what a high calling

It's Saturday morning and so I allowed my body to sleep in...my eyes open and it is 8:11.  Thankful for God's provision in housing for this semester. I have a bed to sleep in and a roof over my head.  I decided to get some reading done.  For student teaching orientation, we are reading a book by Kenneth O. Gangel titled, Called to Teach.   All you teacher friends out there, I highly suggest this book. It takes a biblical approach on our role as a teacher.

While reading, I am overwhelmed by God's goodness.  When I step back and look at my life, I see clearly that I am actively working on two of my biggest dreams in life: [a] to become a teacher, and [b] to become a wife.  Such a high calling in both of these dreams, but I feel (without any doubt in my mind) that this is a call of God on my life.  I have no words to describe the emotions that go into this.

When this all boils down, my high callings have a huge affect on people.  In reading this book, I am continually reminded of how much more is involved with being a teacher beyond teaching academics.  I am a model to them day in and day out and whether I like it or not, they will be imitating me.  What kind of person will I be for them to imitate?  My heart desire is for my students to become more like Christ.  I need to not just be a good moral person for them to follow, but to be a reflection of Christ Himself for my students to imitate. I am reminded of  1 Corinthians 11:1 "Be ye followers of me, as I am also of Christ."

This requires work...hard work.  A lot boils down to my personal relationship with Christ.  It has to be real and genuine.  This is so partially so my students will have a relationship with Christ as their teacher does (or better), but also so that when they imitate me, they are imitating Christ.  I do know though that I will never be a fully accurate image of Christ, so I pray that I will have humility to admit to my students that I am far from perfect and do not give an accurate image of Christ and they must therefore spend their energy ultimately imitating Christ, not me.

As a future wife I am first of all overjoyed with God's generosity in allowing me to enter into such a relationship.  Already I am learning so much more about Christ through my relationship with my fiancé.  May our relationship be a reflection of Christ and the love He has for His bride.

Neither of these tasks will be easy, but I am doing my best to first and foremost work and deepen my relationship with Christ.  I am secondly working on what I can do to prepare: read books, talk to others who have been through it, and pray for wisdom in both situations.  I ask that you join me in praying for these two exciting dreams ahead of me. I praise the Lord for how HE has directed me in this journey and brought me to this preparation phase of my life towards two of my greatest dreams!