Teaching the Teacher

If you've ever led a Bible Study or taught Sunday School (or really anything, whether it is spiritual or not) you really learn a lot as the teacher.  When we have a certain topic in Sunday School, I know that the devil will push me and test me in that area either the week before or after I teach it.

We are doing a study on attitudes in our Sunday School class. It is arranged so that you talk about a less than desirable attitude the first week (or in our case 2) and then the replacement/substitute attitude the following weeks.

I casually asked BJ what our new attitude was for this week and he said a critical attitude. And I groaned. God, do I really have to go around this mountain again? (By the way he said yes I do.)

I have struggled with being critical of myself and others for years. And the devil is well aware of that. I think it all goes together with the part of my personality that is a perfectionist and quite competitive.  In the past I have been the perpetual critic of how others are doing life and was very free to think of how they should do things differently in order to "fix" their problems. I would spend hours and sleepless nights just contemplating how they were doing things all wrong. (Note: I haven't always shared my opinions with others because I also tend to avoid confrontation, but the thoughts alone would make me frustrated and just ruin my day)

And although I am sure it sneaks up now and again, a quick look at myself was really quite encouraging. I really have grown in this area (and all credit goes to God, because I definitely can't change my own bad habits.)  

I have learned that sometimes (okay, a lot of the time) it is really better if I don't know what goes on in other people's lives.  Not that I am uninvolved or rude about it, but I used to have to know what everyone was doing so I could critique (judge) them based on it and determine in my head how they could have done it better and how if it was me, I wouldn't be in their current state. As far as this goes, ignorance really is bliss. If I don't know what they are doing in the privacy of their own home or family, there is less information for me to be critical of.

Because of God's help, I am now able to be the listening ear when someone is complaining about someone else without picking up on their critical attitude. That used to be really hard. I would carry around everyone's opinions of everyone else (whether I agreed with them or not) and would get increasingly critical of everyone.  But God is changing that too.  He is using me in situations that used to be very gossipy to bring in another side, to defend the one they are criticizing. And honestly, we really never do know why people respond/react in the manner they do if we aren't them and haven't been in their shoes. I guess you could call this compassion. God is allowing me to be the voice of concern and compassion instead of fueling the fire of judgement and criticism.  Never really thought about it like that before.

I am so glad that God loves us enough to not leave us as we are but to change us to be closer to him and live in his ways. Praise God!!