On Being Vulnerable

“To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact you must give it to no one, not even an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements. Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket, safe, dark, motionless, airless, it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. To love is to be vulnerable.”

-C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves

 

If you were to ask any of my students who my favorite author is, they would immediately say C.S. Lewis. I’ve used so many of his quotes in devotions and sermons that my love of his works have become a defining aspect of my teaching persona. So as I have been contemplating this latest blog post, it only felt natural to base it around one of his most influential quotes in my life and how it shaped my first year in this tropical paradise.

As of Wednesday evening, I have successfully completed my first year of teaching, and looking back on this year I can’t believe how far I’ve come. As I was in the midst of my first semester of teaching down here, I honestly wanted to quit. I was stressed out, felt like I wasn’t connecting with anyone, and felt just totally drained and useless. But then I made a decision towards the end of my first semester that totally flipped my world around: I decided to be vulnerable. I decided to let my guard down with my students and my coworkers, despite the fears that accompanied that decision. As time moved on through this second semester, I found my fears were unfounded. Instead of being mocked or ridiculed for my vulnerability, I found both students and coworkers responding in ways that were deeply and incredibly rewarding, and I found my purpose in being down here. By being vulnerable, I let God work through me and saw the fruits of His works in those around me, and I’d like to share a few of the most rewarding fruits from God working through that decision.

If you’ve read through my email updates, you saw that I started up a bible study at my apartment on Friday nights for high school students and was also a small group leader at Crossfire (the youth ministry at Crossroads Bible Church, the church CCA is based out of). For both Bible Study and Crossfire, I had played it safe at the beginning of the year. We never really talked about tough topics, sticking to things like Gifts of the Spirit and shallow, “baby food” Christian topics. Then, shortly after making the decision to be vulnerable in my daily walk, I was chosen to give a sermon on Lust at Crossfire…not exactly among the safe, shallow topics I’d been sticking with. But that sermon sparked incredible conversations with my small group and others that “broke the ice” so-to-speak, leading to mentor relationships forming with students that greatly enriched both of the lives involved. Around the same time, I started a different series in Bible Study revolving around the Seven “Daily” Sins; how the seven deadly sins impact us every day. And even though I moved the study from meeting every week to every-other week, I saw relationships deepening and conversations enriching as we all dug deeper into how God’s word can change how we live. All of this lead to incredibly rich and deep relationships with students that I was not expecting, and it allowed God to use me to majorly impact these student’s lives. I’ve been told by these students that our conversations about sinful struggles, God’s purpose for out lives, God’s love and forgiveness, and so many other topics have really challenged them and helped them get through struggles and issues in their lives. I’ve truly experienced how rewarding it is to pour into people’s lives and see them be on fire for God, especially in this year’s senior class. But let’s save that for the end.

The beauty of teaching at a small Christian school is that these out-of-school activities and conversations don’t stay out of school; I saw my teacher-student relationships change as a result of these conversations as well, and new doors opened for me to bond with a class of students that previously had been a major stressor in my life. At the beginning of the year, my Chemistry class was the single most stressful aspect of living down here. Comprised of all Juniors, they were a rowdy, loud and uncooperative bunch. So I responded in the only way that I knew how: channel my inner Catholic school nun and get incredibly strict with them…which worked about as well as you can imagine. But during my second semester, after making the decision to be vulnerable, I started changing my responses to the students. For example, one day I made a mistake in lecture. Previously, I would get defensive and angry when that happened (which wasn’t too often, thankfully). But then I decided to be open and honest instead, confessing my mistake and letting my students have a full 5 seconds to boo me before class the next day, which was recorded by many people and quickly spread around the school, in a good way. As a result of the decision to be open and vulnerable, I saw the class respond in an incredibly positive way; now a class that I dreaded teaching is a class that I love and am happy to see growing towards spiritual maturity in Christ.

While being vulnerable has resulted in such incredible strides in my relationships with students, there’s a downside to living this way. In a few short months, the senior class has managed to get incredibly close to my heart. Several students become some of my closest friends in Panama, and I was able to mentor a few of them and watch them grow even more in Christ. But the downside of letting them get that close to my heart is that they eventually have to leave, so graduation this year was a surprisingly difficult time for me. Getting close to these students allowed me to impact their lives in a way I didn’t think was possible as a high school teacher, but that made saying goodbye that much harder. So I had a moment this past week where I second-guessed by decision to be vulnerable with my students. Was it worth the pain of saying goodbye, or should I go back to the safety of putting people at arm’s length? As I was thinking about this, the above quote from C.S. Lewis popped into my head. So much good has come from my decision to be vulnerable this past semester and sequestering my heart away is no way to live. In order for me to be truly present and impactful in these student’s lives, as I believe God has called me to do in Panama, I need to risk having my heart broken in order to connect with these students and let God work through that connection. And while it’s hard having those bonds stretched and possibly broken through goodbye, it’s worth it for the change I’ve seen. To love is to be vulnerable, and while it might hurt, that vulnerability allows God to do some pretty awesome things. So here’s to another year of being vulnerable, no matter what the risk might be.

This picture represents one of the fruits of this past year. This was painted by a senior and given to me after graduation as a thank-you gift. I’m Goofy, he’s Mickey, and another student I’ve grown close to is Donald. Being vulnerable with these two guys has been such a rewarding experience, and I’m so honoured to have been able to watch them grow this past year.