Ballad of Planting Seeds

I had a really hard / lovely moment with a student yesterday.  He wasn't listening to the teacher when she asked the class to silently line-up. He continued talking after repeated warnings and it became obvious from watching that he was only reacting to his classmates… who were teasing him. However, the teacher said he should have ignored the teasing instead of talking out and breaking the rules. (We’re trying to teach our students to build up their backbones a little before heading off to middle school). When he began to tear up in anger and frustration, she asked him to “Wait here with Miss Carrie until he was ready to move on to music class.”

Everybody left the room. He ran over to his desk and burst into tears.

Oh, golly. What do I do now?

I asked the Lord for His guidance and to help lead me on what action to take, then I grabbed a box of tissues and sat in the desk across from him.

“Hey, kiddo,” I said as I put the tissues in front of him. Thankfully, he looked up and me and began rambling on about why he was so upset, that he believes the teacher hates him and how everyone in the class are jerks. After long minutes of comforting this little boy and speaking some truth to him, he finally decided he was ready to go to music class.

While we walked, he told me that he didn’t deserve the mean friends he had. I agreed. He said they weren’t really good friends if they treated him so poorly. Again, I agreed. Then he said he would never be friends with any of them again. And my instinct wanted to agree with him. Yes, go find new friends! Be loved for who you are!

But then I realized, that’s not the way our God works! If God treated us as we really deserved, we’d all be separated from His gracious, loving care. If God sought to only be friends with people who treated Him right, He’d never find a single qualified soul.

Now, I would never wish for this little boy to continue enduring abuse for the sake of biblical morals, but here’s what I did tell him. That leaving those friendships is what every person in the class would expect him to do. What would it show of his character if he forgave, and presented opportunities to continue being friends? After all, he’s going to be surrounded by these people for the rest of this year, and (thank-you, Montessori,) for the following year as well. What if he showed them love they never thought they’d receive, and re-established friendships based on that acceptance. True acceptance of one another, the good and the bad.

I pray, oh I would love, for this little boy to seal that truth to his heart so Lord-willing if me or somebody else shares the gospel with him, he’ll see that he, too, was completely undeserving of a graciously offered, fully accepting love… but received it anyway through Jesus.

Agape,

CC