The first party fights for the right to believe that this could be a really good week. A great week. A grace-filled week.
The other party has already been convinced that this is another week I'll spend stressed, feeling like a bad teacher, questioning why I ever thought I could do this job.
School has been in session for a few weeks now, and I would be lying if I told you it has been anything but a rollercoaster. I have good moments, good class periods, times when I'm confident my students walked away from class having learned something they needed to know. Then there are times that I feel like a horrible teacher - lessons don't go as planned, I don't communicate well with my other teachers, kids are out of control and I just want to yell and scream or crumple into a heap and cry.
And of course the Enemy (Scripture calls him the Deceiver for good reason!) tricks me into forgetting about all the good and triumphant moments, the moments where God met me in my weakness and proved to me again that he is strong and he is able, and instead dwelling on my failures, my inconsistencies, my inability to measure up (admittedly, to my own, probably unreasonable, standard).
I've heard that this is par for the course for a first-year teacher, and that gives me some comfort. And I try to remind myself that being a first-year teacher in my second language is challenge upon challenge, thereby necessitating grace upon grace (God's grace to me, and mine to myself!).
This girl. A stinker, but I love her SO much :).
I want to share two passages from this book that have spoken truth to me in the past week - God used them to speak to me in my weariness and discouragement, to remind me what it is He has called me to.
Here is the first:
How does it save the world to reject unabashed joy when it is joy that saves us? Rejecting joy to stand in solidarity with the suffering doesn't rescue the suffering. The converse does. The brave who focus on all things good and all things beautiful and all things true, even in the small, who give thanks for it and discover joy even in the here and now, they are the change agents who bring fullest Light to all the world. When we lay the soil of our hard lives open to the rain of grace and let joy penetrate our cracked and dry places, let joy soak into our broken skin and deep crevices, life grows. How can this not be the best thing for the world? For us? The clouds open when we mouth thanks.
I think that one pretty much speaks for itself. Here is the other one:
Here is the only place I can love Him.
Well, if that didn't knock me on my butt. Do you know how much time I spend dwelling on the past and worrying about the future? Too much. Waaay too much. But I can't love Him back there. And I can't love Him up ahead. I can only love Him now, and here. That has been a great reminder for me because, funny thing, you can't dwell on how terrible yesterday's math class was or think about how you're going to be inadequate with your first graders tomorrow when you're focused on this moment, and loving God in it.
That was last week's challenge, and it will be this week's too. I challenge you to it as well.
And also, please keep me in your prayers. I find it so easy to get discouraged, and weary. Pray that the Holy Spirit would minister grace to me, and that I would receive it willingly. Pray for successes and for eyes to see what my purpose here truly is. Pray for the ability to love God and love children now, in this moment.
Thankful for each of you! Be blessed, and enjoy something autumn-y for me this week :).
Love,
Kristen
