Running with horses

Today, a drunk man came into my class and slept there.

I recognized him. He had come during the last session and asked to join the course but I told him there was no point registering now, as the course was into the last two weeks.

Today he walked in with his friends, a group of older boys, plonked himself on the chair and started sleeping. When I asked the boys if he was their friend, they started pointing to someone else instead. One girl told me to leave him alone in case he became violent. And so I let him sleep there.

Throughout the class, I was angry. I felt dishonoured and disrespected. Whether or not this batch of students intended it or not, I had often felt dishonoured by the actions and attitudes of a small handful.

It’s a lousy feeling that’s hard to pin down or describe. If I were to draw the emotion, it would look like the black cloud that follows Eeyore around.

The challenges of the past few months have reminded me of these passages:

“Do not be afraid of their faces,
For I am with you to deliver you,” says the Lord [Jeremiah 1:8]

“And you, son of man, do not be afraid of them nor be afraid of their words, though briers and thorns are with you and you dwell among scorpions; do not be afraid of their words or dismayed by their looks, though they are a rebellious house.” [Ezekiel 2:6]

I’m sure it’s no coincidence that God repeated the same message to two of the most longsuffering prophets in the Old Testament. He knew they would need those words badly.

Whose faces are you afraid of?

I have often found myself being discouraged, dismayed, and sometimes even intimidated by some faces in class. Faces of boredom, defiance, indifference…they certainly don’t do much for the teacher’s self esteem.

Unless of course, your self esteem and the measure of the value of your labour was defined by man’s acceptance and appreciation.

But still, being human, I am sometimes overtaken by a sense of weariness. To which God replied:

“If you have run with the footmen, and they have wearied you,
Then how can you contend with horses?
And if in the land of peace,
In which you trusted, they wearied you,
Then how will you do in the floodplain of the Jordan?” [Jeremiah 12:5]

And so, I just keep running.