When I was teaching, there were many good kids, well-motivated, eager to learn. A few didn’t want to learn and would do all they could to avoid it. A third group just wanted a quiet life. It wasn’t that they couldn’t do the work. They just couldn’t be bothered.
I’ve heard frustrated teachers saying, ‘Make an effort!’
From yesterday… three stories about making an effort…
Our French niece-in-law Julie’s ‘Cup & Cakes Salon de thé’… Her English tea-room in a Paris suburb shows new pictures on Facebook – an outside sitting area, English-style cakes, scones and biscuits. Setting up and developing her business selling tea and cakes doesn’t just happen. She’s really making an effort.
TV pictures of the Boston marathon… Close to the finish, exhausted Ajay Haridasse falls to the ground. He can’t get up. Aaron Beggs stops to pull up. Robson De Oliveira joins him. They put their arms around Haridasse and help him across the finishing-line, sacrificing personal bests. All marathon runners make an effort; these two make an extra effort.
The Normandy D-Day landings… Roy, who last week enjoyed a ‘D-Day Battlefield Tour, left us details of the events of June 5th 1944. I read of the Allied Air Forces bombing – troops landing by parachute and glider… warships shelling coastal fortifications… troops landing at Omaha then Utah beach… Men and women making the supreme effort.
This morning reading..
…Pete Grieg on Lectio 365: ‘Instead of turning up in your living room every Thursday at nine, God waits for you to make the effort…’ God doesn’t always turn up unexpectedly, dramatically. Sometimes we must make the effort…
…2 Chronicles 11: ‘Those from every tribe of Israel who set their heart on seeking the Lord…’ They made the effort to seek their God.
Musing… Today there’s stuff to be done, people to chat to, God to seek and serve. It’s easy to sit back and wait for something to happen, for God to do his thing. Sometimes I must make the effort!
malcolmsmusings.org 