School's Out --- not in Texas

One more week of school. For the past few months, I have had the privilege of substitute teaching in public schools. This full-time job switch from private to public was a stunning surprise to me. My beautiful God has so showed up to carry me through the challenge of going to work full-time and holding out a little hope to today's startling teenagers.

I am learning to long to love and be a blessing MORE THAN I want my students to cooperate with me. I am learning to return a blessing for an insult. You never know where someone has come from or what is happening in their home life. Last night, I had a conversation with a wary wayward teenager who was hoping I would get him "out of trouble." A few tears dropped from my eyes as I shared with him that one decision could change the whole direction of his life. I wondered if anyone had offered him their tears for his precious life.

Funny thing happened to me today...I was Miss PE...teacher's lesson plan said to walk a mile on .the track. It was like 90 degrees outside but no ozone alert. Okay, we can do this. So, 54 students start the first lap with me. When we got to the second lap, I noticed that a fair number had sat down with the other coach by the bleachers. That was okay. What I didn't notice was that the soccer girls team had come onto the track and they took off jogging and walking fast. So, I'm right in there with them all, thinking it was my class, and what great runners/walkers they were. However, my PE class had all sat down with the other coach cause of the heat. Only one person out of 54 finished the workout with the soccer team----me. And, I thought I was with my class the whole time. My class politely waited for me in the shade. If I had just known who they were, but I thought I was with them...LOL.

It really is a privilege to be around young people. God has done so much in my heart in these months and I am so grateful to Him for seeing a higher calling in my life to love rather than wait to be loved, and to advance His Kingdom. You know, I have really dealt with self-hatred over my lifetime and God continues to move in that area for me. I was so broken over it last weekend! His Kindness led me to repentance over my rudeness, my aloofness, my distance. Rom. 2:4. Then comes grace, greater than all my sin. And as a friend said to me: "Shift your focus from how I feel about myself to how I feel about my Christ to how HE feels about me." And you know, I can't even do that without God. The truth is that I can't live the Truth without total dependence on HIM to help me. Take our eyes off of ourselves and revive us in your ways, O God, the psalmist wrote. HE must increase and I must decrease.