Article January 1, 1999 ISSUE

Not at the teacher's mercy

Dagmar Schlüter

A watershed experience in school showed me that, through the power of prayer, disagreements can be overcome. A solution can be found — for everyone concerned. And that I'm not hopelessly at a teacher's mercy.

For the two last years of secondary school, I decided to take French as one of my two main subjects. Soon, though, it was obvious that the class did not get along well with the teacher. We felt she was not giving fair marks. And she made the girls in the class cry with her harsh words. I was not maintaining the required grade point average and was afraid of having to repeat the school year. If I'd known how difficult this teacher was, I would have chosen another main subject.

I, like the other girls, started to criticize the teacher openly. And when after a test I asked the teacher why I had again received a bad mark, she told me that I was not at the level of achievement where I thought I was. I left the classroom crying. Going to that class became harder than ever.

At that point, I thought of praying about the situation. In Sunday School I had learned that God is Love and all power — and that one can turn to Him for solutions. I called my Sunday School teacher and asked her to pray with me.

We agreed that in order to solve the problem I had first to be free from the feeling of being treated unjustly. Gradually I realized that the relationship between my teacher and me was actually spiritual. God was controlling us. He is the one universal intelligence that controls all relationships. I realized that each one of us is an expression of the good and loving Father-Mother God. And that God governs every activity, including teaching. I started thinking only thoughts about my teacher that I knew came from God. I also stopped saying unkind things about her. When preparing for a French oral test, I read a passage from the Bible where God asks Moses, who doesn't think he can speak to the children of Israel, “Who hath made man's mouth?” (Exodus 4:11 ). I saw the upcoming exam as an opportunity to express God.

After the exam, the teacher told me that I must have worked a lot to prepare for that test. She said I'd made progress in my work. The fact was, I had prayed. Also, the atmosphere in class improved so much that an effective collaboration between the students and the teacher became possible. I was happy to have seen God's awesome power at work.:)

Dagmar Schlüter
Hamburg, Germany

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