I can’t begin to describe how happy I am at the moment, but I will try.
It is about 2am and I can’t sleep. It is raining, and I am snuggled in bed warm and comfortable, although a little insomniatic. I just feel incredibly content and overwhelmingly happy (the English language can be so restricting at times).
I had a great day at work today. I love being at Uni, and the Education Faculty of a University is probably one of the most powerful and influential centers of our society. If you can influence a student teacher for the better, they can influence their classroom students when they have their classes. I have about 40 teachers in my classes, all of whom will have roughly 25 students next year. In two degrees of separation, about a thousand kids can be affected by the actions of us as teachers. Quite a privilege. Quite a responsibility. Important to get it right.
It has taken a week to settle back into tutoring, I was a bit rough at the start, but now I just love it so much that things are flowing a lot better. One of the main reasons I left mainstream teaching was due to outcomes-based education that has sucked toilet water since its inception in our education system. After many passionate discussions with principals, colleagues, university lecturers and some colourful letters written to education ministers regarding the manuristic basis of outcomes-based philosophies, I am teaching pre=service teachers how to pretend to use it, knowing that it is now being phased out. Hallelujah.
I have constant reminders that I have the best friends and family that I could ever have hoped for. I am thankful for them everyday, and thankful for the many who have prayed for me over such a long time, or supported me with encouragement. I feel it would take another lifetime for me to show the extent of my gratitude for everyone who has seen me through these years, but I will use this lifetime to convey what I can.
I can’t shut up about my story. I tell people what has gone on in my life, and tell them with excitement and not an inch of doubt about how God has stepped in, how friends have stepped up, and how family have stepped along. I feel I can talk about suffering with some sense of authority. Not that I have experienced an extreme suffering, but enough for me to articulate to others that the presence of suffering in this world doesn’t prove the absence of a loving God, but rather highlights beyond a doubt for me how much we need a loving God in this world – a Saviour from this brokenness. The love and support that I have received from friends, family, and people I will never meet illustrates just how severely God created us in His image. These few examples need more than a sentence to explain, but their truths exist for me stronger than ever.
So I listen to the rain tonight in the wee hours of the morning, grinning. Rain is what God has often used to proclaim His presence to me most clearly over the years. Growing up in Albany, where drizzle seemed constant. Experiencing the almost daily thunderstorms in the Blue Ridge Mountains over 3 summers in the Carolinas. Feeling the powerful deluges of the wet season in Darwin. There is something about the rain that puts me at peace immediately. Having lightning shock me through the ground during a electrical storm whilst drenched and on the top of a mountain back in 1996 would be an exception to that peaceful feeling – but it was memorable, all the same.
