I’ve known Sharon since I was a teenager. Our families crossed paths every summer on vacation. As a pastor’s wife, Sharon has seen her fair share of difficulties and trials, but her story of bravery involves stepping inside the four walls of a classroom. I’m sure many parents and teachers will relate to her experience and gather wisdom from it. Listen in as Sharon shares.
Armed with her love of music and a teaching degree, Sharon stepped boldly into the classroom at an inner-city school. The previous teacher suffered a nervous breakdown and left mid-way through the year. These students would go through a teacher a year. They had learned that choir class was time to goof off and an easy grade.
With over 60 high school students in her classes, only half the kids were actually interested in singing and wanted to be there. The remaining students ran wild; climbing in and out of the windows, bringing in fast food, and displaying unruly behavior. Sharon resorted to “time out” chairs, in the beginning, to build structure in her class and allow the students who wanted to sing, to sing. Students who didn’t want to join in, but still wanted to pass the class, would flip desks over when Sharon gave them a bad grade. Some sent their parents, who were involved in gangs, to confront and threatened Sharon. It was completely out of control.
But God didn’t give Sharon release to quit, so she kept pressing on.
Pushing aside her remorse and disappointment in teaching, and dealing with health issues from the stress and exhausted from battling students all day, Sharon believed that God had a plan. He planted her in the situation and gave her peace in accepting the position, so she made the decision to accept her “war-zone” environment. Sharon pressed into bringing peace amidst her chaotic situation. The Lord began opening Sharon’s eyes to the students who were hopeful, and loved music, and wanted things to work out. She began praying for specific students.
Days and months went by and Sharon kept sticking to her plan of bringing calm to the crazy. When students would cuss her out and throw music in her face, Sharon would respond peacefully expressing disappointment in their sad choices. Students kept hitting her wall of peace and the tide began to turn. Students began trusting her.
God gave Sharon the strength to just keep doing the right thing. Truth will prevail. Rightness will prevail.
Through it all, Sharon learned valuable lessons about dealing with difficult people that she didn’t have a lot in common with. For example, Sharon struggled with one student who was chronically late. Every morning, this student had to find her drug-addicted mother on any given street corner, drag her back home before she came to school. This was perspective Sharon had never faced before and stoked the fires of empathy within her soul.
Sharon also had to learn to be authentic. She learned that kindness and caring will cross the bridge of any cultural divide. Take the time to learn why people are so angry. Find out what struggles they’re dealing with in life that makes their life challenging. The Lord was teaching Sharon skills and ways of connecting with people that served her in many other situations in her life. These students didn’t look like her, didn’t sound like her, but the Lord was teaching her ways to connect.
If God has told you where to go and it is NOT working out, Sharon would encourage you to not quit too early. If it’s too much to handle, don’t assume it’s not from God. Perhaps you’re in the situation to acquire new skills and to reach a new people group for his glory.
For example, when God led the Israelites out of bondage (Exodus 14), he led them in between water and the army. They didn’t have the street skills for the job. But the Lord tested their faith and wanted to bring them through something. They trusted him in an unusual plan to divide the Red Sea. In the same way, God was testing Sharon and wanted to know if she would trust him. Through her teaching difficulties, Sharon learned that she had some underlying behavior that kept her in her comfort zone, never venturing out to reach others that were different than her.
Just like the Israelites, Sharon felt the Lord remind her they would go through this together and she would be amazed at what the Lord would do. Like he told the Israelites, “the Egyptians you see today, you will never see again” (Exodus 14:13). Sharon believed if she trusted God to bring her through this, then she would never have to deal with this struggle again. She trusted the Lord to bring her through the difficulty like he led the Israelites through the Red Sea.
God does not promise that he won’t give us situations that we won’t feel under-qualified, under-skilled, and under-spiritual. God may put you in some fearful places, especially ones you wouldn’t go on your own. Gather prayer partners around you and find some verses to stand on. Believe that God will follow-through where He has led you. Don’t keep questioning his leading. Trust and follow. Press in and see what character development he’s building in you.
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