February 2018 Articles

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Spiritual Corner February 2018: Trust and Obey

Spiritual Corner: Trust and Obey As some of you may know, I taught kindergarten at Junction City Elementary last year. It was a tough year, especially since I had never taught kindergarten before or taught at a public school. God used that year to teach me many things, one of them being that, unfortunately, not everyone is blessed to grow up with two loving parents in a comfortable home like I did. God opened my eyes to things that my brain knew to be true about the world, but that my heart had not experienced. Through one of the toughest years of my life, God taught me so much and my heart grew so attached to a special group of children. After I left Junction and officially moved back to Union Christian Academy, I couldn’t help but think about my Junction babies constantly. They weighed on my mind and tugged at my heartstrings. As the new school year started, I told myself that I was going to go visit them and help out by reading and AR testing them. I ended up going whenever I had a day out of school, where they didn’t. I was able to go once in October and once in December. I also snuck back for about half an hour near Christmas to visit one little student who God has really placed on my heart. The last time I was helping out with the kids at Junction, God gave me this great idea. Instead of me just coming to help out, why not bring more people to help? At Union Christian Academy, I am the teacher sponsor for a Spiritual Emphasis group. This group is made up of a combination of 7th-12th graders and mine just so happens to be 11 boys. The purpose of this group is to encourage and cultivate spiritual growth in the students by meeting and working in small groups throughout the year. So while at Junction on that December day, it just came to me that I should bring my group of boys to help out at Junction as their yearly service project. I say it came to me, but I know it was God putting the idea in my mind. So I set everything up for the visit. My boys didn’t show any signs that they didn’t want to go, but they also didn’t really seem super excited either. I talked to them about how important this visit was, about how they would be getting to give these kids attention that they normally wouldn’t get. I also told them how many of these children were looking for role models and how the little boys especially would cling to them because they were male idols for them to look up to. I remember telling the boys that they could go and make a positive impact on these kids and that the kids might just make an impact on them. The night before it was time to go to Junction with the boys, I tossed and turned. I dreamed of everything that could go wrong, the biggest being that the boys got nothing out of the visit. When the day arrived, we got to Junction and the work began. The boys helped with any task the teachers needed done, from copying to cutting, to reading to children and AR testing them, to helping them with writing, or learning numbers or segmenting words. The boys worked tirelessly in any way they were asked. I was so proud of them for that. As the day went on, I had the privilege of getting to observe my junior high and high school boys interacting with these kindergarten and first grade children. Y’all, it was one of the most beautiful things. I saw little boys and girls’ faces light up. I heard little giggles and saw big hugs given. I saw little looks of admiration and twinkling eyes. My babies were in heaven with these older boys paying attention to them. But, I saw something else. I saw my older boys have the same twinkle in their eyes. I saw looks of genuine love that I had never seen cross some of these boys’ faces before. I saw pure joy exude out of their expressions. Boys that I never would have thought would be able to work well with kids were interacting with them in such a sweet way. Boys that I knew had self-esteem issues and struggled with being happy and dealt with peer pressure issues—I saw all of these boys leave all of that behind and connect with a child. I saw them read softly to a little girl while they showed her illustrations in a book. I saw them push children on swings at recess to help them go higher. I saw them pretend to be pirates searching for treasure with a child. I saw them play football and tag with a group of boys. I saw them encourage children to do well on their AR test and to celebrate with those children when they reached their AR goals. Afterwards, I had Junction babies tell me to tell “the boys” goodbye and I could tell that they hated to see them leave. I had several of my older boys tell me that they wanted to come back and had their parents share with me how much their son had told them they loved the experience and the kids. I truly saw God at work that day at Junction City Elementary. Despite my worrying and lack of trust that God would deliver, He showed up and showed out. He made the experience even more amazing than I could begin to describe or even imagine. This whole experience showed me that if we will continue to seek God and His will and continue to search for ways to serve Him and to serve others, He will move in our lives and will leave us amazed at His handiwork. Friends, don’t ever doubt what our God can and will do. Just open yourselves up to Him and listen to His voice. Then sit back and watch the miracles He will perform in your life. In just one simple experience, God touched the lives of numerous little children and 11 teenage boys. And He touched and humbled the teacher who is typing this. He can and will do the same for you. You just have to trust him and obey him. God is good, all the time. All the time, God is good. --Dana Alexander
“Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins.” --1st Peter 4:8