled around in my head, the more I like it, not just for a daily prayer for my job, but as a daily prayer for life. Imagine if every Christian impacted one other person every single day. What if every Christian said a simple prayer, “Lord, let there be one,” to start their day and lived out their day in anticipation of God answering that prayer? I believe that every day there is one for each of us that needs to experience God through us. The problem is that it is too easy for us to be blind to it. It is too easy for us to be so busy doing our job, or living life, that we are never aware of the person that is looking for God in us and so we hide Him. Whether intentional or not, the result is the same – we miss the one who would have been better if we would have allowed God to work through us.

Let There Be One. I would encourage you to try it as a morning prayer for a week or two and see if you see your day a little differently. Ask God to open your eyes and ears so that you are more aware of the “one” who might be part of your day. Ask God to help you be the one for the one.

Let There Be One.