But for me, my adventure doesn't involve filling up my gas tank every weekend and lacing up my hiking boots. This summer I danced in the waves of the Mediterranean, floated in the salty waters of the Dead Sea, and stargazed in the sand of the Wadi Rum desert. Jesus replenished my thirsty soul with His love and beauty. Although it was a summer of swimming in the beauty and joy of a Father lavishing love on his daughter, my adventure has twisted and turned down a road that is far less dazzling.
Anyone who knows me know that I have a love for children that far exceeds playing hide-and-go-seek and reading with them The Very Hungry Caterpillar. I have written essay after essay about how passionately I believe that teachers have the ability to set a child's life ablaze with a fire of confident hope. No matter the culture, home, parents, or disability that makes up a child's past, I confidently claim that a teacher has the opportunity to speak unwavering truth to a child and that those words can be poured from the spring of living water that is in the Spirit of God who loves and fights for children.
This year I have begun my teaching career by teaching two-year-olds. If you're not a mom you might have forgotten that at age 2 kids begin potty training, expressing themselves, and drinking out of cups without lids. I love them so much, but to say that my day is full of teaching valuable lessons and creating learning environments that promote discovery and exploration, I'd be hiding the reality. Sure, we try our best to make that happen. It's always the goal and failure isn't due to a lack of trying. But truthfully, it's a lot of screams of defiance, wet pants and snot on your sleeve. My day is choosing battles, celebrating the smallest of victories, and reminding kids to wash their hands and pull up their pants.
I can say that knowing the fact that the work I do changes the lives of those malleable munchkins is a golden cord that I hold onto for dear life and shear sanity. I know that my purpose is bigger than each day and that the fruit of labor isn't seen until the harvest, but some days it's just hard. I have to continually ask the Spirit to pour into me an overflow of patience, love, kindness, and peace so that my flesh doesn't destroy a single opportunity. But I don't always win. I fail a lot. Over and over I fail until sometimes it feels like the good of my work has been trampled out by my stomping selfishness.
And yet.
That's not grace. Grace is knowing that when the adventure God takes you on sometimes ends with poop on your hands. And it still is beautiful. His glory shines. Grace is knowing that the world is full of beautiful glimpses of Paradise and that missing out on seeing the world now is only missing out on the shadow of greater things to come. Grace is knowing that He is God in classrooms and he is God in the hills of India and the deserts of Jordan and the grasslands of Africa and the coffee shops of Portland. Grace is knowing that our identity does not waver when we repeatedly fail. Grace is knowing it is better to know your depravity than to think that you've got things figured out. Grace is knowing that the beauty of suffering eclipses the pain it causes.
Grace is knowing that adventure is not always glamorous.
