At Peace or Class Bully

When a person is in sin there is a war going on! It's a battle for the soul. Since all people sin we are all embattled. When I'm most miserable is when my life is not in unity with God's will. I understand that because I'm human, I will never be in his perfect will, but God understands. Unlike your employer or teacher who implies that you are a failure by saying "John tries hard!", that's a good thing in the grading system of God. He knows that all his students will fail, but if they try hard, they pass anyway!

I'm not implying that works saves you at all! However, if you're a student in God's class by authority of his Son Jesus, then you aren't through yet. You are admitted to this special class of people by grace and the tuition has been paid by Jesus. There is one expectation: you must show love in return, not only to the Good Teacher, but also to your fellow classmates, and also those who persecute you! Those who laugh at your class; those bullies who push you around out on the school grounds; you are to love them to. They're in a different class, but you're to be their mentor and work hard to get their promotion so that those who ridicule you become one of the ridiculed!

That's "trying real hard". That's love in action! But even the best students sometimes misbehave, thinking the teacher isn't looking. This Good Teacher IS the one with those proverbial eyes in the back of his head. He can see everywhere and everyone all the time. He never turns his head and there is nothing he can't see!

Since he knows that as a student of his "you try hard", he's more lenient with you. His personality is so loving that good students want to be just like him!  His discipline is "disappointment". He is not well pleased with his misbehaving students, but he gives many many chances because of his love. He looks always to ask  "Does John try hard?" If so, even though John is unruly sometimes, he gets A+ and the Teacher says "Well done, good and faithful student!". His M.O. is not discipline; it's loving kindness!

He expects the student who tries hard to be just like him! All of us are to be loving and kind! We are not to be class bullies. We're on the honor system. All us students monitor ourselves. We have a Book for our guidance and good students learn and practice what the Book says, but also quit doing what the Book says not to do!  There are do's and don'ts. Those who claim their position of "good student" are not to be the class bullies. They are not to do the following:

• Laugh at the teacher or not respect Him.
• Disobey the Teacher's rules.
• Call the Teacher names.
• Skip the Teacher's class.
• Prefer the substitute teacher because his ways are easier.
• Being jealous of other students, the good or the bad ones.
• Pick at the other students to make them do wrong.
• Pick on the other students to hurt them.
• Find fault when overlooking your own faults. Making sure the other student does worse than yourself.
• Cheating.
• Tormenting those around you.
• Disruption and being boisterous.
• Making fun of fellow students and those in other classes.
• Building yourself up, not waiting on the teacher's grade.
• Trying to make a passing grade without following the teacher.
• Being mean to others and being hateful.
• Always looking at the faults of others.
• Never looking at what you can do to make the class in more accord.
• Paying attention to the better students and neglecting the poorer.
• Failing to set an example for the poorer students.
• Acting immature for the class you're in.
• Acting like you don't even want to be in this class!
• Never asking the teacher for help with the hard problems.

Disruptive students aren't happy students because others know how bad they are. Even the teacher knows about their reputation of class bully. Their self-acceptance depends on the failure of others. Even when others don't fail, they work hard to make sure they are perceived as failures!

You might ask "He's in my class, but just who is his teacher?" It turns out that the bad student is taught more on the playground at those long recesses than he is taught in those too short classes. There is an evildoer lurking on and around the playground giving those who would be innocent, bad intentions. He stands there watching and thrives as he sees the chaos he's caused. He loves it when the teacher is discouraged with his class and is disappointed.

That is the war raging inside you right now if you're not up-to-date on repentance. (John cn do better if he makes a change!) It's Class warfare which hurts everyone! Rather than feeling joy to be in your class, you feel terrible. You try to make others feel worse, so that you feel better, but it's that evildoer who has selected you because you are the most vulnerable! "It's not me!" you say! "It's everybody else!" It is you and many others. Your class meets out there. You need to come in and follow the Good Teacher!