Instructor Par Excellence | Previous Challenge Entry

how it works

TITLE: Instructor Par Excellence | Previous Challenge Entry
By Margo McKenzie
10/29/24
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Classrooms-we’ve all been in them. A few teachers may have even left a lasting impression such as my Sunday School teacher did for me. I can see her now, sitting with her round, tin container with Bible verses on slits of soft cardboard inside. Each week, she handed one to me and said, “Now take this home and memorize it for next week.” And those verses are still with me over sixty years later. My third-grade public school teacher is another. Out of thirty students, she recognized two qualities in me: my handwriting and my speaking, and she gave me opportunities to share them with the class: writing spelling words on the blackboard and reciting Wordsworth’s “The Daffodils.” These two instructors knew how to bring out the best in me.

In junior high, my math teacher left an impression for a different reason. He sent home a disciplinary letter. Needless to say, he never had to speak to me again about my behavior. My 9th grade English teacher required that I rewrite my poem over and over until I wrote it without a cross-out or stray pen mark. She submitted that poem to a contest, and I won 2nd place. That experience instilled in me the value of my writing and the need to aspire to levels of excellence when sharing it. Fast forward to today, with so many instructors available online and at a plethora of writing workshops equipped to instill knowledge, encourage perseverance, and elevate performance. I value their expertise.

In my professional life, I even became a teacher instructing students in the required English curriculum and teachers in new modalities. My supervisors gave me good ratings for my work. So much effective teaching went on around me and through me.

It wasn’t until retirement I discovered a side of God I had never considered. In Psalm 32: 8, God says “I will instruct you.”* What? The Lord is not only my shepherd but my teacher too. The language awed me: The Almighty God, the everlasting Father, the Alpha and Omega, is also a teacher. As good as those other teachers in my life may have been, there is an instructor far better than the best. That verse caused me to reflect on what I had learned about education and how God excels beyond measure in every pedagogical category.

God’s educational practice will always exceed expectations. He is the instructor par excellence. Matchless educator. He was, is, and will always be my best teacher. His learning goals remain the best, much like his lessons and teaching methods. And the required reading is available and free of charge. Although I’ve graduated from college, I will never graduate from His place of learning. I gladly remain his perpetual student.

May I always show up to his class on time. May I always attend his classroom ready to learn. May I never forget what he has taught and remember to thank him for all he has imparted to me. Amen.

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