March 16, 2009

  • reaching the one

    sometimes, teaching feels a lot like ministry.  i know that my lessons are not the gospel...in fact they are far from it, but it is about getting through to people.  you know that parable about jesus leaving the flock of ninety-nine sheep to find the one sheep that has gone astray?  sometimes teaching feels like that.  i have to admit that i am writing in the middle of the mid-year slump.  the weather is gray.  spring break is not for another three weeks.  and we've had two straight weeks of school, with no respite.  the kids...and the teachers...get pretty wiped.  last week, every day felt like Thursday, and every day it wasn't made us crankier.

    but in the midst of that, it was nice to get an e-mail from a student who'd been doing some research at home.  i teach a unit on "The World" and have been able to show some films about different situations around the world.  we're watching born into brothels this week, and we watched god grew tired of us last week.  several weeks ago, we watch the documentary invisible children, about the night commuters in uganda who are fleeing being recruited by the LRA as child soldiers.  most students watched it, were surprised by it, and promptly forgot about it.  but even several weeks after i showed it, a student e-mailed me this weekend to tell me about an event that the invisible children organization was throwing.  her exact words were, "i thought you might be interested in this !" it was interesting, but what excited me more was to think that i might have possibly reached one person...that something i taught has impacted her life in some way.

    it's moments like that which make me really love what i do...