Sunday School Teacher

I have been drafted to teach the high school Sunday School class at my church. Actually I asked to be involved with organizing some sort of youth group and this was the best they had to offer. It's a good start. If I can win over a base group of kids who are forced to be there, perhaps I can get them to come back to the church later for other activities.

Sunday School meets while the service is going on. This is certainly a flawed system, I know, but it's what we have so I have to work from where I am. Anyway, because of this there is no weekly teacher; no one wants to miss church every week. We have a rotation schedule and this past week was my turn. The School is revamping itself - trying to get a better curriculum - something more structured and also to retain the kids that come. I was told to prepare to teach from a specific lesson, maybe Luke 24. I prepared. I had cross references (haha, cross references) and ways to relate the lesson to history and to our own lives, and hopefully the lives of teenagers. I also had some discussion topics picked to get high schoolers talking so that we could grow to be more familiar with each other.

I arrived at church on Sunday a little nervous. (I would like to point out that I had abstained from drinking the night before, so I was not hungover. This was a special Sunday.) I waited patiently in the classroom. Some students arrived. We chatted. And then the old teacher arrived from before the curriculum revamping! And when I use the word "old" I mean it in two ways. The first as in "the previous teacher"; the second being that she sat next to Jesus in the third grade. I was going to try to get her to leave but then realized that she would be a good foil for me. The students could compare us and see how much cooler I am. This woman, Betty, started off class by explaining how she knows where teenagers are coming from and the problems that they face. She told us about her sexual abuse as a child and how her kids abused drugs. OMG, how do I get out of this?

I then had the good fortune of the Sunday School director deciding to stop by. She, Dina, is old (and crotchety). And I mean "old" purely in the "she used to beat up Jesus in third grade" kind of way. As the two old ladies (from here on out I will call them "the biddies") began to talk about the olden days, I highjacked the conversation and decided to set out on introductions. We went around the circle, most of us (me and the students) answered in straight-forward manners to my questions - name? school? grade? what we expect to get from church? - but the biddies went on-and-on. I had to interupt again. I probably said, "That must have been really hard for you...but let's get back to our original topic."

I found out that the lesson I had planned was not what the biddies were expecting. They expected us to read about the temptations of Christ. I almost mentioned Scorsese's The Last Temptation of Christ but then thought better of it. In my delay, though, Betty went on about how kids these days are tempted to sell drugs. I brought us back to a normal topic and we talked about the choices we make, such as choosing between careers that make a good deal of money versus those that help other people. I then went out on a limb. I talked about The Lord of the Rings. I asked if they could see the parallels between Jesus and Gandalf. Jesus could have been King of the Jews, Rex Iudicis. He could have used his powers as the devil tempted him to do to destroy Ceasar and the oppressive Roman Empire. Likewise, Gandalf could have used the Ring of Power to defeat Sauron. Neither would have been "evil rulers" but both would have used their God-given powers for purposes that God didn't want. The kids had seen the movies. (score: 1) The kids understood the parallel and wanted to know more about how the stories relate. (score: 2) The kids started asking questions. (score: 3) The biddies were interested too; they must be closet-Tolkien fans. (score: bajillion)

I think I won. They biddies approved of me. The kids were friendly and some of us talked during coffee hour. Some other congregants asked me in hushed tones, "I saw you were teaching today with both of them - how'd it go?" It went great. It'll take a lot more to knock me down. But I know that this East Coast Liberal can't let his guard down.