Recalcitrant Students

 

"We have much to say about this, but it is hard to make it clear to you because you no longer try to understand." Hebrews 5:11

I’m a public school teacher. In fact, I teach in an elementary school in a special education class. I have to admit that I often love my job. It’s amazing to see students’ eyes light up when they successfully learn how to do long division or can read a difficult story. When they actually succeed after working hard for many months, they are so excited! They love being successful.

But it’s not always that way. In fact, there are times when the bad days far outnumber the good days. There are the days when life has come crashing in. When their parents are getting a divorce or there’s illness in the family or they have to move again. Stressors in life make learning a burden. But there are also days when the hilarity of life is more exciting than the discipline of school. When my students come back from Disneyland or a vacation or a day on the slopes (we live in a ski resort). These are the days when learning grinds to a standstill. They would simply rather not learn because learning is work. Hard work. And, to be honest, who wouldn’t want a day off to play?

The problem is, if we take every day off, then nothing gets done. Nothing is accomplished. And if I allowed my students to treat everyday as a holiday, they would grow up not being able to read or write or do the kind of math that they will need as adults. And so, part of my job is to help them remain faithful to the tasks of school, to learn that the discipline of learning—even when it’s hard—is important to achieving in life.

As Christians, we are also called to the discipline of learning. And learning how to be a Christian—a Christ-one—is rarely easy. Our natural flesh fights us at every turn! We don’t want to learn how to be more sacrificial, to be more forgiving, to be more patient. We want our turn, our time, our ease. And, unfortunately, there come times in life when we become so focused on what we want that we begin to fade away from the discipline of becoming more like Jesus. We become more self centered and less Christ centered. And it is in times like this that our teacher, the Holy Spirit, becomes thwarted in His efforts to teach us because we simply are no longer trying to understand what He is saying. We only want to hear the easy things of scripture; we don’t want to grow and mature any more than we have. The problem is, there is no static motion as Christians. We are either moving forward, toward Christ, or we are moving backward, toward sin. We are either maturing or regressing.

The things of scripture may sometimes be difficult to understand and seem even more impossible to implement in our lives. But we have to try! And once we try, the Holy Spirit will be there to make it possible for us to actually achieve that which He is working in our lives.

© 2017 Robin L. O’Hare. All rights reserved. Permission granted for nonprofit and church groups to use this article in its entirety (including this notice). For other uses, please contact servinggodalone@yahoo.com.