Relay For Life

Last weekend I was walking around the high school track with Sandy, during the Relay for Life. We were walking slowly, reading the names on the luminaries when it hit me. One month and 13 years ago I spent two weeks in Aurora, Colorado, with most of my family, sitting with my sister who was dying from cancer that had metastasized in her brain. On August 7 of 2000, just a week short of her 49th birthday, she passed away. It seems strange to say, but in many ways those two weeks were amazing. It is not often that we are able to gather around our loved ones before they die. Too often death happens without warning and we are left with regrets - things undone and things unsaid. But we had time to say the things we needed and wanted to say. We had time, as a whole family, to cry together and laugh together and affirm our love for one another. It was powerful, and, strangely, it was a blessing.

In the midst of tragedy, our family bonded together like never before and God was at work in ways that I would have never anticipated. In me I was questioning my faith, in good ways mostly. I prayed in ways I had never prayed before. I remember holding my sister’s hand while she lay unconscious in her bed. On the outside I talked to her, hoping she could hear and understand me, but inside I was talking to God and it was all kind of surreal. I don’t know if my sister found any comfort in that, but I did. God granted me a sort of peace that I had not experienced before, because I never needed it before. From the beginning of the two weeks to the time I came back home, I changed. My faith changed. I can’t say that I understood all the questions why, any better, but the answers didn’t matter so much because I understood that God was in control. For the non-Christians in my family, things were much different when they got home, and they think about that time much different even today. For them there was no peace. There was no forgiveness and no greater purpose. For them there was bitterness and anger and resentment. Several months later, I heard from my brother-in-law - he had given his life to Christ and wanted me to know. For the non-Christians in my family, that brought no comfort and in some ways it seemed to compound the resentment. But for me and for my parents there was rejoicing that God made something beautiful out of something that seemed so painful. For me it affirmed my sense that He was in control all along.

I thought also of my Dad, who lost his battle with cancer seven years ago. Again, we were blessed with the opportunity to gather as a family, to say the things we wanted to say, to cry together and laugh together. And again God taught me about His peace and the way that he was in control. This time he taught me about the church - that it is far more than just a building and a place to worship on Sundays. God taught me that often my judgements about people are misplaced and what I see on the surface is not always a good representation of what He is doing inside of them. The church I grew up in, the church that I had developed a certain distaste for, did amazing things for my dad and my mom and for all of us. They cared for both my mom and dad when my sister and I were not able. They brought food, they ran errands and they came just to make sure there wasn’t anything else that was needed. They spent sleepless nights by my dad’s bedside when my sister and I could not be there, so my mom could rest. They embrace our whole family and extended family and made us part of their church family. They loved us and served us and sacrificed for us without any expectations.

I learned again, that God was in control in ways that were far beyond my understanding.

I remembered my sister, Pam, and my dad as I walked and there was still sadness in my heart, but there was also peace. God reminded me that he is in control - he was then, he is now and he will always be.

the Explicit Gospel

On my bookshelf in the basement I have a section set aside for the books that have had significant, long-lasting impact on my faith and/or how I view or live my life. In the past few months I have added two books to that shelf. 

If you know me at all, or read much of my writing, you know that I have a certain disdain for the often thoughtless language we use in the Christian community (including when I use it). We tend to throw around many words that simply identify us as being part of the group or make us sound “spiritual,” but the way we use them often betrays the true meaning of the words. Often we simply mimic the use of words as we have heard them from others in our Christian group, but we haven’t taken the time or made the effort to understand the implications of what is being said. If we were to look carefully at the “Christian” language that we use, I suspect that we would find our language reflects our ignorance - the direct result of our unwillingness to read, to study, and to seek understanding, or sometimes the more subtle result of understanding our faith through the tainted filter of American culture.

One such word that is often used loosely, is the word “Gospel.” Both the word itself and the implications of the word are frequently misunderstood, even amongst long-time Christians and/or misused in our conversations and statements about our faith. Sometimes this misunderstanding and misuse is out of ignorance, but sometimes it is a reaction of dissatisfaction with the church and how it has traditionally responded (or not) to the gospel. Trying to react in a more appropriate way to the gospel may be well-intentioned, and have a powerful impact on those involved, but the end result sometimes distorts the true meaning of the gospel. The response to the gospel is not the same as the gospel itself.

If we are not careful, all of this can lead to a bit of confusion about the gospel and what, exactly, the gospel message is about. It can cause us to act in well-intentioned ways, but confuse our actions with the true gospel itself. Breaking through the cloudiness of this issue is Matt Chandler’s book, the Explicit Gospel. In a readable, methodical, precise way, Matt Chandler details the message of all scripture which culminates in gospel. Along the way he touches on the dangers of overemphasizing certain aspects and responses to the gospel at the expense of the others and dispels misuses and misunderstandings.

The Explicit Gospel has opened my eyes to my own misunderstandings and has caused me to re-orient my thinking and my response to the gospel. It filters out the catch phrases and the pollution of American culture (which we don’t even realize has so greatly influenced our thinking) to explain what is the very basis of our faith. It confirms in the reader correct belief while surgically removing error. It encourages appropriate response for the right reasons. It reminds us of the reason to have hearts of gratitude. It refreshes a thirst to do what brings glory to God. 

All of this makes the Explicit Gospel one of the most important, must-read books of recent time and it will cause you to read scripture with eyes that are more open to the truth before you.

Teacher Integrity

I just finished a week of training in Ohio for a class I will be teaching this next school year. I joined 17 other teachers under the instruction of two other educators who had extensive experience with curriculum. This post is not at all about the training itself, but one element of the experience that I still find troubling, an issue that has been troubling me all year.

Near the beginning of the last school year I had a blog post voicing some frustration over the near paranoia that schools are experiencing with teachers having contact with students outside of the classroom. In our district we had been directed to disconnect from our students and former students as much as possible. We were told not to initiate phone calls or texts with students (whether past or present). If we responded to a text message to a student we were instructed to include our principal in the exchange. If we answered or returned a phone call from a student, we were told to notify our principal. Of course giving rides to students was forbidden as well. And lastly, we must "unfriend" students on Facebook and deny requests to be their friends.

There is a degree of reasonableness to all of this, I understand. Ultimately, the district is trying to protect teachers, students and itself, from inappropriate associations. I get that. But I changed jobs 8 years ago so I could live in the same community where I taught. I was tired of only seeing my students during the school day and not being able to connect with them outside of class. Living where I teach provides me the opportunity to know my students (and former students) as friends, as neighbors, as participants in the youth group in our church. Living where I teach has allowed me to teach the friends of my children, to see my students in the grocery store and around town at a wide variety of events. It has allowed me to attend sporting events and concerts of students. It has given me the chance to be a part of special events alongside my students and I have even been able to do short term mission trips with my students. In short, living in the same community where I teach allows me to know students and former students outside of the classroom and it allows them to know me.

But here is the problem...

While at training this week, I was reminded of why school administrators may not want students to know their teachers outside of the classroom. Teachers are often different people when they are not in the confines of a school. I was appalled this last week at the language that was deemed acceptable during our training. Vulgarity and profanity were common and only once did I hear an instructor make any attempt to stifle it (and it was a very weak attempt). Instead instructors often found the language humorous and, apparently, appropriate for our situation. Throughout the time there were also references to drinking and inappropriate sexual conduct that received more than a fair share of laughs. While this language did not dominate each day, it was, nonetheless, common and accepted. I can't imagine any of the teachers allowing that to occur in their classrooms with their students, but for some reason, in a class of "adults" the language is allowed to change. I did not participate in evening meals out (I was a late addition to the class and spent my evenings trying to get caught up), but, from conversations about previous evenings, it was clear that drinking was a part of the nightly fare. I can't speak to excessive drinking, but joking comments about getting drunk and being drunk were made. Whether those were completely in jest, or not, I can't say.

My point to all of this is to simply say that after the training was finished, I was sadly reminded of why such seeming paranoia can overcome a district. Do I want my son or daughter to see their teacher drunk or even drinking? Do I want them to hear their teacher tell dirty jokes? Do I want them to view the teachers' filthy language or questionable pictures on Facebook? Do I want my kids to see that teachers have different expectations of their students than they are willing to conform to themselves? Some might not see a problem in all of that, after all, they are just being "real" and students should be okay seeing that. But if being "real" is acceptable out of the classroom, why isn't being "real" acceptable in the classroom?

I got into teaching because I wanted to have a positive influence on the students I taught, but I never believed that the influence should only be isolated to the classroom. I have always wanted my students to see me as a man of integrity (not just a teacher of integrity), both in and out of the classroom. If they see me in the grocery store, I want them to know that what they see in me and what they hear from me, will be consistent with what they see and hear in the classroom. When my son or daughter's friends come to our home, I don't want them to be surprised by what they see and hear, I want them to be reassured that I am still the same. When the neighbors see me in the yard or walking my dog, I want them to see the same person that they would see at my school.

A teacher once told me how nice it was to live out of town from the school where he taught, so he could just be himself without fear of his students observing him. My heart sunk when I heard that said out loud, even though I had actually observed it lived out for many years. I cringe when teachers find such a double life not only acceptable, but normal and even expected. Because of that, districts try to shield students from seeing the truth of teachers' double lives. Because personal integrity (in and out of the classroom) and moral consistency are no longer expectations of teachers, or even in society as a whole, we must put up barriers to shield our students from seeing beyond the school day. What a sad statement about where education has gone.

It is no longer the expectation that a teacher or a coach or an advisor should be a role model for students. Instead we expect that the job of a teacher or a coach, is only about the subject that they teach. It is about communicating the right information, about passing tests and winning games. Sadly, the job of a teacher or a coach no longer has a moral calling, it has become just another job and students must look elsewhere for role models.

Unified Worship

Today a remarkable thing happened. Something that should not have been unusual, but was. Something happened that was beautiful in its simplicity, and exhilarating in its obvious rightness. Today was one of those days where you look at those around you and wonder why it took so long for this to happen.

Today, four area congregations, all with different affiliations, different styles, and different cultures, but who worship the same God, the same Lord and Savior, came together to worship together as one church. 

What a crazy idea...

And it was wonderful!

I kept hearing in the days leading up to this event and even at the service itself, how unusual it was that congregations in the same community would join together for worship on a Sunday morning. Each time I heard it said I found it unsettling. How did we get to this place, where local churches are in competition with one another and refuse to work together, to fellowship together and to worship together? Isn’t it an incredibly sad statement about where we are in the church when it is considered strange to have local congregations join together to do one of the most basic actions of our faith? The more I thought about it, the more astounded I was. But after today, I am also hopeful and I am excited about my hope.

Today the congregations worshipped together and relished the time together. For the first time, for most of us, we joined with Christian neighbors, who just happen to attend services at a different building, and we worshipped with them. When the service was finished, we shared a meal and fellowshipped with them. I have neighbors just six houses away from me, that I saw for the first time in the context of “church.” I have talked with them before and knew of their faith, but in the many years of knowing them, I have never worshipped with them. Doesn’t that seem odd? But that was corrected today and I have no doubt today will not be the last time.

Today was so obviously right. Worshipping with neighbors, with brothers and sisters from other congregations, was an incredible blessing. Seeing our pastors humbly join together was inspirational. Setting aside differences was refreshing. And knowing, beyond any reasonable doubt, that God like what he saw, was satisfying to the soul. It was a touch of how things ought to be. Not that our churches should all merge as one, but that we should welcome opportunities to be together and enjoy our common bond in Christ. 

Today was a greater taste of unity in the church, and I liked it!

Hirelings and Shepherds

Almost as soon as I posted my last blog (The Call to Ministry), I saw this beginning to a different blog, from one of the pastors of a well known mega-church, titled, “It’s Not A Job When It’s Ministry”:

“At the time, I was president of a successful company that was a piece of cake to manage. My life was quiet, comfortable, and easy. I wasn’t looking for a change. Why give up CEO status to be an executive pastor at a church?

For me, the answer was simple (if not easy): God called me out of a job and into ministry.

The difference between job and ministry represents the dividing line between hirelings and shepherds: those who work because they get paid by the church, and those who work because they love the church. A job is a paycheck. Ministry is a calling.”

It was almost immediate affirmation of what I had just posted. The phrase “full-time” is not used, but the associated implication comes through loud and clear - you can’t be in a secular job and do ministry. Even worse, if you are in a secular job you are just an “hireling” and can’t be a shepherd. And, of course, there is the “calling.” Apparently God could not call this man to minister in his secular job, because that is not really possible, so he was called out of his secular job into “ministry,” which of course means he was called to be a pastor (remember in Christian language “minister” and “pastor” are synonymous).

Maybe I am being hypersensitive, but this reeks of holy arrogance. Even the title of the blog post carries the implication that “I am doing something special and really spiritual and if you are not a “minister”, then you’re not.” I am sure that is not the intent, and I would guess that the author of the blog does not even see it because it has become such a commonly accepted way of talking in Christian circles. But I believe words and phrases have subtle ways of shaping the way we think and behave. When we are careless with our words it shapes how people think and respond to us, even when we are not fully aware of it.

I do not deny that some are given special gifts and are called to do special jobs. Ephesians 4:11 says, “So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers...” But it is important to read on to verse 12 and 13 so we understand why Christ gave some to do those jobs, “...to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ.” That sounds a lot like doing the work that some would call “ministry.” In fact, it could be, and has been argued, that if pastors are simply doing all the ministry, they are not really doing their job. Their job is not to simply “do ministry,” but to train others to do ministry. In fact I have heard some pastors say that, ideally, they should work themselves out of a job by training those in the congregation to do their job. And that is where the disconnect often comes.

How does the author of this blog train another man, who works in a secular job, to do ministry? Does he encourage him to quit his job? Does he tell him to wait for a calling? Does he tell him to go to Bible school? If he does not do  any of those, how can this pastor tell the man to do “works of service” by staying where he is, when the pastor did not see that as an option for himself?  

In fairness, the blog is really about treating the position of a “minister” like it   is just a job, and it is a warning against a lack of understanding that it is about so much more. But I would contend that the same mindset should be true of any job. Although the passages do not directly talk about our jobs, we are quick to apply 1 Corinthians 10:31 and Colossians 3:17 (and rightly so, I believe) to our jobs and and everything else that we do to give them purpose and meaning:

“So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.” (1 Corinthians 10:31)

“And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.” (Colossians 3:17)

The reality is, that if we can’t apply those concepts to our jobs, then we are truly wasting our time by being in those jobs, because nothing else matters. If my actions, if the things that I do, do not bring glory to God, than those actions are worthless. If I am spending 40 hours a week or more doing something that is completely worthless, then I should quit. God’s glory is far too important for me to spend so much time dishonoring God. So, we must believe that our lives can glorify God in our job and we must also believe that we can carry out the great commission in our jobs, otherwise we are tragically wasting our lives. 

It may seem out of place to quote Rob Bell at this point, but whether you love him or hate him, Bell makes some terrific observations that are worthy of our attention. In Velvet Elvis, Bell says this:

“...it is impossible for a Christian to have a secular job. If you follow Jesus and you are doing what you do in his name, then it is no longer secular work: it is sacred. You are there; God is there. The difference is our awareness.”

On this point Rob Bell is right on the mark - for a Christian there should be no secular job. In fact we should all be ministering and evangelizing and acting as God’s ambassadors in our job, regardless of the line of work, as well as in our neighborhood and most importantly in our church. Doing the work of ministry is not reserved solely for pastors and missionaries. Some are paid to do those things more exclusively, but it is the call of every Christian to do those things, wherever they find themselves. And yes it is a calling. It is not a calling that we need to agonize over, spend time fasting and praying about and/or wait for some sign indicating that this is what we should do. All that is required is a little time in scripture. 

“As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. Be completely humble and gentle: be patient, bearing with one another in love. Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to one hope when you were called; one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.”

Ephesians 4:1-6

“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come. The old has gone, the new is here! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us.”

2 Corinthians 5:17-20

We are all called to be and do many things that fall under the category of “ministry” and it does not require special revelation beyond the scriptures given to us. It is clearly taught to us throughout the New Testament. The idea that we need to be “called” is a topic for another post, but I believe we often use the idea of a “calling” as a way of sounding more spiritual. I do not deny that some have special callings on their lives, but it is a mistake to believe that this is God’s normal way of telling us what to do. A calling is an exception. God communicating to us through the Bible is the norm.

So here is the bottom line to all my ranting and raving. Words and phrases have meaning, both obvious and implied. Words and phrases have subtle and not so subtle ways of influencing the way we believe we should respond and act in given situations. If you don’t believe that, try doing a little study on language and culture. Study linguistics. If you don’t believe there is importance in words and phrases, then stop worrying about the meanings of Greek and Hebrew words in the Bible and variations in different translations. What we say and how we say it, matters, and we should be careful about the messages we send when we use our “Christian” language. If we truly believe that we are all called to serve God in forms of ministry, regardless of our situation in life, then we should stop using language that implies that ministry is only reserved for the chosen few.

The Call to Ministry

I think that when a person becomes a Christian we should encourage them to go to Bible school and study to become a “full-time” minister. If they are a youth and have yet to graduate college we should encourage them to avoid other schools and help them focus solely on going to a Bible school. If they are already in another college, we should encourage them to change schools and change majors, to pursue something better. If a person is older, and already in a career, we should encourage them to quit for the sake of becoming a missionary or a pastor of some sort. If they are retired, we should tell them to go back to school (Bible school) so they can spend their remaining years doing something useful like being a senior’s pastor or a chaplain at a nursing home. I think that’s what we should do, because then we would have more Christians that are really spiritual and we would have more “full-time” workers to advance the kingdom. I think “part-time” ministers are really a drag on the system, so we need to replace them and have more people be “full-time” ministers.

In case you did not pick up on the sarcasm, let me clarify something - I hate the phrase “full-time ministry.” I don’t know where it started and I don’t know why we perpetuate its use, but I find it insulting, subtly deceptive, and borderline arrogant when someone uses it to describe themselves and what they do (I don’t believe it is done intentionally, but that it comes with the phrase itself). At the very heart of the phrase is the implication that if someone is a “full-time” minister, then other people must be “part-time” ministers, or not really ministers at all (maybe “no-time” ministers). If I say, “I am going into full-time ministry,” we (the Christian community that has learned proper language) understand that I am going to become a pastor or missionary of some sort. No one gets the mistaken idea that I am going to study to become an engineer, or an accountant, or a lawyer (that one is really obvious, right?). And no one thinks I am going to start farming, or look for a job as a custodian, or join a fire fighting crew. We understand “full-time” ministry to be synonymous with “pastor” or “missionary.” We don’t talk about other people being “part-time” ministers, but the not so subtle implication is that there is one group of people who do ministry all the time and everyone else does not. 

Of course when pressed on the issue, we will say, “everyone is a full time minister,” but we continue to perpetuate a language and an associated culture that says, “not everyone can be a full-time minister.” Then we wonder why people sit back and want the pastors to do everything. After all, if the pastor is the “full-time” minister and I am not, then the things of ministry must be their job, not mine. To further support this line of thinking is the idea that “full-time” ministers are “called” to the ministry. Pastors and missionaries talk frequently about their calling from God to ministry, but seldom does a “lay" person (maybe there is some subtle meaning in that phrase to) talk about their calling to ministry (unless the call is from the pastor). If the pastor was called and I was not, it follows that the pastor should be doing the ministry work, not me. 

Here, also, is where the unintentional touch of arrogance comes into play. Seldom does someone say, “I am going into full-time ministry,” instead they say, “I have been called into full-time ministry.” Being “called” into full-time ministry sounds so much more spiritual and so much more important. People don’t go around talking about being called to farming. It would have sounded weird if my dad would have talked about his calling to be a furniture salesman. Christians assume that if you are in another job, it wasn’t about a “calling” from God, but rather a lack of calling from God. The implication is, that if you are called by God, you will be called into “full-time” ministry. God wouldn’t waste a cool voice (whether it is a literal voice, or a feeling, or an open door, or a sign, or whatever) to call a bookkeeper, or a mechanic, or a chef, would he? Again, when pressed on the matter, most will say you can be called to those things, but the reality is that not many really give it much credence or thought. In fact some will say that you should not go into “full-time” ministry unless you have received a calling, but they would never say that about most other professions. You would be hard pressed to find someone argue that you should not become a pharmacist unless you have been called by God to be a pharmacist. It is one of those things we don’t talk about, but it is generally understood - a special calling from God is reserved for those in “full-time” ministry.

In my profession as a teacher, there is a definite hierarchy to the education system and people working in offices have all kinds of fancy titles. They will send out emails and give mini-speeches about the importance of teachers in the classroom, but there are subtle and not-so-subtle ways they communicate that teachers are not really quite as important as they are. It is not uncommon to hear a teacher say, “I am just a teacher,” to describe themselves. That is a way of saying, “I have no authority, I have very little power and I am not really that important.” Teachers feel that way despite the praises of those in power above them, because there are ways of communicating the hierarchy of importance without explicitly saying, “I am more important than you.” It is done with decision making, it is done with titles and offices, it is done with specific practices, structures and procedures, and it is done with repeated phrases and language with implied meaning. 

We do similar things in the church. I have already mentioned the language, but there are other things. Have you ever noticed how excited people get when a young man or woman talks about going into “full-time” ministry? How does that excitement compare to the young man or woman talking about going into computer science or into the arts? Do you see the difference? How about church scholarships? How many churches give scholarships to medical students in state universities? How about the way we treat students when they leave and come back? Have you ever heard a young person come back to their home church and report about what God is doing in their job as waiter or waitress? Do we invite college students to talk about how God is revealing Himself through their study of ecology? I haven’t, but I have heard kids talk about Bible school, and about mission trips and about how they hope to be used by God in “full-time” ministry. 

So here is the real blow to the gut - in all those actions, the implied communication is that we really don’t expect God to be at work in our youth (or adults) unless they are in Bible school (or at least a “Christian” school) and they are pursuing “full-time” ministry. We hope and pray for God’s protection while they are in “the world” pursuing “worldly” things, but we really don’t expect God to do much with their pursuit. We hope that when they start their career, they will get connected to a "good" church where they can be involved in part-time in ministry while they do their other job. In fact our prayers for them tend to be defensive, whereas our prayers for Bible school students tend to be offensive, that is we tend to pray more for protection for those outside of Bible school and pray for power for those in Bible school. The same thing happens as adults settle into their jobs and careers. We talk occasionally about ministering in the work place, but overall we don’t really act like we expect much to happen there, because they are not really ministers anyway. Instead we talk more about doing our work with integrity and to honor God through our diligence and our example to others and we try to get them into "ministry" when they are at the church building.

So here is the thing... If we really believe that every Christian is truly called to a life of ministry - full-time ministry (whether paid or not) - shouldn’t we act and talk like that is what we expect. Shouldn’t we be just as excited for the student who wants to serve God in the world of medicine as we are for the student who wants to serve God in a church (it could even be argued that we should be more excited). We have young people from our church, who were a part of our youth group, who are away at school pursuing careers outside the realm of “full-time” ministry. Their explicit intent is to serve God with all their might in those careers and to make a difference for the sake of the kingdom through their work, and yet we seldom hear about them. We do, however, hear much about those away at Bible school (and I am not saying that we shouldn’t). What do you suppose will be the reaction when each of those young men and women get a job? Who will generate more enthusiasm - the “full-time” minister or the nurse?

So, who is called to "full-time" ministry? The correct answer, of course, is that we all are. Whose ministry is most important? The obvious correct answer is that they are all equally important. So we know the right answers, now we just need to back it up with how we act and how we talk.

There are different kinds of gifts, but the same Spirit distributes them. There are different kinds of service, but the same Lord. There are different kinds of working, but in all of them and in everyone it is the same God at work.

If the whole body were an eye, where would the sense of hearing be? If the whole body were an ear, where would the sense of smell be? But in fact God has a placed the parts in the body, every one of them, just as he wanted them to be. If they were all one part, where would the body be? As it is, there are many parts, but one body.

The eye cannot say to the hand, “I don’t need you!” and the head cannot say to the feet, “I don’t need you!” On the contrary, those parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, and the parts that we think are less honorable we treat with special honor. And the parts that are unpresentable are treated with special modesty, while our presentable parts need no special treatment. But God has put the body together, giving greater honor to the parts that lacked it, so that there should be no division in the body, but that its parts should have equal concern for each other. If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part rejoices with it.

Now you are the body of Christ, and each one of you is a part of it.

1 Corinthians 12: 4-6, 12-27

Soul Refreshing

Shortly after we left for our vacation, I received a text from a good friend:

“Hope you guys have an awesome time! May it be refreshing to your souls. May your time with God during this trip be sweeter, richer, more vibrant. May that be the thing that stands out when the trip is all over.”

It was a wonderful blessing and a great reminder of what a vacation should be. What greater purpose for a vacation than to enrich my time with God? What better result could there be than to come home from vacation and feel closer to God than when I left? It is a great perspective on vacation - one that I don’t always have when I leave. Too often my focus is just on escape - escape the daily grind, escape the worries of the job, even escape the burdens of church leadership. But my friend reminded me of a much better focus.

When I was in high school I worked for a farmer moving irrigation sprinklers. In some fields I would move 30 to 50 sections of 12 foot pipe, trying to connect and lay them in a straight line. As I attached each section it was important to keep the whole line the same distance from its previous location. If the sections varied too much, especially at the end of the line, the water from the sprinklers would not overlap properly. The longer the line, the harder it was to keep it straight, but the farmer gave me one valuable piece of advice - “Keep your sights on where you are going, not on where you have been.” At the opposite end of the field was usually a bright orange jug hanging from the fence that was the target. After each section was laid down I would look down the line of pipe to make sure it was headed for the jug. Of course I didn’t always remember the advice and sometimes I would catch myself looking back at my line, trying to straighten what I had done. It was amazing how that never worked. Invariably I made things worse when I tried to straighten the line behind me. I might make sections of the pipes straighter, but my line would be pointing in the wrong direction, off line from the jug. When I kept my focus on the jug at the other end, the line of pipe might not be perfectly straight, but it always ended up where it needed to be. 

It is a life lesson that I need to be reminded of often, even on vacation. I have a tendency to look at what I am trying to leave behind, instead of what I am trying to move towards. My line my not always be perfectly straight when I keep looking ahead, but at least I end up in the right place. It is such a simple idea, but one that seems so easy to forget. So, on this vacation, I am trying to set my sights on drawing closer to God, because it is always better to focus on who you want to move towards rather than on what are trying to leave behind. 

Thank you, friend, for the reminder!

What I (Re-)Learned From My 25th Year of Teaching...

That I Should Have Never Forgotten 

(Part 3)

I love to teach, but sometimes I hate my job.

When I am in teaching mode - when I am actually teaching - I am in a happy place. It doesn't really matter what I am teaching, I just genuinely love to teach. I love teaching math, computer applications, science, the Bible, - I love just teaching about life and what I have learned. I love engaging people in conversations that are thought provoking and challenging and I love learning from those kinds of conversations. In fact, I have found that the process of teaching often requires a fair amount of learning. And I love learning.

After four years of college I still hadn't graduated and thought I should decide what to do with my life so I could finish school and move on. I wasn't really in a hurry because, despite some horrific years at Washington State University, I had grown to love learning - I really didn't want school to end. As I was talking about life and my future and my desire to do something meaningful, to a friend who had become my mentor, he made an acute observation. He said, "You should be a teacher. The best teachers are people who love learning and are never done learning. I think that describes you." It would probably be arrogant to say that I am among the best teachers, but I believe my love for learning and my love for sharing what I have learned, has helped to make me a good teacher.

So it would seem I am in the perfect job. I teach for a living, right? Well, not exactly... 

As the years have passed teaching has become less and less about teaching. More and more we are asked to be assessment coordinators and data analysts. We are strategists, consultants and form fillers. We check boxes, jump through hoops, rewrite standards, and meet together to talk about it all and celebrate all the check marks. The union asks us to be letter writers and lobbyists. Experts tell us all to be the same and the politicians tell us all our kids should be the same. Administrators tell us to set goals, but be sure they are the right goals, said in the right way, so we can show the world how great we are for meeting our goals. And all of this really isn't teaching.

I spend too much of my time on my job, checking off boxes, attending meetings, recording and analyzing numbers, administrating assessments, discussing school issues, and having release days to appease someone else's list of achievements. But when I am able to escape all that and apply what I have learned from 25 years of experience and just teach, I love it. I love actually teaching. I hate boxes and hoops and data and giving assessments, but I love to teach. 

This last year I found myself, often, frustrated by my job, but late in the year I was on a roll with quadratic functions in my Algebra class. The kids were tracking with me, laughing at my poor attempts at humor (when 8th graders can laugh in the midst of quadratics, you know you are on a roll), moaning when things got hard (but then digging in anyway) and it hit me - this is the part of my job that keeps me going. This is when I have fun. This is what I am supposed to be doing.

If I could be a teacher who only had to worry about teaching, I would love my job! The rest of the job is not likely going to go away soon, though, so I will deal with it the best I can and simply understand that being a teacher is not just about teaching. And I will try to be careful to explain, that sometimes I hate my job, but I always love teaching!

What I (Re-)Learned From My 25th Year of Teaching...

That I Should Have Never Forgotten 

(Part 2)

My ability to teach is a gift.

I believe God has gifted me with an ability to teach. Sometimes I have difficulty acknowledging this, thinking that it seems like an arrogant thing to say. But it seems more arrogant to say that I have not been given the gift and I have figured out how to do it on my own. Seeing the ability to teach as a gift helps me understand two things:

• First, my ability to teach is not something that I have developed myself out of nothing. I have not willed myself into being a good teacher, it is by God’s grace that I have developed my gift to become a good teacher. If I did not start with the gift of teaching, I would be a horrible teacher because I would be totally dependent on developing a talent that I did not have, which seems almost impossible to do.
• Second, I have been given the gift with the expectation that I will do something good with the gift. Gifts of talents are different than other gifts (like new clothes or flowers or fruitcake), in that there is an expectation to use the gift to glorify God. The gift is not for my pleasure, it is my tool to be used for God’s pleasure. If I choose not to use my gift, than I am dishonoring God. If I refuse to acknowledge the gift that God has given me (which is really a false kind of humility), than I am denying that God has given me a gift and I am insulting God. It is like refusing to open a present, and because I never opened the present I say that I never received it. 

So, I realized (again), this year, that God has given me a gift - the ability to teach. I am not delusional enough to believe that he has made me the best teacher, but I also know he gives good gifts and to say I stink at teaching while acknowledging that I have been given the gift of teaching, would be foolishness. God does not give bad gifts. If I stink at teaching it is because I am doing something wrong that is messing up the good gift that God has given. At times, this year, I have messed up the good gift that God has given me. My problem has been two-fold:

• First, I forgot that my ability to teach is a wonderful gift from God. I never denied it, I just didn’t think about it and it didn’t impact me on a practical level. I depended too much on myself and forgot that it is only by God’s grace that I am any good at this at all. When I depended on myself, I failed to involve God in the very thing that he gave me. When I depended on myself, I never did as well as I should have done, I put more pressure on myself than I needed to, and I started to deny my gift. It is a vicious cycle that causes frustration and bitterness and it is only in remembering that teaching is my gift from God, that I can break out of that cycle.
• Second, I forgot that I have been given the gift to bring him glory - it is not for my glory or for the glory of anyone else. Too often I looked for glory for myself and too often I looked for praises from those in more powerful positions than mine. When I did not receive what I hoped for or sometimes felt I deserved, the cycle of frustration and bitterness would continue. But when I use my gift for god’s glory, the praises of others matters less. If I know I am bringing God glory by how I am using my gift, than the criticism is more bearable and the lack of praise or recognition is inconsequential. 

“Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for human masters, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving.”
Colossians 3:23-24

I have come to understand that I can teach math to middle school students and bring glory to God at the same time, but not if I do not include God in the process and not if I forget that God has given me the gift to teach in the first place. I bring glory to God in my teaching when I understand that teaching is far more than just disseminating facts. I will be a good teacher when my students understand that I care about them, not just their ability to do math. Good teachers care and have compassion and are interested in the humanness of their students. And isn’t that how we bring glory to God, by loving those around us, especially those entrusted to our care; those entrusted to us to teach? I don’t need to teach the Bible to bring God glory (although I can certainly do that too), I just need to love those that he has put in my path. Love can be expressed in many ways, and we have all been given gifts by which we can express love. Some do it with hammer and nails, some do it with music, some do it in conversation, or in knitting, or in baking or in medical care. We are all given gifts through which we express God’s love and bring him glory - mine is in teaching. 

May I not forget my gift in year 26 or any year after. I pray that I will use my gift wisely and that there will never be doubt in my students’ minds that their math teacher cares more about them then their ability to do math. 

What I (Re-)Learned From My 25th Year of Teaching...

That I Should Have Never Forgotten 

(Part 1)

I am a teacher because I care about kids, not because I care about test scores

It seems like such a “no-brainer” but it is amazing how easy it is for teachers to lose sight of why they started teaching. I would be hard-pressed to find a teacher that began their teaching career because they had an overwhelming desire to increase test scores. Almost any teacher (at least any good teacher) will say they got into teaching because they care about kids and they want to have a positive influence on their lives. But in the world in which we live today, kids often blur into numbers and check marks in data tables. We classify kids by test scores and diagnostic assessments. We accumulate data and put points on graphs and draw lines to determine the group where a student belongs. We determine whether students are above certain lines or below, their percentile rankings and the number of standards they are “proficient in.” We analyze our data and beat ourselves up over the students’ lack of performance and agonize over how to move student A above the next line and how to get student B above any line and how to increase the number of students above a seemingly arbitrary “proficient” line. All the while we lose sight of the fact that student A and student B are real people with real challenges and complications and real needs that extend beyond getting above level three on the state assessment. 

At times, I lost sight of all that this year. I don’t know yet how many of my students will pass the state assessment (the politicians’ ultimate measure of my success), but I know in my heart that I was not as successful as I could have been, and it has nothing to do with test results, assessment scores, grades or points on a scatter plot. I did not build the kind of relationships with my students that I always hope for. I don’t believe I was a failure, but I did not achieve the level of success that I expect from myself and that I first aspired to when I began this career. At times I lost sight of what was most important and I allowed the data points to block the humanity of my students. At times I spent too much time worrying about curriculum and grades and not enough time worrying about lives. Sometimes I saw numbers when I should have seen faces. And sometimes I simply lacked the courage to let the needs of the students trump the less important mandates of the state and my district bosses. I focussed too much on checking off boxes and jumping through hoops that caused tunnel vision to the academic “needs” of the students, instead of meeting the genuine needs of my students to be encouraged, to feel safe, to be respected, to be listened to, to know that there is an adult at school that cares about who they are, not just about their performance.

I pray that year 26 will be better. I pray that God will grant me wisdom and courage to be the person I believe I should be, regardless of the cost to me, and that I will always be intent on doing what is truly best for my students. I pray that my students will leave my class, every day and at the end of the year, knowing, without question, that I care about them and have their best interest at heart, regardless of what any numbers might say. I pray that I will not need to re-learn this lesson from year 25!