I would have rather been on a boat, charging up the Amazon River as a career missionary, headed towards one of the 4 Shuar villages that I know still does not know my Jesus. But instead, I was returning to a job I have always loved, yet this time felt no joy in the returning.
Let me explain:
When I finished Year #19 of teaching Bible in Christian schools, I had truly finished. In my mind, I was off to another adventure. I was not retiring. I was not finished teaching Bible, I was just finished doing it in that classroom. I love my students...."every stinkin one of them" (as they hear me say often). But my heart needed a change, and in all fairness to those students, they would need me changed as well. I couldn't return without using the same word I had started with every year...excited., and every student needs their teacher to begin the year with that word.
So I prayed. And God's answer was another year of teaching Bible in that classroom (per the request of my husband, who-when he speaks-I listen). I would return in obedience, but I felt anything but excited about the returning.
After two weeks of sitting with the understanding that I would in fact go back , I finally had peace, but the excited was still absent. I prayed for it, I longed for it, and I waited for it, but Day One and Two were void of it.
One morning, a few days before school began, I was reading Hebrews 12:2 when the Lord caused me to focus on the word joy. I realized that Jesus never waited on the word excited; He moved because of joy. In that moment, the Spirit told my heart that I could do the same. I bowed my head, and I promised to move in joy (not the happy, not the excited, but the joy that he Lord promises will be my strength).
And then, three days into this first week of school, one of my students approached me with tears (they were given a 5 minute brain break during our block class to go to the restroom when she approached me with sobs so deep I could barely understand her). She was under such conviction, and I had no idea why. I began searching through my words over the past hour, trying to find the ones that could have possibly led her to those tears, but I came up with nothing. And then I realized, it didn't matter. The Holy Spirit's conviction was from the words I had quoted from the Scriptures; words I was only using within the context of our lesson. They weren't my words (because OUR WORDS DO NOT CONVICT THE HEART). And the Spirit whispered softly into my ear, "It was for the joy, Stacy, and it was right in front of you all the time. You've been waiting for the excited , but just like Jesus, I'm asking you to move towards the joy".
You see, the most unexpected thing happened to me during my first week of school; a school year I had not anticipated being a part of. I was met with joy from a convicted heart who just needed someone to remind her of the Spirit's words. You're thinking that the heart I'm speaking of was my student's, but you would be wrong. It was mine.
