Sunday School Thoughts

I know that I shouldn't have favorite Sunday School teachers. Logically, I know that. But nevertheless: I do. I have favorite Sunday School teachers. Well, favorite Sunday School teacher--singular. It's not the others are bad people. It's not that the others are faithless or stupid or boring. (Well, okay. Maybe sometimes the others are boring, but I sincerely doubt they're trying to be, and I'm readily willing to admit that sometimes I don't have the best attitude about sitting through their lessons.)

Anyway, I've been trying to peg lately why I like this particular Sunday School teacher. The easy answer, of course, is to say that he's cute (true) and that he's intelligent (also true) and that he has a definable and well-asserted teaching presence (true to the truest degree). But today as I sat through his latest lesson, I realized that what impresses me most is this: he knows how to ask questions.

That might seem like a weird attribute to observe in a person, but it's nevertheless true. As a teacher, he's unwilling to settle for an easy question that I can almost hear the class collectively rolling their eyes at. (Ever notice that once you get old enough the questions that hardly ever get answered are the ones we already know the clear-cut responses for?) His discussion questions do that magical thing--actually inciting a discussion--and I suppose it would be fair to say that his asking the right questions is tied to a knack for encouraging participation. (Although whether it's the question or the teacher encouraging the participation is, in my opinion, a bit of a chicken-and-egg scenario...)

One random note from the tail end of the lesson today--we ended up glossing briefly over the story of the woman at the well, mostly because our discussion had revolved around other equally good things. And perhaps I'm particularly dense, but this teacher pointed out something I'd never noticed before--the woman at the well did an excellent job of bringing people back to the well to listen. But then whether people accepted the message or not was determined by those people. Not by her.

She led them to the well, but she didn't remotely attempt to force them to drink the water (as it were). They had to drink of their own accord. This seemed to me an interesting lesson in missionary work--we, too, can direct people to the well--but we can't make them drink any more than she could. If I take this thinking to its extreme...which I do, because I'm me...I ultimately reach the conclusion that if we force someone too hard into the well water, they drown.

(I know. It's kind of a violent thought...but it nevertheless seemed pertinent.)

Brief Notes on a Movie . . . Also, My First Relief Society Teaching Experience

Feel free to tell me that it's sad, but watching The Dark Knight once was more than enough for me. Heath Ledger was quite amazing (and as decidedly creepy as he should be) as The Joker, Michael Caine and Morgan Freeman were--as always--delights as Alfred and Lucius, and Christian Bale served his purpose. (He was good eye candy. Sadly, though, he wasn't in the film nearly often enough.)

Anyway, once was more than enough for me because this film was dark to the edge of my limits. Which my roommate found interesting, because I own The Prestige, and she finds that movie far darker. (I don't. Obviously. But then again, The Prestige isn't something I watch on a regular basis . . . I've decided it's worth repeated viewings, but only if those viewings are spaced out to such an extent that it's not so easy or obvious to look for clues about what is going on.)

That said, it was definitely worth watching. There were lessons from the movie definitely worth learning. (Yes, yes . . . I know that modern cinema is no Aesop's fable, but I sort of feel like I should be able to find at least one theme in a movie, even if it has nary a plot line in sight) But it's highly unlikely I'll see it again.

Once we got home from the movie Saturday night, panic ensued. On the way to the movie, I'd made a flippant (yet not untrue) comment about how I'd yet to unpack the notebook containing the notes for my Relief Society lesson. But how I was so sure I knew where it was.

When I got home, I promptly retired to my room to review my lesson notes. Only to discover I did not actually know where I had packed said notebook. It would not have been nearly so stressing if we had an Internet connection, but alas--we're 'Netless at home until tomorrow afternoon. Otherwise, I would have printed off the talk and rewritten my lesson. My memory, after all, works quite well and I remembered--more or less--what I wanted to.

Instead, I asked my roommate if she knew where her copy of the Conference Ensign was, and more panic ensued as we searched for that. She found her copy, only for me to go upstairs, look at my laptop bag, open it, and therein find my copy. All was right in the world.

And my lesson went well. The sisters laughed when they were supposed to laugh, participated when I asked for their participation, and paid attention to what I said. Nobody gave me a deer-in-the-headlights, our-Relief-Society-teacher-is-crazy kind of look.

But I learned something valuable yesterday that's rather paradoxical: when you teach, you have to plan a lesson. But you can't truly plan the lesson. I invariably plan how I teach based on the way I would react to my lesson. But that's the thing about teaching church: you aren't teaching you. Well, actually, you are. I learned any number of things while preparing this particular lesson. But you're called to each (in my case) about fifty other sisters, none of whom think in exactly the same ways you do.

(Thus my surprise at some of the answers to a question I posed yesterday. We were discussing President Uchtdorf's "Faith of Our Fathers" and a quote that says (I'm paraphrasing): "True religion should not originate from what pleases men . . . but rather, from what pleases God." So I posed the question: what sorts of things please God? I was looking for answers like service, being kind to others, and faith--my segue between the "pleasing God" part of my lesson and the "faith" part of my lesson . . . Because according to Hebrews, without faith it's impossible to please God. The sister who quoted that scripture with no solicitation whatsoever earned many, many brownie points. I wasn't looking for answers like, um, chastity.)

Lessons, I learned, are evolving creatures. While a teacher can steer them in the direction she wants them to go, the boat never ends up at precisely the pre-determined destination she wanted. And that, I discovered, is not a bad thing. In fact, I think I will worry far more if my lesson goes exactly according to plan. (I will also be disturbed, because that would mean that 50+ girls were channeling my thoughts, and that is downright frightening)

And so I leave you here with a thought I had when I prepared my lesson: though Alma 32 teaches us that faith is not to have a perfect knowledge of things, faith--once cultivated--eventually becomes knowledge of perfect things (when we're talking about principles) and of The Perfect Person.

And as we learned from Elder Oaks, that knowledge--though not empirical--is no less valid than things we learned by seeing. In fact, I think that knowledge may be more valid. But that's a topic for another time.