LEAven Blog

It is 7 AM when you arrive at school and enter the teacher’s workroom. There you find your colleague Kate scrambling frantically to make copies and get plans for a substitute teacher together. You find out that she has been up all night with a sick child and needs to get back home quickly before her husband leaves for work.

At 7:30 morning devotions commence. During the prayer time at the end of the session John, the 7^th grade teacher, shares that his father is undergoing exploratory cancer surgery tomorrow, and that they expect to find a significant tumor.

The school day starts. You begin with classroom devotions and find out during the prayer time that Annie, one of your students, just found out she is moving. She is despondent, but also angry at her parents for “doing this to her and taking her away from all her friends.”

Then it is time for the religion lesson for the day. During this class you notice a growing antagonism of your student Hunter toward all things faith-based, and that defiance is starting to emerge in classroom discussions.

Later in the day, a teary Tiffany apologizes for not completing her English assignment last night. She explains that her dog had to be put down last night, and she is devastated.

Gavin forgot his lunch and has no money with him to purchase anything from the school store. It is difficult to determine whether the lunch was forgotten or if there is something else going on in his family.

Personal fatigue sets in during the afternoon hours. The late-night grading session of the previous evening is catching up to you, yet you are fighting to stay enthusiastic as the hours crawl by.

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While these names and situations are not real, they do represent what typically goes on during a school day. What do all these things have in common? They represent either known or unknown situations where Satan is working to discourage students, colleagues, and us, tempting everyone to question God’s goodness and provision.

However, I believe that the presence of these situations may also be seen as a great blessing in that they force us to fully rely on God and regularly come to him in prayer. In fact, I am thankful that I am a teacher because I have that persistent need for God to be amid my life and the circumstances I encounter.

Over time God has led me to a few disciplines that have helped me embrace the challenges I have and those of others through prayer. Here are some things that I have learned to do:

• Lift up little prayers all through the day, such as, “Lord, help Tiffany during this time. Help Gavin and reveal anything that needs our attention. Bless Kate as she cares for her daughter today.”
• Journal at the end of a day or week, listing those prayer concerns and noting how God has acted mightily with these prayers.
• Intentionally connect with colleagues. I tend to make it a point to hang out in the faculty workroom before school just so I can talk with colleagues and check in with them, lending support where I can.

Thanks be to God that I work in a Lutheran school where I can pray at any time, whether with my students or alone. Thanks be to God that he continues to draw me to him through my prayer concerns and those of others. Thanks be to God that I can see Him active and alive, meeting the needs of His people in remarkable ways. May each of you see the same blessings through your work in Christian education.