Kingdom Conspirators
Some Thoughts Now the School Is Truly Underway
I’d like to offer a few short thoughts aimed at those laboring in callings where the school year dictates the calendar. A version of this was first shared with fellow faculty when I served Master’s Academy as the high school’s academic dean. But the thoughts here served me well as I labored in other academic environments, and I hope they’ll be an encouragement for anyone in the trenches of the classroom.
As the school year gets under way, I think it’s encouraging to reflect on rhythms and habits come to shape both students and faculty. As a starting point, I’d like to consider a brief encounter in Mark 12:
The scribe said to Him, “Right, Teacher; You have truly stated that HE IS ONE, AND THERE IS NO ONE ELSE BESIDES HIM; AND TO LOVE HIM WITH ALL THE HEART AND WITH ALL THE UNDERSTANDING AND WITH ALL THE STRENGTH, AND TO LOVE ONE’S NEIGHBOR AS HIMSELF, is much more than all burnt offerings and sacrifices.” When Jesus saw that he had answered intelligently, He said to him, “You are not far from the kingdom of God.” After that, no one would venture to ask Him any more questions. (vv. 32-34, NAS95)
It is this recognition of the kingdom of God that I think can be a salve in these early, high-energy days of the school year. Sixteen Sundays have come and gone since the Church celebrated Christ’s ascent to the right hand of the Father and the subsequent coming of the Holy Spirit. Many schools are in week three, or even further. For clergy, students, parents and teachers alike, a certain sense of the ordinary has settled in. The rhythm of school and work and sports has, for the most part, become routine as our calendars and watches seamlessly synchronize with the activities in which we find ourselves engaged.
For teachers, students, administrators, and parents, every day is an opportunity for illumination. As many churches around the world pause to reflect upon the liturgical selection found above, I think it wise for schools to reflect on what it means to be teachable in the midst of the ordinary. Do I, as a scribe in the 21st century, ask questions for my own ends? Do I seek the knowledge of God’s kingdom to justify myself, or to know Jesus intimately? Therein, of course, lies the rub. Just as the scribe who questions his yet unrecognized Messiah, I must genuinely assess whose kingdom I am serving.
Yet this story offers hope, especially for those of us with obstinate natures. John Calvin notes, “it is worthy of notice that, though he had attacked Christ maliciously, and with the intention of taking him by surprise, not only does he silently yield to the latter, but openly and candidly assents to what Christ had said. Thus we see that he did not belong to the class of those enemies whose obstinacy is incurable,” (Commentary on a Harmony of the Evangelists Matthew, Mark, and Luke, vol. 3, p. 64). I have always loved Calvin’s phrasing: silently yielding, candidly assenting. Here, in Mark 12, we find an individual who not only knows when truth has been spoken, but who also allows that truth to melt any agenda that had hardened his heart and mind. That is what it takes to not be overcome by the rote or the mundane; this is the attitude needed to overcome the feeling that we have it all figured out.
As a teacher, this is often an acute struggle for me, and I am sure many others feel the same sting. Yet illumination is a daily opportunity. As I read, I begin to wonder: am I willing to hear the difficult answers when I ask a question? Are we, as a community, open to having our priorities shifted or altered so that we are aligning ourselves with God’s Kingdom? Do I allow my own comfort or malaise to rob me from seeing God’s redemptive work in the regular days of my life? Are we lost in the ocean of the ordinary, unable to find our way off this unspectacular route that seems so endless?
The answer, I believe, is found in the words of Jesus: “You are not far from the kingdom of God.” Love God. Love people. That is our compass which points to the abundant life, the life less-often lived (John 10:10). I’m reminded of Chuck Colson, a man who thought he had it all figured out until he allowed the truth of Christ to melt his own agenda into something kingdom oriented. At the end of his life, Prison Fellowship remembered Colson by sharing this thought from him on their website: “One of the most wonderful things about being a Christian is that I don’t ever get up in the morning and wonder if what I do matters. I live every day to the fullest because I can live it through Christ and I know no matter what I do today, I’m going to do something to advance the Kingdom of God.”
May each of us incline our hearts and minds to Jesus, that we may be co-conspirators in His Kingdom.