Deep Calls

Hymns...5 verses, 6 verses. Prayers full of thee's and thou's spoken reverantly and full of emotion. Students' faces shining. Traditons: stepping over swords; students plunked on the head with a Bible to remind them that they must submit to the admonishment and correction of the Word of God; "Alma Mater" sung IN LATIN!!. Students hugging teachers passionately; teachers eyes and voices full of love and tears. Soberness mixed liberally with laughter. Everything serious; no one taking themselves too seriously. Honors. Pride. Joy. Laughter. Music. Tears. A room full of students who all worked together, who all worked hard ~ really hard. A room full of students who loved eachother and were passionately proud of eachother. . . . and me ~ crying my make-up off, and crying again, and crying again ~ and me ... hugging my students, crying with them, with joy, with passion. I remember these students in my class  -- deep talks, jokes, laughter, admonishments. I remember loo

I have, today, the amazing privilege of attending the graduation for the Torry Honors Program at Biola. I am going as an invited guest ~ invited by two of my former students. Four years ago, 5 students who attended Southlands were accepted and are now graduating...2 of them are my students. I am pleased...pleased in a saturate and solid way. What I love about teaching is sharing the moment when a light comes on in someone's eyes ~ seeing wonder unfold on their face. Conversely what I hate (loathe, abhor) is the feeling I get when students do not want to learn and infact refuse to do so. . .students who close their eyes -- students who are purposely obtuse. The exhaustion and tedium of  enduring those dull boorish lumps (ok, harsh but yeah that is what it is like) is MORE than over matched when a student looks up, catches my eye and I can tell that they SEE...when I can see the wonder of "oh YEAH!" on their face. So I go on teaching. Therefore to be allowed ~ invited ~ to

sometimes as I walk, or clean a bathroom, or do dishes, my mind is full of thought fit for writing. Ideas and images brew into concepts that flow through my fingers off onto the computer screen. ... sometime ... not now. Now ~ it is like when you are standing against a wall in a very full room and you feel your lips seal -- tight tight -- you know, you just know, nothing will escape. That is how my mind feels now. There is no sound there. No words. No images. Nothing. Maybe tomorrow ~

OK! Better day!!!! As I groused and grumbled before the Lord, in His mercy He gave me an idea. I took blank paper, colored pencils, crayons and pens to class. I told them to read Revelation chapter 6 and draw something that depicted what was happening. THEY DID IT!!! They didn't grumble ~ they chatted and laughed, asked good questions and DID the assignment. Amazing how a better day makes you feel so much better!! And I have an entire weekend ahead of me with NO disgruntled-done students to manage. Before I went to class I asked one of the other teachers how it was going in their Bible class. I told her about my day and confessed, "I wasn't mean to them ... but I wanted to be!" She said, "OH, I was!! They were terrible and I got mean." We ended up laughing with all the teachers in the room about the silliness of end of the year syndrome, and the craziness in the class room. One teacher said, "yeah, they are asking questions .... just to make noise, like

Ok...read the last post? well I crashed and burned! Not in an explode and fry the students way...but the class -- ok both classes were like I was speaking Gaelic to a wall...even I wasn't sure what I was saying by the end of the class. So...I will try again tomorrow, and the tomorrow after that and a few more days after that...

So the year is over ~ well almost anyway. And my Bible class is now at the Revelation. (I strongly emphasize to them that the book's real name is The Revelation of Jesus Christ, not "Revelation s ") I am making them do response papers. Sadly, I do not expect much from most of them ... It was a job of WORK to keep them interested for most of the year. I have a class that is quite mixed...all high school, grades from 9 to 12, about 15% American, then a mix of Korean and Chinese...some of those are Christians and but many of them literally had never heard of Jesus or seen a Bible before they came here to school in the US. They are taking a Bible class because we require it of them...but as far as they are concerned : what ever!!! It will not count for college, they don't believe any of it, and it is a colossal waste of time. And, for that matter, a good many of the American kids couldn't, pretty much, care less either. They are here cuz their moms and dads sent the

I love reading. Anyone who knows me, if they really know me, knows that. I have hidden in books, and found myself in books. When immersed in story I can see my world, often, much more clearly. Literally, books feed my soul ~ and my spirit ~ and my mind. When life has scraped me raw inside, my favorite balm of healing is often an hour or more reading Heschel ~ The Prophets, or C. S. Lewis--any of his apologetics. I agree with Lewis...books should be re-read; and if a book isn't worth re-reading, it probably wasn't really worth reading. I am reading two new authors right now: Richard Peck and Ursula Le Guin. OK...they are not "new"... I just found them. They are both wonderful. Peck took me back to the 30's; Le Guin took me to another world. Both made truth the background music of story.