Broken

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As this school year ends, I’m contemplating things I’ve learned over the last ten months. And yes, teachers often learn more than their students.

After teaching 23 years in grades 3-12, I thought I’d seen it all. However, this school year has been different, as it was my first year working with students aged 2 to 5. Honestly, this year’s learning curve was more like an acute right turn, with no roadmap or signposts to guide me.

In retrospect, after a year of teaching preschoolers and kindergartners, I’m amazed at the absolute love these kids have for learning. Every day was a new adventure for them – for me too. They gave me a renewed excitement for teaching and provided me with the sweetest little lessons from God along the way. And their daily hugs were just an added blessing!

Some days, those lessons involved things my students said, and other days, I learned from their actions. But every day included something important and meaningful that God wanted this old teacher to learn. Ironically, one of the funniest lessons of the year centered around blue jeans.

It’s important to note that public school teachers are rarely permitted to wear comfy blue jeans. Some schools totally forbid them. Other schools allow employees to wear them (with a school T-shirt or jersey) on Fridays or during the week of Homecoming. So, of course, I was elated that at my new school, we could wear jeans whenever we chose.

Also, I’m basically a cheapskate, so my jeans aren’t trendy or expensive. They are hand-me-downs, sale items, or thrift store finds. My only pair of designer jeans was given to me by the owner of my favorite boutique, to wear to a baseball event held in honor of our late son, Chris.

With those two facts in mind, it’s easier to understand how God used blue jeans and a school full of little kids to teach me a big, big lesson this year.

It all started at the beginning of the school year, when I wore some hand-me-down jeans to school one day. As I sat on the floor, singing with a class of 2-year-olds, one of the sweet, quiet little girls reached out and gently touched a hole in the knee of my old blue jeans. I smiled when she said in a voice filled with love and concern, “Oh, Ms. Joy, your pants are broken.”

I hugged her and assured her that I was alright, and my broken pants were also okay. I explained that they were just old and well-used.

When I told my husband about my broken pants that afternoon, we laughed about the innocence and sweetness of that comment. I had no clue, though, just how profound that word would become over the school year.

Though I did not wear that broken pair of jeans again, the same scenario happened when I wore my designer jeans with several trendy slits on my knees. This time, a little guy from a group of 3-year-olds asked me how I broke my jeans.

After that second encounter, I tried to avoid wearing both pairs of jeans, but I inevitably forgot and wore them every now and then. And every single time, my pants garnered the same response from different students. A child always mentioned my broken pants.

It became an ongoing joke for my husband when he saw me come home from school with my broken jeans. He simply shook his head, laughing because I did it again, and because I evidently could not learn my lesson.

He was right.

I did not learn my lesson until last week as I was reading the Bible during my daily devotion time. That morning’s passage from 2 Chronicles was part of my yearlong reading of the Bible from cover to cover, Genesis through Revelation. But to be honest, I was bored with reading about ancient Jewish history.

That day’s dreaded reading centered on King Rehoboam, who inherited the kingdom from his father, King Solomon. His story spanned three chapters (2 Chronicles 10-13) and was filled with the ups and downs of his reign.

Rehoboam was not as wise as his father, but he was a strong leader who firmly established the kingdom – until he abandoned the Lord’s law and led his people to do the same, eventually dividing the kingdom into two parts. (Thankfully, he later repented and sought God’s forgiveness.) Still, it was a long, boring story, in my opinion.

Until … right there in 2 Chronicles 12:14, at the tail end of Rehoboam’s story of prideful arrogance and smackdab in the middle of my prideful boredom, the Lord dropped a nuclear bomb of truth into my heart: ^“But he was an evil king, for he did not seek the Lord with all his heart” (NLT).

Wait a minute.

Rehoboam had good days and bad ones, none of which involved the atrocious level of behavior of other kings in his lineage. Yet, the Bible labeled him as an evil king, simply because he did not seek God with his whole heart.

Thankfully, the ageless words of Charles Spurgeon helped explain the root of Rehoboam’s heart problem:

“There was not anything real and permanent in his religion; it did not hold him. He held it sometimes, but it never held him.”

Commentary from Bible Hub, gave additional insight:

“Rehoboam’s life joins this gallery [of kings] as a cautionary tale: half-heartedness invites defeat, humiliation, and loss of spiritual legacy.”

Think about that for a moment: Rehoboam was a broken king with a broken kingdom, a broken line of legacy, and worst of all, a broken heart, divided between two objectives – seeking God and seeking things of this world.

As I mulled over the implications of that verse in my own life, I was instantly reminded of my broken jeans.

One pair was handed down to me by a loved one, much like Solomon passed down a well-worn kingdom to his beloved son Rehoboam. My other pair of jeans, stylish and sought-after, were the best the world had to offer – like the people and prosperity that drew Rehoboam’s attention and heart away from God.

But neither pair of my jeans, one with accidental tears and the other with purposely designed ones, fooled my little students. My kiddos instantly recognized and labeled those jeans as exactly what they were – broken.

If only we had the same discernment of our own sinful brokenness. If only we could recognize and repent of our own half-hearted pursuit of God. For the Bible makes it clear (via Rehoboam’s story) that if we are not careful, even as seasoned Christians, our half-hearted pursuit of God will render us evil in His sight.

But Psalm 51:17 promises that God will never despise “a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart.” So, seek Him with your whole, broken heart, and find Him – eager and waiting with open arms.

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