I’m Thankful for School
“Blessed be the Lord! For he has heard the voice of my pleas for mercy. The Lord is my strength and my shield; in him my heart trusts, and I am helped; my heart exults, and with my song I give thanks to Him. The Lord is the strength of His people; He is the saving refuge of His anointed. Oh, save your people and bless your heritage! Be their shepherd and carry them forever.”
Psalm 28:7-9
Sitting on the stump outside her front door like she does every day, Precious peered down the lane waiting for her friends to come. The road was busy, filled with adults hurrying off to work, goats looking for their next meal, and a few bikes zipping passed her home. She first saw Judith in her newly pressed uniform and perfectly white stockings pulled up to her knees. Mary wasn’t far behind skipping to keep up with her friend. Her new school shoes were spotless, and her neatly plaited (braided) hair swayed with each skip. Rhoda joined them, stepping out of her house with her brother, James. They both had new backpacks, and Precious had never seen James wearing a tie before. He looked smart.
As the group of friends approached her, Precious couldn’t help but let a little tear fall down her cheek. She filled with pride at the sight of her friends, but that pride was mixed with a little sadness — sadness that she wouldn’t be joining them. Her family just couldn’t manage to provide the cost for her education. Precious looked down at her dirty, shoeless feet and worn dress, smoothing it against her legs. Her dress immediately felt dingier than before, now that it was next to the new crisp uniforms of her friends.
The sympathetic friends gathered around Precious giving her hugs before begging her to walk with them. Hand in hand, Precious joined her joyful friends on their way to school. SCHOOL! What a glorious place! The uniforms! The teachers! The desks, the chalkboards, books, and pencils! And who could forget about the learning? Numbers, letters, science, and English! How wonderful would it be to learn more English? That would make her feel so smart.
With the school gate in front of them, Precious gave her friends a tearful goodbye. They each waved as they entered the schoolyard… a place of such hope and adventure and promise… and mystery. What would her friends be doing all morning? What stories will they have for her? Unwilling to turn around and leave the school gate, Precious laid on her belly straining to see under the gate to catch even a glimpse of the wonderful happenings of school. She saw school shoes running about and heard happy giggles of friends from her community. Then the bell rang. The pupils scrambled from the gate, their voices faded in the distance. The school yard became quiet.
It was only then that a kind security officer approached Precious, giving her a suggestion. “Go around to the left side of this wall-fence. The newcomer class meets over there. If you climb to the top of the rubbish pile and listen very carefully, you can hear their lessons over the fence. You’ll like it there.” Precious curtsied to the officer and dashed around the corner to her desired location. Sitting on a cracked yellow bucket, she tried listening carefully, but all she could hear was a stray dog digging in her mountain of trash. “Go away, mutt!” she yelled as she took a Fanta bottle and threw it in his direction, which made him scurry around to the school’s front gate.
Precious got back in position and strained to hear the teacher teach a lesson about the letter A. “What does an A look like?” Precious wondered. She hoped her friends could teach her all these things when got out of school.
For three hours Precious didn’t leave her post at that rubbish pile. She was concentrating so hard on each lesson and rehearsing those things in her mind that she didn’t realize the bell rang for school’s dismissal.
The laughter of the children as they came back through the school gate aroused her from her thoughts. Running to catch up with Mary and Rhoda, Precious was almost too out of breath to begin pelting her friends with her endless list of questions.
“What was school like? Who is your teacher? What does the letter A look like? Did you really get to taste an apple? Was it as juicy as it looks in pictures? Who did you sit next to? Did you get…”
“Wait a minute, Precious.” Mary interrupted. “I will make sure I answer all your questions. But first I need to give you this.”
“A notebook. What is that for?”
“My teacher said that I could take an extra one home with me, and I knew that I didn’t need one. But YOU need one. How else am I gonna teach you all about school if you don’t have a notebook?”
“Wow! A real notebook all for me? You are the best friend I could ever have!”
As she thumbed through the pages of the book, she couldn’t believe how clean and white the pages were. She only remembered seeing the used ones that the children carried home from school with crumpled edges, dirty pages, and ripped covers. Her eyes began filling with tears as Mary handed her a pencil, her very own pencil!
“Thank you, Mary. This day couldn’t get any better. I now have a real notebook and pencil… and a true friend who will help me learn! What could be any better?”
DISCUSSION QUESTIONS:
Most children here in the US don’t look forward to school, so why do you think Precious was looking forward to school so much?
If you didn’t go to school, what would you fill your day with?
What disadvantages would a child or adult have if they didn’t ever attend school?
What changes could you make in your heart to make you enjoy school more?
Have you ever thought of school as a gift or privilege?
THANKSGIVING ACTION ITEMS:
- Provide school supplies to children in your community who can’t afford them in your school district or pay off school lunch debts for children in your district.
- Sponsor a child in another country to attend school. (Check out www.familylegacy.com to sponsor a child in Zambia, Africa, where these stories are set. This is the organization that our family works with in Zambia.) You can even do that RIGHT NOW!
- Pray for your teachers and ask God to give you a heart to learn and be thankful for it.
- Download these papers for your children to write and draw what they are thankful for today. (Make one each day of this devotion series.)
SCRIPTURE MEMORIZATION:
(Psalm 100 is a classic portion of Scripture for our families to memorize during this Thanksgiving season. Click HERE for a FREE PRINTABLE of Psalm 100. If you need ideas on how to memorize Scripture with your family, click here to see some of my favorites.)
(If your family has already memorized Psalm 100, you can try Psalm 95 instead.)
PRAYER TIME:
Thank God for the opportunity and privilege to go to school and to learn. Ask God for forgiveness for the times that you have not tried your best to learn and have taken school for granted. Ask Him to help you do your best.
Would you like to learn more about our ministry in Lusaka, Zambia? Click here to be taken right to the home page of Family Legacy Missions International.
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