New Start?

Two weeks ago, the children's pastor from our church asked me to teach sunday school for the preschoolers. Yes, I've taught before, but not full time. It was because others weren't there to teach, so I had to fill in. She told me to pray about it, and then give her an answer by the end of the week. (This was all last week)

I ended up putting it at the back of my mind and then eventually forgetting about it. Nearing the end of the week, I realized that I hadn't prayed about it, or even thought about it. Everyday after that, I thought hard about what I should do. Voices came from all around me. Some said, "Yeah! Take this oppurtunity to really learn. I don't see why you would object." Others said, "You're youth is the prime time to learn about God. To really dig into his word. Go to sunday school. You need to build your relationship with God so that when you go out to teach, you won't be afraid of saying the wrong words and teaching the children the wrong principles."

I was influenced by all the voices. Eventually, I thought to myself. Should I really take this oppurtunity? Before, I did think about teaching sunday school. It has always been on my mind, but I just hadn't really put my finger onto it.

This time around, I really needed the time to think. So today, I ended up calling Pastor Tung. I asked him what I should do, and who was teaching for our next quarter's sunday school. He told me that summer was a really good time for me to teach because he was going to teach the summer quarter, and he won't really have a curriculum. So I decided. Yes, I'm going to teach.

I called Ps. Ellie. We talked for about 1 hour only about this matter. She asked me several questions such as:

1. If I didn't come up to you that Sunday, would you have asked me if you could teach?
2. What do you think about teaching?
3. How do you engrave something in a childs mind? (3-4 year olds)
4. How is your walk with God?
5. What did you learn from the past experiences of teaching this sunday school?
6. Why do you want to teach?

And many
more. Some of the questions I really had to think about. But the others, I could just answer right away. Here are my answers:

1. I might have came up to you a little later. But definitely not at that time. You asking me to teach that sunday was more like an extra push from God telling me to come teach. If you didn't ask me, I probably would have waited before asking, or never asked you. When you asked me, I took it as a calling from God to go teach. It's like how God speaks to you through others. So therefore, I accepted.
2. I don't have experience with teaching older grades. Usually I stick to the preschoolers. When I teach the preschoolers, I usually follow the syllabus you give me, therefore I have no problem. I'm not sure about having to prepare EVERYTHING though. As in, in this hour, this is what I'm going to have the children do. I don't know if I would be ready for that. But I think that's just about experience. =)
3. You could repeat it many times, and then ask them if they still remember it next week. Take one of THEIR life situations and give an example. Or give them a craft to keep. (These answers were not all mine. Some of them were hers too)
4. I think that teaching the preschoolers will also help my walk with God. Having to understand the stories real well, and dissect them before going to class.
5. Back then when I taught, I felt more like an assistant than a teacher just because someone higher than me was there. Honestly, the post of a teacher and an assistant is totally different. But still, I learned a lot from the teacher. From trying to make them listen, to making sure they are alright.
6. I think it's a blessing to be able to see the children grow as well as myself. When I grow a little older, and the children are in elementary school, those are the children I will still be teaching. It's like I move up with them. They don't move up grades by themselves, I move with them. It's really fun to see God working in all these children no matter how young they are. (These children will be around 3-4 years old.) Even though they're so young, God can still work in their small little hearts/brains. It truly is amazing.

I will start officially helping to teach next sunday June 14th. I'm excited to see God working in me. I hope this calling is real. I hope my life will change because of this new start. I'm hoping to change....really change.. Through the ups and downs of life, I hope to connect and bond closer with the Lord. I will start posting my experiences from my devotions and also from teaching. I think one of my biggest challenges will be to act the right way both in the classroom and out of it. I've been told asked many times, "How can you teach the children when your attitude inside the classroom is different from outside? How will the children react if they knew how you reacted when you weren't teaching them?" This really opened up my eyes to say, "I really wanna change. I want to." Although it'll be a tough decision, and a tough path, I know that I have friends who are out there supporting me in everything I do. I really can't wait to see the results.