Following Directions

This last week at the school has been eventful, and tiring. I was glad for the long weekend and Labor Day, even though I spent all of it getting over a cold. It's the first week of the school year, so Erin must get sick; I think the universe might implode if I didn't. Oh well, the long weekend gave me a chance to mostly recover. We also gave Lewa a bath this week. She just loooved that.

We've been playing with schedules all week, and are doing some "retraining" of our students on behavior in the classroom. A lot of my students are better at this than they were last year, but the newer students are having a hard time with following directions. I can't tell you how many times a day I say, "Okay, but what were my directions?" or "Please listen and follow my directions." Not because I want to be mean and demanding, but because the day flows much more smoothly when everyone is listening and cooperating. Even Lewa has to follow directions.

It got me thinking about other kinds of directions. We're told to love our neighbors as ourselves {Mark 12:30-31}, yet I often think of myself first, or say or do things against my neighbor (brother-, sister-in-Christ). What other directions is God giving me that I don't listen to? It could be anything; being nice to the driver who cut you off instead of getting upset, talking to that person in line about Christ, taking the time to rest and be filled with Him, leave everything and move into a life of missions. Maybe I don't hear them, or maybe I don't want to hear them. Either way, I need my teacher to gently remind me to follow His directions for my life, just like I remind my students. Then I have to learn and grow and choose to follow Him again. I've said it before, and I'll say it again. It's a process, people.