Show, Don't Tell

"‎Don’t speak to me about your religion; first show it to me in how you treat other people. Don't tell me how much you love your God; show me in how much you love all His children. Don't preach to me your passion for your faith; teach me through your compassion for your neighbors. In the end, I'm not as interested in what you have to tell or sell, as I am in how you choose to live and give.'
~~~ Mayor Cory Booker, Newark"


I teach writing, and when we start with descriptive writing, one of the catch phrases I use is "Show me, don't tell me." The idea is to get the students to go beyond the ordinary, the everyday, and have the readers really experience what they have experienced. To put the reader into their experience with them. The quote above is one that I found on a friends wall on FaceBook. A friend who does not share my faith. Yet, through that one simple quote in a status update, I find myself being convicted. Am I showing, not just telling people about my God? Does my life show to whom I belong? Sadly, probably not. I have the tendency to be short tempered, to be so caught up in my day to day living, that I forget that people around me are watching me more than they are listening to me. I need to start "Showing, not telling". There are people who are "reading" my life...I need to go beyond the everyday, the ordinary, and allow people who have never experienced a relationship with Christ to experience what I experienced. I have a brand new bunch of students who are watching me every single day. I need to let them see more Jesus and less Lee. Because Lee isn't always pretty, Lee isn't always nice, and Lee isn't always pleasant. Lee gets cranky, stubborn, and sometimes downright mean. But the great thing is, Jesus lives inside Lee, and He is the one that I need to show. Because He IS pretty, He IS nice, He IS pleasant....He isn't cranky, stubborn, or mean. He is all that is good and lovely and wonderful, and when I get out of the way and let Him show through, then Lee becomes like Him, and that is a wonderful thing.

Hmmm, Look what I found....

It's my old blog! I'd almost forgotten about this! It's been so long, where to begin?? Well, the boys are older now. Daniel is going into 3rd grade, Mikey is going into 2nd, and much to the dismay of the girls at daycare, Zach is going into his last year at Noah's Ark. I'm looking around and wondering where on earth my babies went! I'm still teaching the 6th graders, still in Holtville. As you can imagine, the Hurricanes have been quite busy. Last time I posted, they had just started getting into baseball. That has become a big deal around here. All 3 boys are playing now, and starting in the spring, all 3 will be playing on separate teams. Daniel will be moving up to kid pitch, Mikey will stay at coach pitch, and Zach will be playing t-ball. Mikey made the 7-8 year old All-Star team this past year. He has become quite the ball player. And after a disasterous experience with football when he was 5, he's reluctantly decided to give football another try. He's agreed to go to a couple of practices to see how he likes it. He and Daniel are both wanting to play fall baseball too, so we'll see where that leads. We really lucked out with baseball though. We've had the same group of coaches since the boys started playing. They are a great group of guys. Robert has even helped coach, all 3 boys. Also, I'm going to be an aunt in a few months. Robert's sister is having a baby boy in late Nov./early Dec. SO excited about that!! Well, now that the catching up is done, I'll be posting more often!