Have you ever tried to help someone with a task and then realized that there are so many tasks that have to be grasped BEFORE you can make any progress.......

That's where I am finding myself this afternoon with my students.

Struggling to determine where to begin on many topics.

You can't find a greatest common factor if you don't know what a factor is.

You can't add fractions with unlike denominators if you're not sure how to make the denominators match.

In a classroom, there are so many different needs. Teachers face this feeling every day all over the world.

And yet the bigger question looming in my mind is,

"DO THESE KIDS KNOW JESUS?"

So, I find myself with my head leaning back against a soft recliner trying to decide how to break down this feeling of being overwhelmed.....yes, overwhelmed just 12 hours after writing about leaning on God........

Oh, Paul, I understand your words when you say "the very things you don't want to do you find yourself doing." Being human makes being like Christ so difficult........(Romans 7)

So I lean back and close my eyes and know that right this minute in the few moments of breathing space that I have before Olivia's big basketball game (which by the way is against the school where I teach) I cannot answer any of my questions.

I can't teach my students everything they don't understand. There are still so many things that I don't understand at the age of 45. But I can teach them something.

So I just have to decide what that something is going to be......

And I can't come right out in a public school setting and say, "Do you know Jesus?" But I can show them love and pray that through my love they will see Jesus.

Oh, what a day it will be when God reveals Himself and all our questions are answered!!!!!!!!!!!!! When our faith becomes sight and we see Him face to face (no more poor reflections in a mirror - I Cor. 13)......

So where do I start?

The answer is always the same.

With Him.

With Him.

With Him.

All core content aside.

All standards removed.

All combined curriculum documents placed temporarily on a shelf.

All rubrics and assessments tucked away.

I have to go to Him.

To breathe.

To cope.

To make sense of things that often don't make sense.

To cry.

To talk.

To rest.

Oh, thank you, God, for always being there.......waiting for me to "begin" with you.

I feel better now.