October | 2013 | itsawonderfilledlife

Archive for October, 2013

Girls Just Wanna Have Fun

Posted in WONDER, tagged Cyndi Lauper, girls just wanna have fun, karaoke, recess, reprieve, Rest on October 11, 2013| Leave a Comment »

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It was a Saturday evening, after a day of laundry and housework, after a long week of out-of-the-house work. I was tired, hormonal and had simply been just surviving for far too many days in a row.

So, out of the house (where more housework awaited) to my friend’s house for a coffee. Originally it was to be a cute and trendy coffee shop, but we both decided it was only right to save our pennies (even if they no longer exist in Canada) and have our coffee at her house … which would be emptied of her hubby, her Littles, and their homestay student.

Once there and our cups warmed, I mentioned a new TV channel I had heard about … the karaoke channel. Since my friend is a kindergarten teacher, I thought it might be a fun way to help kids in their learning to read, as the song lyrics are on the screen as the song plays.

Well, in seconds she had sought, and found, the channel … and an hour and a half later, when her two kids and hubby returned, one would think that they had entered an eighties dance club. We were singing from the songs we had saved in our queue, at the top of our lungs, complete with air guitar (it was the eighties, after all).

What a reprieve from the mundane routine of life … sleep, work, housework … Best of all was the laughter, from the pit of our beings, it burst from our insides out, removing the fatigue that sometimes resides within our beings.

We females, we people, need laughter, we need fun! There is a reason that recess is scheduled in for students in elementary schools … it provides a reprieve from all that is expected for a little while, so that, when recess is over, students are better able to do what is expected of them … the hard work. So too we adults need periodic recess breaks, to let loose. It might not be karaoke for you (nor did I ever think it would be for me), but instead a sport, a comic movie, a walk in the park, a visit to a new town or an episode of your favorite show, with a good friend or family member. The thing that we need to remember is that we need recess … it makes us better able to do what is expected.

And just so you can try this out for yourselves :

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Giving Birth

Posted in WONDER, tagged Birthday, carolyn arends, giving birth, Growing Up, laboring, we've been waiting for you on October 10, 2013| 5 Comments »

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Ten minutes after ten in the morning,

On the tenth day of the tenth month of 1999,

… into this world I pushed, with great excitement and hesitancy, our final child, a son.

I couldn’t wait to hold him in my arms, smother him in kisses, and drink in his baby scent.

But, I dreaded his leaving my body, along with his kicks, his heartbeat …

I dreaded … the loss of his constant presence within me.

Fourteen years ago … and I still feel I am giving birth … with excitement and hesitancy.

The other night, my son came home with his new football pictures, and so I rushed to put it in ‘the frame’ holding the one from last year. I studied the two visions of the same son …

– his teeth have grown into his mouth, providing a grown-up smile

– his face is not so round, more angular, more grown-up

– his shoulders more broad, more like those of a man

Sigh …

The pains of giving birth, of laboring, tore at my momma heart, once again. The visual reminders that my boy is becoming man, that the end of his time in the safety of the womb that is our home is just a handful of football pictures away.

Giving birth really is a tearing, a separating. Without it, there is not life. But, it is not an easy, or pain-free process … it is labor.

As we celebrate our son’s fourteenth birthday today, we celebrate his life, the fruit of our laboring.

He is now in the final trimester of his school years, having been birthed from elementary and middle school years, to this new phase called high school.

He is now a Bantam in football. His five foot nine, 180lb body often facing peers of six feet tall and 250lbs. … a reality that gives me labor pains for a solid two hours every Sunday.

Each and every stage of the life, of this son of mine, is a birthing, complete with labor pains … conceived within my dread of the loss of his constant presence with me. But, it is this giving birth, this giving of life, that allows him to take that first breath of each new day, and live his life.

“We’ve been waiting for you
We’re so glad you came
We’ve been looking forward
To showing you the place
There’s so much in store and
We’ve been waiting for you”
Carolyn Arends
We’ve Been Waiting for You Lyrics/MetroLyrics

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” … And You Became Mine”

Posted in WONDER, tagged 2 Samuel 7, Abraham, all for jesus, blood, covenant, David, Exodus 24, ezekiel 16:8, Faith, Galatians 3, Genesis 17, Genesis 22, God's promise, Hebrews 8, Hebrews 9, Moses, Noah on October 9, 2013| Leave a Comment »

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A covenant is more than just a promise. A covenant is something agreed upon by at least two parties … both knowing what they are agreeing to.

The Bible speaks of a handful of covenants between God and people.

God made a covenant with Noah that He would never again destroy the Earth with a flood (Genesis 9:8-11), and gave the rainbow as a reminder of his covenant.

“By faith Noah, when warned about things not yet seen, in holy fear built an ark to save his family. By his faith he condemned the world and became heir of the righteousness that is in keeping with faith.” Hebrews 11:7

God made a covenant with Abram (later Abraham) when He said that Abram would be the “father of many nations” (Genesis 17:4).

Poor, old Abram, with his old wife Sarai (well beyond childbearing years) … this covenant sent Sarai into laughing hysterics. But, God did as he promised, and Sarah bore Isaac to Abraham, and God’s covenant flowed through his descendants.

By faith Abraham fulfilled his end of the bargain, and he went where God sent him (Hebrews 11:8). By faith, Abraham was circumcised, along with all males in his household, as a sign to set he and his descendants apart (Genesis 23:27). By faith, Abraham lay Isaac on an alter, willing to do whatever God asked of him (Genesis 22:8) … and so thankful that the Lord did provide.

God made a covenant, through Moses, with His people (not all people, but the children of Israel … the Jewish people), in the form of the Ten Commandments. This came after God, with force, brought His people our of slavery in Egypt. Before Moses had even written these laws in stone, the people, by faith, said, “everything the Lord has said we will do.”

And after he read the Book of the Covenant, Moses took the blood of young bulls that were sacrificed as offerings to God, and “Moses then took the blood, sprinkled it on the people and said, “This is the blood of the covenant that the Lord has made with you in accordance with all these words.”” (Exodus 24:8). The people, who, by faith, said “we will obey” were, quite literally, covered by the blood of the covenant … their sins were covered by God’s promise.

God made a covenant with David, that the Messiah would come through the lineage, the house, of David. David wanted to build a house for God. Instead, God sent a message to David, a house would be built, through the One who would come after him, through his very own bloodline. This builder “is the one who will build a house for my Name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. I will be his father, and he will be my son” (2 Samuel 7:13-14). David responded to God: “your covenant is trustworthy, and you have promised these good things to your servant” (2 Samuel 7:28) … David trusted his God, he had faith, that that which God promised, and David would never see in his lifetime, would come true.

Over and over we see that when it comes to a covenant with God, the equation is :

Covenant = Blood (Faith + Promise)

I suppose we should consider that fulfillment of God’s covenant with David :

“The days are coming, declares the Lord,
    when I will make a new covenant
with the people of Israel (the Jews)
  and with the people of Judah (the Gentiles).
I will put my laws in their minds (not just knowing, but understanding)
  and write them on their hearts (intimacy).
I will be their God,
    and they will be my people.
(Hebrews 8:8-10)

A new covenant, “has appeared once for all at the culmination of the ages to do away with sin by the sacrifice of himself” (Hebrews 9:26). Previously, “the law required that nearly everything be cleansed with blood, and without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness” (Hebrews 9:22). Jesus Christ was the final blood sacrifice for sins. “He redeemed us in order that the blessing given to Abraham might come to the Gentiles through Christ Jesus, so that by faith we might receive the promise of the Spirit” (Galatians 3:14).

Jesus’ blood covers God’s promise and our faith.

And now, our part in the covenant:

Do we have the faith to follow, and obey? to be His?

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No Guarantees

Posted in WONDER, tagged 1 peter 2:22-25, Consequences, fairness, no guarantees, what we deserve on October 8, 2013| 2 Comments »

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Maybe it is my age or stage in life, but I have come to the conclusion that there simply are no guarantees in life.

To which you, the reader might reply :

DUH!

Although I know that in my head, who I am, struggles to accept that reality.

The way I have always lived my life is of great understanding of consequences … both good and bad. My inner personality strives to work hard, do what is good and right, treat people well, live honestly and truthfully, and to obey the rules (I am not saying that I am always successful in those things). My inner personality also believes that if I live in this way, the consequences will be good for me. What I am really saying is that, I believe that if I act and behave a certain way, I then ‘deserve’ a good result or outcome …

as though …

life were …

fair.

But, if life were fair (aka if there were guarantees or deserved consequences) our world would be so different …

Good men and women would not lose the jobs they do well, because of a nose-dive in the economy.

Parents who have been loving and consistent in raising their children would not have to see their child make choices about drugs, or alcohol that endanger their very lives.

The guy who always spent his money wisely, and bought a house at an early age would not have lost over half of his resources after being married just a few years to the woman who only married him for his financial assets.

The woman who ‘saved herself’ for marriage, would not be heartbroken by the discovery that her husband had been cheating on her since early into their marriage.

The person who eats only what is healthy, and exercises like it is their full time job, would not be told by their doctor that their life is in danger because a mass has been discovered in their lungs.

The student who spends every spare minute to study, at the expense of experiencing life and deeper relationships, would not receive a letter of denial to every law school he or she applied to.

If only we had guarantees that if we do something good, or right, or just we would receive the appropriate, fair, response!

But, there are no guarantees in life.

We are not alone in this unfair, cruel, unpredictable reality of living.

Once, there was one who did nothing wrong … ever.

Yet,

“He never did one thing wrong,
Not once said anything amiss.

They called him every name in the book and he said nothing back.
He suffered in silence, content to let God set things right.
He used his servant body to carry our sins to the Cross

so we could be rid of sin,
free to live the right way.
His wounds became your healing.
You were lost sheep with no idea who you were or where you were going.
Now you’re named and kept for good
by the Shepherd of your souls.”
1 Peter 2:22-25

Hum …

we really don’t get what we deserve …

thanks to the author and perfecter of our lives.

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Why Are You Downcast, Oh My Soul?

Posted in WONDER, tagged as the deer pants, discouraged, downcast, psalm 42, satisfied in you, why are you downcast oh my soul on October 7, 2013| 2 Comments »

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Ever feel beaten up? misunderstood? constantly corrected? wrong? wronged?

Haven’t we all?

There are times … years, seasons, days when we understand the Psalmist who wrote, Psalm 42. A Psalm most familiar for:

“as the deer pants for water, so my soul longs for you.” (v.1)

It is such a lovely verse … a hopeful verse, a verse stitched on pillows on printed on mugs, and displayed creatively on Pinterest.

But, Psalm 42 is not simply a beautiful and peaceful Psalm. It is also a heart-cry from the Psalmist, to the living God who brought blessing, in the past. It is a cry for ‘the good ‘ol days’ that have been replaced by sorrow, loneliness, mourning, oppression … a downcast spirit.

It is the pouring out of the sorrows of the Psalmist’s soul, and his reminders to his soul, to “put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and my God.”

What a good example that, not matter what is going on around us, or in us, our soul can be satisfied by the hope of God … and even in those not so great days, we can praise him, our Savior and our God!

“I have lost my appetite
And a flood is welling up behind my eyes
So I eat the tears I cry
And if that were not enough
They know just the words to cut and tear and prod
When they ask me “Whereʼs your God?”

Why are you downcast, oh my soul?
Why so disturbed within me?
I can remember when you showed your face to me

As a deer pants for water, so my soul thirsts for you
And when I survey Your splendor, You so faithfully renew
Like a bed of rest for my fainting flesh

When Iʼm looking at the ground
Itʼs an inbred feedback loop that drags me down
So itʼs time to lift my brow
And remember better days
When I loved to worship you and learn your ways
Singing sweetest songs of praise

Let my sighs give way to songs that sing about your faithfulness
Let my pain reveal your glory as my only real rest
Let my losses show me all I truly have is you

So when Iʼm drowning out at sea
And all your breakers and your waves crash down on me
Iʼll recall your safety scheme
Youʼre the one who made the waves
And your Son went out to suffer in my place
And to show me that Iʼm safe

Why am I down?
Why so disturbed?
I am satisfied in you”

Brian Eichelberger
The Sing Team

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WWJD … What Would Jonah Do?

Posted in WONDER, tagged an offer i can't refuse, god's will, marjorie george, ministry, reflections online, what would jonah do, wwjd on October 6, 2013| Leave a Comment »

When I read this post, by Marjorie George, on her blog Reflections Online, I thought she was describing a Jonah-like response. Jonah, that servant of God, who really did not want to go to Nineveh, so he fled on a boat headed in the opposite direction. I guess he forgot that God is all-knowing. So, Jonah ended up in a whale for three days, followed by a quick exit, and obedience to God.

In this guest post, by Marjorie, I could hear myself in this author’s story of a willing servant. Perhaps we can all see ourselves in this post, called An Offer I Can’t Refuse.

“A ministry opportunity presents itself. In faithfulness, I enter into the discernment process. I go again to Frederick Buechner’s definition of “vocation” as “the place where the world’s greatest need meets your greatest passion.”

Is this ministry something I feel passionate about? Yes.

Is this something the world needs to have done? Does it benefit society? Yes.

Is it scriptural? Is it something that resonates with the faith I have been taught? Yep.

What about me. Am I equipped to do this ministry? Do I have the ability needed, the resources that will be called upon, the time to commit? Yes, yes, and really I could make the time.

Then Jesus looked at the rich, young ruler with the eyes of love and said: “Now give it all up and come, follow me” (Mark 10: 21).

Well I didn’t see that coming. I was preparing to offer God my gifts and talents and abilities – the ones that YOU gave me, God, I might add – and God asks for myself instead.

I can see myself in this ministry and I will take that chair right over there, God, I say. Bless me on my way.

God says, “Right, now go over here.”

But God, I point out, I could do that over there.

“Got it,” says God. “Now go over here.”

Really, I am better working out of my strengths — you know, the ones YOU have given me.

“And I want you to work out of my strength,” he replies.

God is always choosing people, points out Richard Rohr. But “First impressions aside, God is not primarily choosing them for a role or a task, although it might appear that way. God is really choosing them to be God’s self in this world, each in a unique situation. If they allow themselves to experience being chosen, being a beloved, being somehow God’s presence in the world, they invariably communicate that same chosenness to others.” (Daily meditation for September 16, 2013, find it here http://myemail.constantcontact.com/Richard-Rohr-s-Daily-Meditation–You-Have-to-Be-a-Beloved-to-Know.html?soid=1103098668616&aid=WIKS9hNDLm0 )

Jesus, walking along the seashore, calls Peter, James, and John – but not to be better fishermen. He does not choose Matthew for spiritual training in how to become a better tax collector. God equips us and showers us with gifts and teaches us and sets us on a path then says, “Now put that all aside and just show up. And, by the way, nothing has been wasted.”

Christ had a great ministry going. Who knows what else he might have accomplished had his life not been cut short. How many more followers he might have attracted. How much easier it would have been for his disciples. How many martyrs’ lives might have been spared. Maybe the entire Roman Empire could have been converted on his watch.

But he came to God saying, “Nevertheless, your will be done, not mine.” And that was the offer God wanted (Matthew 26:39).

It is exactly our uniqueness that each of us brings to the Kingdom and that each of us must put second to first being the expression of God in the world. In Four Elements: Reflections on Nature, John O’Donohue writes, “It is ontologically and spiritually true that each person is privileged and burdened with the gift of uniqueness . . . No one else sees your life in the way that you do. No one else feels your life in the way that you do. Neither can any other stand on the same ground as you . . . You are the unique inhabitant of your own reality and of your own life” (pg 5-6).

So it is my uniqueness that God asks me to bring to ministry, and it is my uniqueness that God asks me to surrender. My gifts, skills, and talents are not what I have to offer; what I have to offer is being a creature whom God created, Christ redeemed, and the Holy Spirit endows with a certain perspective and a certain experience. Everything else is just details.

Thomas Merton, observing nature, writes “A tree gives glory to God by being a tree. For in being what God means it to be it is obeying [God]. It ‘consents,’ so to speak, to [God’s] creative love. It is expressing an idea which is in God and which is not distinct from the essence of God, and therefore a tree imitates God by being a tree” (from New Seeds of Contemplation).

“And thus the Mystery passes on from age to age,” says Rohr. “Yes, we do have roles and tasks in this world, but finally they are all the same—to uniquely be divine love in a way that no one else can or will.””

Marjorie George is editor of Reflections magazine and ReflectionsOnline. Reach her at marjorie.george@dwtx.org

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The Best of September 30 – October 4

Posted in WONDER, tagged september 30-oct 4, the best of, the best of itsawonderfilledlife on October 5, 2013| Leave a Comment »

It is October already!

The month of falling leaves, burning the dust off the furnace, Thanksgiving, and a night to dress up as someone (something) we are not. In our house, October is the month of the anniversary of the wedding of hubby and I, as well as the month that our oldest and youngest celebrate birthdays.

This first week of October, you viewers blew me away with the numbers of you reading What a Christian School is What it is Not, the best of this week. But, it was not just the numbers reading it, it was also the numbers of you that liked, commented, or sent me a personal note saying how much you appreciated what was said.

Please know, as I have said, again and again, what I choose to write is based my own need to share what I have learned. I hope each time that what gets written (in my very human state) can be used to bless, to help, to make someone else feel that they are not alone. The comments I receive tell me, that I am not alone either.

Also this week, I published:

Overcomer
(put your dancing shoes on)

As You Wish
(a little anniversary gift to hubby)

Gods Hands and Feet
(could be one to read with a tissue nearby)

Opposing or Complementary
(there is a time for everything)

Blessings to you this day,
Carole

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Opposing or Complementary?

Posted in WONDER, tagged complements, ecclesiasted 3, end in sight, opposing or complementary, opposites, seasons, yin and yang on October 4, 2013| 2 Comments »

There is a yin and yang to most, it not all, portions of our life and living.

Where there is weakness in one area,

there co-exists strength nearby.

Where there is sadness in one area,

there is joy close by.

Where there is foolishness in abundance,

just around the corner, there is supreme knowledge and wisdom.

It would seem that there is an ongoing co-existence of opposites in our lives, but does that have to be the way we interpret it?

Ecclesiastes 3 is full of such ‘opposites’ :

“There is a time for everything,
and a season for every activity under the heavens:

a time to be born and a time to die,
a time to plant and a time to uproot,
a time to kill and a time to heal,
a time to tear down and a time to build,
a time to weep and a time to laugh,
a time to mourn and a time to dance,
a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing,
a time to search and a time to give up,
a time to keep and a time to throw away,
a time to tear and a time to mend,
a time to be silent and a time to speak,
a time to love and a time to hate,
a time for war and a time for peace.”

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As we read through these comparisons we cannot simply read them, and see them as opposites. They are also complements …

– like the colors on an artists color wheel, that which is directly across, actually enhances the other.
– like the rotation of the earth around the sun, bringing day then night.

When we hear of a death, as well as a birth, in the same family, in the same week … the birth is made more beautiful, more dear the breath of life, and the sting of death can be diminished by the joy of new life.

When we weep, with great sorrow in our hearts, words from a friend that allow us to also experience a deep belly laugh are words of freedom from the weight of sorrow.

To uproot cam be to reap the benefits of planting.

Sometimes, the only way for peace to reign, is from the effects of war.

In these contrasting complements, there is also a promise, and assurance, that we frequently forget as we read … as we live. This promise comes at the beginning of these verses, and again at the end … hum, it is repeated … maybe it is that which we should write a song about, rather than the verses which became a great seller for Pete Seeger.

“There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens:“ Ecclesiastes 3:1

“God has made everything beautiful for its own time.” Ecclesiastes 3:11a

In both verse 1 and verse 11a, there is a great reminder … there is beauty in all situations, and all situations have a season … a beginning and an end.

This tough time that you might be going through … causing you to weep, or mourn, or be silent, or feel as though death itself is preferable … it had a beginning, and it will have an end. And when it has had it’s season, soak up the complementary season, and look back to see the bright light that the ‘dark side’ has brought you.

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God’s Hands and Feet

Posted in WONDER, tagged Alzheimers, god's hands and feet, Jesus Loves Me, Special Needs, zephaniah 3:17 on October 3, 2013| 6 Comments »

Many years ago (about twenty-one actually), I experienced one of those times where I felt confident that I was God’s hands and feet.

I was very pregnant with our our eldest daughter, and working in a group home for disabled adults.

There were five adults living in the home, ranging from about nineteen years of age to over fifty. One had regular visits by her grandmother … I never met family members of any of the others. Four of them had lived much of their lives in institutions, and this intimate home setting would be the closest to ‘family’ that they ever experienced.

I loved my job in this house, with these people.

There was the woman who loved to snuggle up beside anyone on the couch.

There was the woman who loved to grab tightly to hair … I think it was her way of having control, after all we picked her clothes for her each day!

There was the man who regularly stripped off his clothes … from the waist down … when guests were in the house!

There was the man who loved practical jokes … like the time he reached up to pinch the bottom of the lady in a line, just as a staff member stepped in front of him, and when she turned to deal with whoever was touching her behind, it was the staff member, not the jovial client who she faced.

Then there was Carmelita.

Carmelita, the first person I met when I came to the house for my job interview. She yelled at me … loudly. I was told, after I got the job, that they used her as the first line of deciding who to hire, by watching interviewees reactions to her.

Carmelita, or Carm, was a lady in her late forties, born with Down’s Syndrome (Trisomy 21). She loved gaudy jewelry, all food, and babies. When I met her she was also dealing with the effects of the later stages of Alzheimer’s Disease. She was often crying or yelling.

I remember the day I said, “Carm, you look so happy today” and she shook her fist at me, while giving me the nastiest face.

I also remember, like it was yesterday, the night I worked at the home, alone.

All of the clients were sleeping, except for Carmelita, who was in and out of crying fits. It nearly broke my heart.

Despite holding her hand, and saying soothing things, nothing seemed to allow me to penetrate the misery that she was experiencing.

Finally, I started to sing (I am NOT a good singer … ask my family) Jesus Loves Me, as I sat on the side of her bed, holding her hand. But, it was in the middle of the night, and I was exhausted.

As I sang, “Yes, Jesus Loves …” I yawned, mid verse.

Without skipping a beat, Carm abruptly stopped crying, and sang with absolute clarity, “me” to finish the verse.

Then, we sang a bit more, together. After which she fell asleep.

The next day, as I was recouping the sleep I had lost that previous night, I was awakened by my hubby, who told me that Carmelita had never awakened that morning, and that she had died.

To know that our shared song, of the most theologically relevant message, would be the last Earthly experience she would have, allowed me to feel that I was being the very hands and feet … and even really bad singing voice, of God.

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What a Christian School is … What it is Not

Posted in WONDER, tagged christian education, ignorance, Matthew 19, misconceptions, what a christian school is, what a christian school is not on October 2, 2013| 7 Comments »

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When I heard that an individual wanted to ‘shake up’ a handful of kids from the Christian school I work at, I have to say I started to feel rather like a mother hen.

Was this individual one connected to a local group of Satanists?

No … this individual was/is connected (and has held positions of leadership) at a local Christian church … a good group of believers.

After months of fuming about this, and asking myself (and God) what causes someone, who professes to follow God, to desire to mess with kids … any kids. I keep coming back to one word … ignorance.

I know ignorance is the key, because when I think back to my own misconceptions of what Christian schooling was all about, it is far from what I now know it to be.

Here is what I know to NOT be true about Christian Education Schools
(although I can only speak for the schools that I know well) :

– it is not a glorified ‘Sunday School’

– it is not a school full of Christians

– it is not a place parents put their kids to protect them from the ‘real world’

– it is not a place where Creationism is forced down the student’s throats, and Evolutionism ignored and scoffed at. I have always been thrilled with the grade 9 science teacher who, when introducing a chapter on evolutionism said, “I will not tell you what to believe, but I will give you the tools to discover for yourselves how our world began.” Hum, equal time for differing points of view …

– it is not ‘easy’ education.

– it is not always, for all children, in every circumstance.

– it is not perfect.

Here is what I know to BE true about Christian Education Schools:

– all students who attend, have someone in their lives who loves God, and who wants their kids, grandkids, nieces and nephews, to learn all academic subjects appreciating how intricately God created everything, and how His truths seep through everything from literature, to sciences, to automotive, to art, to history.

– there are probably not many more students, who are Christians, in a Christian school, than in a public school.

– the students who I have seen graduate from our Christian High School, do not have a big adjustment to the academic expectations of post secondary universities … Christian and public.

– Christian educators need to be licensed.

– Christian schools need to be evaluated (in this province, by the Ministry of Education).

– each day starts with teachers, Educational Assistants, and other students praying for the day ahead, in a time set aside for devotions.

I have often heard people refer to different public schools as ‘like’ a Christian school, because many of the staff and students are followers of Christ, but it is not the population that makes it a Christian school. To be a Christian School is to have built everything … from curriculum, to mission statement, to service, to daily schedule, to hiring of staff … on the foundation that all that we have comes from God, and it is our knowledge of that which gives us purpose in all that we do.

And so, that Christ-follower who wanted to ‘shake up’ the kids who attend a Christian School …

“One day
children were brought to Jesus
in the hope that he would lay hands on them and pray over them.
The disciples shooed them off.
But Jesus intervened:
“Let the children alone, don’t prevent them from coming to me.
God’s kingdom is made up of people like these.””
Matthew 19:13-15