I realize that offering grace and letting them start fresh is very similar, but I've really been challenged lately with what it looks like to offer our students grace.
We are in the middle of a series at church over Galations 2:20.... "I have been crucified with Christ, and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me."
Today we discussed the balancing act that is freedom and legalism. It is easy to live in either of these extremes and extremely difficult to find the right place on the pendulum. We either judge ourselves against others making us seem okay or we live a life that is spent entirely on ourselves and our "rights." Romans 6:23 says the "wages of sin is death..." and all throughout the gospels we're told of how Jesus came for us to die for us. Without Jesus, we have no rights. We don't have the "right" to be treated better by people... we actually deserve to be treated worse, because we have treated God worse... BUT GOD (probably my favorite two words together) still offers us GRACE... over and over and over and over and over... you get the picture.
And Galations 2:20 says that I no longer live, but Christ lives in me ... well, then I am called to be offering the same grace God has offered to me. So, if i really understand God, I will ALWAYS respond out of grace, NO MATTER WHAT you've done to me, I will give you grace because I've done worse to God and he still gives me grace.
Do I do that? Big negative. Was I guilty of not doing that 5 seconds after I left church this morning? Unfortunately, yes.
And I just can't seem to wrap my mind around what it looks like to offer this grace to my students?? How can I offer them grace over and over and over again and still expect them to respect me and the guidelines of the classroom and school?
I understand that there is such a thing as tough love and that God loves that way too... It is just really hard for me to know what it looks like to apply all of this in a way that is pleasing to God and works in the classroom. Not that I don't offer grace to my students ever... but let's be realistic in saying that I definitely don't offer them grace after X amount of offenses...
So my dare for the week is to really focus on what it means to offer your students grace. Pray that God would provide ways for you to offer them grace and that He would open your eyes to His grace in your own life.
I know that there's a good amount of you that read this, I get the stats on here. Most of you never comment, which is fine, but I'm asking that you would share with us all how you have learned to offer grace in your classroom or in your daily lives...
Praying you have a wonderful week and that God would bless your socks off! :)
I actually did intentionally give this a try today. When we started class, several of my students had "moved their sticks." I went to the board and, with everyone's attention, moved all sticks back to "starting position," and said I am going to pardon these students. I explained what it meant to pardon someone. They were amazed and mentioned it to one another several times throughout class. How else will some of our students learn grace and forgiveness unless we model it for them. I loved this and will do it again. Maybe my students will learn to pardon people and show grace when they have been wronged.
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