Time and time again, I have seen written comments on Facebook that go something like this, "I'm so stressed out! I just don't think I can do this anymore.", "I love my job, but something has to give. The hours I put in are ruining my family life, but I have to do it.", or "I want to look for another job BUT the kids, what about the kids?" Many times they are accompanied with, "Please pray for me. I know this was what the Lord called me to do, but, I'm not sure anymore!" If you are a Christian teacher, I know exactly what you are going through. If you are a Christian teacher, feel free to read on. If you are not a Christian teacher, feel free to read on, knowing that the following information is being presented as an answer-the ONLY answer as a Christian-is that Jesus is our ONLY answer. From this we get our every breathe, our every strength, our every answers. He died for our sins and by accepting Him as our Lord and Savior, we can seek Him out for the very answers within His Word-the Bible. It is with this true, saving spirit that I proceed in my post-to provide a way from the one and only Way-Jesus! So, let's go!
First, I'd like to say that I've been there. I've been in the spot of crying my eyes out daily. I've been in the spot of HATING my job EVERY SINGLE DAY! I've been in the spot where I asked my husband if I could quit- just quit-my job! I've struggled with administration and how to deal with just a plain bad evaluation system that seemed to rob me of everything I am and was! And then THE Lord began to work. And work He did! Of course, every person's walk and experience will be different, but I now feel like I'm equipped with some tools that come directly from my Armor of God! And, when needed, I grab The Armor of God too! But, more on that to come.
So, where did I start. I started in the pit of defeat, something I never thought I would come out of! It was in that pit that I began to fight the enemy back. I would walk the halls in despair, wondering if showing up to a terrible experience every day was even worth it. Yet, in Church every single Sunday for 7 weeks I had been hearing, "God is Enough!" I would approach the building from afar in dread, until one day I looked across the empty field, at the building and said out loud, "GOD IS ENOUGH!" That's when things began to turn inside of me! GOD IS ENOUGH! What if, each and every day, we could walk our halls and know that we are walking on Holy Ground because HE is with us, GOD IS ENOUGH! I spoke it in my classroom when no one was there! I carried scripture in my pocket to touch and remember GOD IS ENOUGH! And things began to change! I began to find JOY again. No matter what came my way (and there were some VERY bad things that came my way.) Nothing ever job threatening in the fact that I could loose my job, just things that ate at my core as a Christian. Things that I was technically powerless to do anything about. Yet my JOY returned. I could smile at these very people who were going out of their way to be evil, and be JOYFUL! Because, time and time again, I returned to trust the LORD to provide my joy, to make the LORD the focus of my day at my job, and to recognize I was nothing without HIM! GOD IS ENOUGH! That's where we all need to start our journey of recovery in a system that is created by the enemy to destroy us.
It wasn't until I started a Bible Study at Church that brought me to the next level of spiritual understanding. It was ordained that God brought along The Armor of God by Priscilla Shirer. (Affiliate Link) At the very beginning of this study, Shirer shared The Enemy's Strategies (here is a beautiful print of these strategies) and almost immediately I saw IT ! I saw IT! I saw that my job was on his list of things to destroy-and he has been for YEARS! I saw that I was just small potatoes in the big stew of destruction-and it OPENED MY EYES! So, take a minute and go check out that beautiful print before reading on! See if you can see it? If not, I'll be right here, ready to go with what I saw!
<
I guess you're back by now! Did you see IT? The it I saw was my teaching career ALL OVER THAT PAGE! My passion, my calling, my focus, my identity, my confidence, my heart, my relationships, my purity, my contentment was ALL OVER THAT PAGE! Teaching is who we are! Teaching goes way past the normal job expectations into our very being-and the enemy was right there attacking every part of who I was! It even crept into my family because I was constantly a hot mess all over my family! He was manipulating me within the system and I could not escape! Or could I!
As I walked through that study I began to peel off the layer upon layer of beat down I was taking and could see, clearly, that God had a different plan for me! This is NOT the part where I tell you I quit my job and am doing something even better. This is the part where I tell you that I still walk into that same building every day, with JOY! That God is ENOUGH every single day and that victory is had through this each time I choose to let God be ENOUGH and put on my armor! Yes, this system is broken and defeated, yet God still has me here, teaching my students! The difference is, I'm no longer a slave to it! I can honestly say, I have been set free from the slavery of the education system, yet I am still inside it! It is so difficult to explain because it is spiritual freedom, and that's from within. Word upon Word upon Word flowed from the wisdom in this study that broke down the walls and caused me to be FREE because I repositioned myself to be in line with God, and not with the broke system. I stopped being angry at people, and started calling out the enemy who was behind the plans to begin with! Now, this is not perfect, I am still human after all! But I am FREE! I can walk within the plan that God has for my life-to teach children who need love and caring and great teachers-and feel peace and joy. I can be who He needs me to be-focused on Him and not my circumstances!
Honestly, if you take one thing away from this post I hope upon hope that it is that God is ENOUGH! That we are part of system but the LORD is the ONLY solutions to this system-for it is already defeated! We just have to walk in it, in victory, with Jesus! That's the Good News of how we, the Christian teachers, battle the current system with Christ!
Let me know what you think! Let me know what victories you have had in this system by following Christ! And, above all, PRAY! In another great study I did, I grabbed this little nugget-Pray is not emotional-it is PRE-WORK! So, get your pre-work on! And, wear that Armor God gave you!
Pin for Later
No comments:
Post a Comment