Today’s passage is Matthew 8:23-34.

Jesus is sleeping in the boat as he and his disciples cross the lake when a storm threatens. Jesus tells the wind and waves to calm down. When they land on the other side of the lake, two demon possessed men met them, the demons in the men complaining about Jesus being there. They ask him to send them into a herd of pigs, which he does. The pigs jump in the lake and drown.

The townspeople ask Jesus to leave the area.

I am teaching a summer school class.

All but one of the students failed their English class last year, which is why they have to take summer school.

I rejected those students last year. I didn’t want them in the school.

They all had troubles.

I saw them as problems, just as the townspeople saw Jesus as a problem.

I didn’t want to care for them.

I was so angry with one of them that I looked for a reason to expel him from school.

He gave me the excuse I was looking for by punching another boy.

In repentance, I took him back into the school.

I rejected all of those students because they made demands on me last year that I was unwilling to accept.

They needed encouragement and gentle but firm guiding.

They needed acceptance and hope above all. I gave them rejection.

So God gave them back to me this summer to love, accept and encourage.

The curriculum is irrelevant.

Their spirits are what is important. Hearing some of my story with Jesus is important.

Knowing that they are not demon-filled pigs but little disciples in a storm that can be calmed by God is important.

My repentance is to helping them understand that.

Part of my mission is to help them see that the bad news of their failure is the good news of summer school success.

Lord, I pray for your spirit of acceptance to fill me so that I will stop rejecting my students and the people you put in my life.