As we have meandered through the weeks of summer, and we have returned from our road trips, the inertia of the next couple weeks will sweep us up into the days of school. Whether we have to pack a lunch box for someone in our home or not, we feel the energy of school all around us. We watch the car lines in the morning in front of the elementary schools. We see the college students moving back into the dorms. We celebrate the book bags gathered down at the front of the sanctuary on the Sunday before school starts.
We are caught up in the inertia around us, which is an opportunity! It gives us the chance to give thanks for our educators. They are the people in our lives, who have taught us lessons and shaped our character. It might have been our third grade teacher or a coach we had in high school, but their names are important to us. We can also give thanks for the teachers greeting students this fall, ushering them into a new school year, or semester.
As we remember our teachers, and give thanks for today’s teachers, we can also give thanks for the educators found outside of the classroom. Even if they do not remind us to use a number two pencil for our test, they are teachers and mentors, who show us the way forward in life and in faith. We learn from one another as well as those who have gone before us.
On Sunday, August 11, we will celebrate Promotion Sunday, where our young people will promote to the next Sunday School class, and we will mark the beginning of a new school year. We can give thanks for the people in which we study and learn together both inside and outside the classroom.
We can listen for good questions. We can ponder thoughtful answers. We can take advice from a friend. We can gain wisdom from others. We can remember there is always something new to learn and ways to grow!
We will celebrate Promotion Sunday with a church-wide breakfast in the Fellowship Hall at 9:00 a.m. We will also give our first graders Bibles, our sixth graders trees, and bless everyone’s backpack in worship! We will give thanks for the raised hand in the back of the room and for the teachers who generate those discussions (inside and outside the classroom)!
-Tripp