Monthly Archives: November 2013

“Knowing is Loving”: Part 2

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knowledgepuffeth

Continuing from my previous post . . .

My whole approach to education as a student all the way through graduate school (and, if I’m honest, the first few years of my teaching career) was to collect (disperse) knowledge so that I (my students) could “coerce the world into meeting my (their) needs.”

As it turned out, I lacked a deep understanding of what my needs really were, “to known as I am known.”  This uncharitable pursuit of knowledge eventually led to the death of my spirit.  Mercifully, God saw fit to redeem me from that pit, but I would prefer that my students not require that type of epistemological journey to land them back on the path of flourishing that God intends for them.

But this brings up the question of how much of my students’ path toward flourishing is really up to me (and I ask the same thing for my own two children).  In my feeble attempts to teach them how to love and to know lovingly, I often tend to rely too much on my own efforts and influence.  In other words, I’m just trying to control another outcome.

It is at this point that my faith in God’s providence for my students must provide a hope that surpasses what I can muster by my own efforts.

And, ultimately, it is at this point that I need to stop “conveying knowledge” and start loving.

“Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up.  Anyone who claims to know something does not yet have the necessary knowledge; but anyone who loves God is known by him.”
– 1 Corinthians 8: 1b-3

“Knowing is Loving”: Part 1

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adamandeve1

In his book To Know as We are Known, Education as a Spiritual Journey, Parker Palmer takes some time in his first chapters to discuss the (d)evolution of the image and purpose of knowledge.  To paraphrase, Palmer posits that in premodern times, knowledge was approached lovingly, reverently, and for the purposes of drawing the knower into a deeper communion with the known, that “hidden wholeness” of creation that Merton speaks about.  Modern images of knowledge, however, suggest that we value knowledge only to the extent that it allows the knower to control, to manipulate, and to lay claim on the known.  In other words, “we value knowledge that allows us to coerce the world into meeting our needs–no matter how much violence we must do.”  Palmer cites the invention of the first atom bomb as an extreme example of this “violence.”

Palmer then connects this denatured image of knowledge to the story of Adam and Eve:

“In the language of religious tradition, Adam and Eve committed the first sin.  In the language of intellectual tradition, they made the first epistemological error.  [. . . ] The sin, the error, is not our hunger for knowledge [. . . , rather] Adam and Eve were driven from the garden because of the kind of knowledge they reached for–a knowledge that distrusted and excluded God.  Their desire to know arose not from love but from curiosity and control, from the desire to possess powers belonging to God alone.  They failed to honor the fact that God knew them first, knew them in their limits as well as their potentials.  In their refusal to know as they were known, they reached for a kind of knowledge that always leads to death.”

I was immediately convicted by this discussion.  As the teacher, “the mediator between the knower and the known, the living link in the epistemological chain,” I repeat this original sin in my classroom whenever I present knowledge as something to “master” or “possess” or “control” rather than something to love for the sake of bringing my students into closer communion with the Lover.

Even in classical Christian education, we talk about “teaching for mastery” and “mastery learning.”  I tell my students every day that they need to “master” this or that.  Sure, I also explicitly lead them in discussions and exercises for the express purpose of cultivating in them a love for math and God’s creation as explored through the sciences, but at the end of the day they are assessed and evaluated (“told their value”) based on what concepts and skills they have mastered.  Is there something out of joint here?

Perhaps instead of telling students that I expect them to master the factoring of polynomials, I should say that I expect them to enter a state of loving communion with polynomials.  This sounds kind of ridiculous, but is it not what Palmer is getting at?  Palmer, Jamie Smith, and a host of others – not to mention our own experience in the classroom, whether as teachers or students – tell us that students are significantly formed by the “hidden curriculum”  in our schools as much if not more as by what we explicitly teach.  If this is indeed the case, then the words we choose to describe the “act of knowing” should really matter.

A Sheep, a Coin, and a Scoundrel

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sheepandtree

I used to think that classical Christian education was all about rigor and challenge – a “time tested” method by which to best develop intelligent, logical minds.  The “Christian” part came in I guess either when I gave an especially difficult test and students needed an “I can do all things through Christ” kind of prayer or when I needed to remind students that we, of course, do our best on this test to “bring glory to God.”  (Oh, and I made the occasional reference to “the revelation of God’s character in the order and beauty of math and science,” but I’ve only really begun to “get” the significance of that integration in the last few years.)

So students who had a natural aptitude for math and science loved me, particularly those who enjoyed a challenge.  Their parents loved me too.

Those students who worked really hard but just never quite “got it” became acquainted with a new level of frustration in my classes.  I felt bad for them; but hey, hard work in life doesn’t guarantee success (just ask a farmer).  Although I admired their hard work, my attitude towards them could best be described as pity.  My job was to keep the brightest students challenged.  As for those working feverishly in their shadows, well, “I hope they find a tutor who can bring them along.”

And then there were the students who lacked above average aptitude and either didn’t bother working hard or exhibited very poor work habits (granted those cases were the extreme exception).  Well, I just wrote those students off completely.  That was the “just response,” I thought, for not taking my class seriously.  I guess I kind of took their laziness personally.  “They’ll get the grade they deserve.”

Fortunately, not too long into my teaching career, God convicted me through the help of some very wise parents and the Gospel.  If the Kingdom of Heaven is like a shepherd leaving 99 sheep behind to go search after the one that is lost, or like a woman with 10 coins who turns her house upside down when she loses just one of them . . . well, if I am going to reflect the Gospel in my classroom, then I need to be willing to go after those students who aren’t the best, who aren’t staying up with the rest of the flock.

So I resolved to do just that.  Well, sort of.  As it turns out, I fell short of what I think Christ intended by these parables.  I started to pursue fervently those students in the second group above – that is, those who lacked the above average aptitude but worked their butts off.  I adopted the credo: if you’ll give me all you’ve got, I’ll run along side you all the way.  My new class mantra became, “All I want is your best.  As long as you’re giving me your best, I am pleased.”

In other words, I went to bat for that second group of students because I came to value their hard work in lieu of aptitude.  And boy did I come to love working with those students, mostly because doing so made me feel good about myself.  “Give me a hard working student over a really bright lazy one any day,” I would say, with noble affect.

You see, a lost sheep is still a sheep.  And sheep are fluffy and cute.  And, to a shepherd, each one has tremendous value.  Just like a coin.

Jesus’ parables made sense for the hard working student, but that student who refused to work hard or that student who just couldn’t ever get organized enough to be prepared for class – I still dismissed them both.  They weren’t lost sheep or lost coins, they were just lost.  Sure, I “loved them,” but pitiably so.

Last year God began a new work in me.  Okay, that’s too euphemistic.  He hit me in the face with a baseball bat.  He basically said three things to me:

1) Every child bears my Image.

2) You are only as good a teacher as your “worst” student thinks you are.

3) You need to learn to love grace as much as you love the truth.

So this year I set forth to pursue even the lazy student, even the flippant student, even the student who refused to get organized or refused to work hard or refused to assume responsibility for his or her academics.  But because these descriptions only apply to less than 1% of my students, I found that my “new plan” was actually more difficult – not less – to put into consistent action.  After all, it is much easier to serve the overwhelming majority and ignore those on the fringe.  Especially when your job is to “challenge and prepare academically able minds.”

In fact, a couple weeks ago I caught myself acting dismissively towards a student who not only failed to turn in a major assignment but also refused to come talk to me about it.  I finally had to confront the student a few days later.  When I offered an extension on the assignment, I received no gratitude in return.  “Not even an appreciation of my grace!  Why do I bother extending it?”  Yes, that was my actual thought.  Although I would never say it, I once again dismissed this student as feckless and “unworthy of my valuable time.”

So God took the opportunity this past Sunday morning to clarify for me the true meaning of Jesus’ parables of the lost sheep and lost coin.  Enter the story of Zacchaeus.

Zacchaeus may have been a “wee little man,” but that is where any potentiality for endearment ends.  A chief tax collector in Jericho, Zacchaeus got rich by taking his own cut of the oppressive taxes levied by the Roman government.  Unlike the sheep and coin, which had practical value to both the shepherd and coin owner, Zacchaeus would have been considered a hated scoundrel by everyone who walked with Jesus that day, and perhaps justifiably so.

So we might expect Jesus, who always advocates for those who are given the short end of the stick, to take the side of the crowd when he encounters the immorally wealthy Zacchaeus peering down from the sycamore tree.  I can imagine someone in the crowd saying to Jesus, “Hey, this is our chance!  Tell Zacchaeus how wrong he is!  Put him in his place!!”  Or even, “Ignore that guy, Jesus, he has gotten rich off of our hard-earned money!”

But that of course is not what happens.  Jesus not only invites Zacchaeus down from the tree, but invites himself to be a guest in Zacchaeus’ house.

“So the people began to mutter, ‘He has gone to be the guest of a sinner!’

The crowd could not believe that Jesus didn’t choose someone “more worthy” to spend the evening with.  Jesus’ decision made no sense in their economy.  So Jesus has to remind them of Zacchaeus’ true identity: that he, too, is a son of Abraham.

Do we judge our students by their true identity (the Imago Dei), or by their academic efforts?

And then the story ends with the real kicker.  Jesus says:

“For the Son of Man came to seek and to save what was lost.”

Those words ran through my heart like a bullet.  The “lost” aren’t just cuddly sheep and valuable coins; the lost are scoundrels.

And, when I thought about it, this is very good news for those of us who are scoundrels.  And, if we’re honest, isn’t that all of us?

The very next day I looked at my “problem student” a lot differently.  I pray that my actions towards this student follow suit.  Holy Spirit help me.  I must tirelessly pursue this student, because God has never stopped pursuing me.

So what does it mean to be a “Christian school”?  The longer that I’m on this journey, the more strongly I believe that if we are going to reclaim the integrity of true Christian education, we must aim to reflect the gospel in all aspects of our teaching.  For me that means I have to chase after not only the sheep, but the scoundrels as well.  In other words, I have to chase after the students who are just like me.