Skip to main content

What Being a Family Teacher Means

(written for and shared today at our annual board of director's visit to campus during our speech "life of a family teacher"):

Being a Family Teacher doesn't mean you have all the answers but that you are willing to help searching youth find them.

Being a Family Teacher doesn't always mean you are the problem solver but you are there as they encounter the obstacles no one should face alone.

Being a Family Teacher doesn't mean you will always be able to change a heart but if you are open, yours will be always touched, molded, and changed.

Being a Family Teacher doesn't mean all souls will be saved but Jesus' love will be shared and felt and His power is beyond ours.

Being a Family Teacher doesn't mean all kids will love and appreciate you but some will realize how much you care, even if it is a year later, and it will make up for the ones that don't.

Being a Family Teacher doesn't mean you have 8 kids of your own, but it certainly makes you a parent.

Being a Family Teacher doesn't mean life is always fun or like a camp experience but it is an opportunity to dig into the harsh realities of life with God's real and solid love and grace.

Being a Family Teacher isn't about having a job; it is a way of life.

Being a Family Teacher isn't about being a hero; it is about providing a springboard for each youth into a future they could not have otherwise imagined or attained.

Being a Family Teacher isn't about warm and fuzzy feelings but about real and sometimes painful moments of discovery, growing, and walking into a new way of life.

Being a Family Teacher does not mean you are a babysitter; it means you are entrusted as a healing agent with bleeding hearts and crippled spirits.

Being a Family Teacher doesn't mean you have everything it takes but that you are part of a wonderful and supportive infrastructure that together can take a really good stab at it.

Being a Family Teacher doesn't mean you always get enough sleep at night but it is the perfect opportunity to rely on the Lord for His strength, His courage, and His abilities when yours fail.

Being a Family Teacher doesn't mean life will be easy, but the adventure, the education, the experience, and the opportunities to share Christ's healing love with the youth and with each other make every day worth it.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Twenty Ways to Love a Foster Family Well

The tears slid down my cheek as I typed out the email just a few short weeks ago that would officially close our home and end our season as foster parents.  We may have another season before we hit the nursing home, but after a lot of prayer and confirmation....we know this season right now? It is about the family God has formed inside our home.  We will be focusing on meeting the needs of each of the amazing forever children we have the privilege of parenting. We will also do all we can to provide intentional support to those fostering around us.  ( Hint: If you are local and maybe "not having enough support and/or respite" has kept you from fostering, holla at ya girl! ) I wanted to mark this moment in some way, which is why I am here.  I want to share with YOU all of the amazing ways people - our family, our friends, our community, our church, our village...so many of you - made this season possible for us. I want to highlight all the ways God showed up for us in ...

Rhythms

Maybe because the anniversary of   “the big change”…             when I slowed my own rhythms down…             when the rhythm of our family slowed down…             when we began a dance to a simpler, slower, but just as meaningful melody… Maybe because the anniversary of that time is slowly approaching or maybe because, since that time I’ve tried to rev up and hit “accelerate” again only to have found myself intrinsically changed and unable to “rev” as I used to… Or maybe because as we approached this small-ish, one-room, home-reno project this spring break, we approached it as different people and in a different way and I’m only realizing it at the end of spring break with only one of three phases complete? Or maybe it’s been the freedom-seeking with the ladies on those Thursday evenings slowing ...

Unsent Good-Bye Letter

I thank God and will continue to thank Him every day that I had the privilege to know and work with you.  There are so many reasons for this that come to mind.  The first is that I was able to witness God (not me...not you) do miraculous things.  The second is that I was able to know someone with your heart and your story.  And last, I learned a lot from working with you.  That's usually how it works; you start off helping someone else and end up learning a few lessons for yourself.  Here is what I learned from you: 1-Sometimes those that need love the most will not ask for it and will sometimes actually ask for the opposite...to be left alone, unloved.  Because left unloved, they are left unchanged and unchallenged.  But when you love anyway, their broken hearts begin to trust. A terribly rough life has put him in a place where it is almost impossible to believe even the most genuine person could really care.  And if they do...