A Lutheran school is a place where life-learning takes place. And not just any life-learning—the eternal kind. There are students across the world who attend school every day. So what makes ours so different? It’s eternity.
Teaching in a Lutheran school brings about opportunities that you never quite see coming. We live in a broken world. We are surrounded each day by humans who are related to Adam and Eve (which means sin comes along with them). We face the day knowing that there will be challenges, as is often the case when your job involves people. But with broken people comes the opportunity to love them and show them a different side of life.
There’s the student who just can’t seem to ever have their homework in hand, but who can blame them when you know that they stay at Dad’s house two nights a week, Mom’s another two, and Grandma’s for the weekend? Their life is so jostled. Turns out, you are the only thing stable in their lives. They will remember the time you took to make them an extra copy, time spent with them during your prep time so that they could finish it in school and didn’t have to worry about losing it. You bestowed upon them the same grace that we receive when we don’t deserve another chance.
Or how about the student who never seems to have clean clothes on? Yet, they’re the kid who wants to hug you twenty times throughout the day. You’ve learned that they now come to you for a clean shirt, or mittens to go out to recess. You’re at the point where you are frustrated because they seem to have lost the other 5 pairs of mittens you gave them previously. But then you remember that Jesus didn’t only help people an allotted number of times and then stop because they reached their quota. He kept giving, knowing that He’d never see much in return. You’ve now come to enjoy giving all those hugs because you know how much they truly mean to that kid.
Then there’s the kid who can’t seem to do anything right. He’s constantly getting in trouble and doesn’t seem to care about much. So, this time during recess, you decide to pull him over to talk to you instead of just making him take a time out by himself. You eventually realize he’s now asking to come talk to you when times get rough. And then you notice he’s actually getting in trouble less. He comes to talk with you just to check in, not because he has to. Because you showed him that forgiveness day after day, he was able to make a change in his behavior.
In each situation, the opportunity was presented to show Jesus in what we do. And when speaking with these children, we are being the hands and feet of Jesus. We tell them of His forgiveness. We show them His true love that knows no certain allotment of times before it runs out. Is it hard some days? By all means. But we know it’s worth it.
I end each day with prayer. At the beginning of the year it’s led by me, but by this point in the year, the kids pray. Not only do they fill up the prayer board, but they are very strict in remembering whose day it is to pray—because they don’t want to be skipped! What a blessing to be a part of children’s lives. What an even greater blessing to be part of their eternity!
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