My Dearest Student,
I wish it were time to let you know that if I weren’t your teacher, my voice would sound much different. But for now, for this time and space, I will hold on to the noise that reverberates through my being, the one that wants to speak loudly into your life, because for now I am your teacher and all I can do is hope that somehow what I can say and what I can do today finds a way into the corner of your mind so that one of these days, when you start to clear out the cobwebs towards clarity, you will hear me.
I will sound different then. More like the real me. And I will speak what I really wanted you to know all along. But for now, I will just hope I can show what I so earnestly wish to tell.
To tell you that I see you. I see the struggle in your eyes and the anxiety in your heart.
To tell you that I understand you. Believe it or not, I was once your age, walking the dimmed streets of shadows.
To tell you you are worth it. You are worth every night I sacrifice time with my own family to help you grow in knowledge and in truth. You are worth every gray hair from deeply contemplating how I could best reach into your heart when I have such limited time each day to whisper some sense of the meaning of life.
To tell you that I love you . . . not because you are lovable. None of us are. But because I have a Savior whose Spirit lives in me, I can know the Truth and it does set me free. Free to love you even when you miss the mark. Because we all miss the mark. But here is where I hope my voice speaks loud and clear, because vague walls build dangerous hearts.
I believe in God the Father. I believe in Jesus Christ. I believe in the Holy Spirit. I believe in the infallible Word of God. And I believe in TRUTH. Not my version of it, but the only real Truth that I believe exists, and please trust me that I have earnestly sought the world over for these seeds. And because I hold firmly to that Truth, I see how my choices separate me from God’s love, and that great chasm is vast array of utter loneliness, and I don’t want you to be alone.
So when you trust me enough to ask really hard questions, I have a really hard time not answering. But for now, I am your teacher and jaded avoidance breaks my heart, but I know not what else to do, not because I fear what may happen to me, but because I fear what might happen in you prematurely. Sometimes, the hardest questions have to wait for a different time. A time when you can hear me clearly, without those damned walled hearts. To know that when I consider it a sin, it is because I am building my life on God’s Truth. To know that it really is possible to love you even in the midst of your sin, fully for who you are, but wishing desperately you would walk with me, as I too am fighting my way up from the pit of me.
Will you have grown enough when you hear me to be able to love like this? To allow me to still sit at your table of confidence, even when our worldviews collide? Isn’t that what true acceptance means? Not that I can accept only those who are like-minded, but that I can invite all to the table where we meet to think. And will you then be able to think deeply, and widely, and openly enough to entertain other ideas, sharpening your mind against the edge, and all the while truly maintaining love in spite of our differing selves? For if you think back really hard, this is the lesson I tried to teach all along.
But for now I will love you through the silence, because though I desperately wish I could speak, I am still your teacher. In time, my voice will change, and I will wait because I understand seasons differently than you do. And I will hope. I will pray for the day you can hear me clearly. But on that day, please don’t look at my age and assume I am archaically outdated. Even age needs company who will listen to the noise inside.
Deeply and Earnestly,
Your Teacher
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