Thursday night was Parents' Night - an evening in which parents attend 6 min. versions of all of their students' classes, get to meet teachers and other parents, and eat finger food (because every event has food). I had two interactions with parents (one positive and one not) in which I was reminded how central grace and imputation are in our everyday lives.
Without getting into details, I'll say this: when we do not have a complete understanding of what it means to be fully and completely redeemed by the grace of God, when we are driven by a fear of failure rather than a freedom that allows us to risk with a confidence that it is not about us, we are crippled by a fear that we will mess everything up. We seek rigid rules, looking for standards to live up to, structure that we can conform to in order to not fail. So afraid that failure will be our fault, we continually try to identify weakness in the structure around us in order to make sure failure cannot be attributed to us. Either we live in constant anxiety that what we are doing will not succeed or we live in constant fear that the rules won't hold up in the end and that there is no way we can possibly succeed.
Students approach tests, papers, etc. with the fear that either they haven't prepared properly, they don't have the skills in the first place, or they haven't been given the tools they need to succeed. Fear of failure prevents them from taking risks, from approaching tests, papers, etc. as an opportunity to use what they know and to challenge themselves to push harder, to piece together their knowledge and apply it on a greater scale. While this is most apparent in the tendency of students (mostly girls) to anxiously dread not knowing the right answer (failure is their fault), it's also apparent in the tendency of students (mostly boys) to find fault in the system and therefore not try, rather than try and fail.
This brings me to Les Mis. My friend Sara sent me lyrics from Les Mis this week in an e-mail, so of course, I had to watch the movie (not the musical, so not quite good enough) and then listen to the soundtrack. Javert, the inspector who spends his whole life trying to bring Jean Valjean to "justice", makes me so sad. Mostly, he makes me sad because I recognize in Javert my tendency to adhere so strictly to rules because rules feel safe. He sings:
He knows his way in the dark
Mine is the way of the Lord
And those who follow the path of the righteous
Shall have their reward
And if they fall
As Lucifer fell
The flame
The sword!
And so it has been and so it is written
On the doorway to paradise
That those who falter and those who fall
Must pay the price!
Javert is afraid of Valjean because Valjean broke the rules and yet is able to experience freedom and happiness that Javert has never had. If Valjean can have this life, it means that vigilance in following the rules does not assure happiness. Instead, Valjean's continual breaking of the rules (Fantine, Cossette, etc.) brings him increasing happiness. In the end, Valjean's mercy to Javert leads Javert to end his life. Javert cannot continue life knowing that the system of laws and rules he has followed is false. He sings:
How can I now allow this man
To hold dominion over me?
This desperate man that I have hunted
He gave me my life. He gave me freedom.
I should have parished by his hand
It was his right
It was my right to die as well
Instead I live.. but live in hell
And my thoughts fly apart
Can this man be believed?
Shall his sins be forgiven?
Shall his crimes be reprieved?
And must I now begin to doubt
Who never doubted all these years?
My heart is stone and still it trembles
The world I have known is lost in shadow
Is he from heaven or from hell?
And does he know
That granting me my life today
This man has killed me, even so?
I am reaching but I fall
And the stars are black and cold
As I stare into the void
Of a world that cannot hold
I'll escape now from that world
From the world of Jean Valjean
There is nowhere I can turn
There is no way to go on
A world of grace and mercy is too much for a man who has motivated his life to following the rules and making others do the same. So.... how do I, as a teacher, help little Javerts become Valjeans before it's too late?
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