It has been my great honor to be able to teach a new course at Concordia this year titled, “Education Professions.” A partial description of the course, provided by the Indiana Department of Education course booklet, is: “Education Professions 1 provides the foundation for employment in education and related careers and prepares students for study in higher education. An active learning approach that utilizes higher order thinking, communication, leadership, and management processes is recommended in order to integrate suggested topics into the study of education and related careers.”
This year-long course has been this and so much more this past semester. I have been blessed with the opportunity to work with twenty-four young people this semester, as they navigate the many choices they have to make at this time in their lives. For them, most certainly one of the biggest decisions is to determine what future career they hope to pursue.
Teaching is an amazing occupation. Teaching in a Lutheran school offers blessings beyond number. We have had a speaker each week — a pastor, a camp leader, a preschool teacher, an administrator, high school teachers, elementary teachers, and more — each one sharing their story of how they became a teacher. For some it was a “Jonah” story — a resistance of the Call for a variety of reasons. For some, they knew from early on that they would someday work in a church or school. However, it came about, each one sooner or later answered that Call and became somehow connected to Lutheran schools.
Something that we heard almost every week was that, at some point in their life, each speaker had an important adult tell them that they should consider the ministry — teaching, pastoral, etc. There was something in this youth that these adults saw and made an effort to seek out this youth and share that with them. The message I have gained from all this is how important it is for us, as adults, to encourage the next generation of church leaders to consider this calling. Often, we do not see in ourselves what others can see, and I believe it is our responsibility to help our young people see what we observe.
Concordia has been blessed with a plethora of amazing young people. Many future occupations will be represented by the fine students who now grace the halls of Concordia. Wouldn’t it be great if some of the next generation’s future teachers and pastors came from our school, as well? Help us to encourage these young people to see in themselves what they are not able to see for themselves! What a blessing our community is for everyone who is connected here!
To HIM be ALL the glory!
Chris Murphy,
Education Professions Teacher