SEEING GOD IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS

Today I was teaching 9th grade Science. The class was very small so it allowed an opportunity to sit with the kids and just casually talk. The subject of the Virginia Tech shooting came up and I asked the kids what they thought. One girl started talking about the professor who barricaded the door while students jumped out the window. She went on the explain how he took the bullets in order for the students to jump to their freedom. "He was like Jesus that day" she said. I thought to myself...how cool is that. I said, "you're exactly right!" It was so neat to hear a high school student understand what Jesus did for us and how this man sacrificed his life for his students. I went on to ask them what would they do if a shooter entered this classroom. Would they be sacrificial. Everyone hope that they would but we agreed it would be hard to honestly say what you would do until you're in that situation. Of course...the girls all agreed that they would have to grab their purse first.

In the same class I realized that one of the boys looked very familiar. I finally asked him if I had subbed for one of his classes before. He reminded me that I had taught his math class and that I had kicked him out of the class. Now I remembered. He was in a math class that was completely out of control one day. One of the students threw something at me and I thought it was him so I sent him out. He told me that it wasn't him but he wasn't about to snitch on the student who was guilty. I explained to him that I did feel bad about that day. I questioned my decision later if I had punished the right student. We laughed about the situation and I asked if he would forgive me for my mistake. He said yes. I love that kid now. I even gave him some candy. Yes...I gave a freshman in high school a tootsie roll pop.