"Eyes Wide Open" by Liska Shilling

I am absolutely certain that God placed me in Memphis for this period of my life. There can be no logical explanation for the circumstances that brought me here. With that knowledge, I approached this year in the Academy with cautious optimism that God was about to do something significant in my life. In order to “prepare” myself for the urban jungle that is the Memphis City Schools, I talked my way into a student teaching placement in one of the largest city school systems in Indiana. Now, I’d like to think that I’m not as naïve as my upbringing and demographic profile might suggest. I’ve spent time walking around in major cities of the world and worked two summers in this very neighborhood with SOS. I knew that part of the purpose of the Academy is continued exposure to the inner-city with a focus on living and working in the area. Despite all of my preparation, God has used this year to break me down and show me a completely different world than anything I’ve ever known.

I accepted my current teaching position, in buyer’s terms, sight unseen. I knew nothing about the school or community. According to education protocol, this is not typically the way things are supposed to be done. I soon realized that I’d accepted a job at a school more known for making the five o’clock news than its quality of education. On the third day of school, a large, gang-related fight broke out and almost took me along with it. My first lesson of the school year: when the fight is big, get out of the way and call for help. As the school year progressed, my vocabulary and understanding of the students’ vernacular both expanded to an amazing degree. With a little assistance from a colleague’s research on UrbanDictionary.com, I have learned more than I ever wanted to know about the things my students are saying. I have prayed that my pregnant students would not deliver in class. I have broken up near-fights in the hallway and in my classroom. My phone has been stolen twice. All of these things I expected to a certain degree. It is perhaps the fact that I have become accustomed to being cursed out and now struggle not to return the favor rather than be offended which surprises me.

Other things that I have seen are more tragic than anything else. I watched a fight begin to break out in front of my house between the 9-13 year old kids that hang out around the basketball hoop. That day I almost stood in the street and wept because these tiny, sweet children already possess the lethal combination of anger and lack of reason that puts my students in jail. There is such a twisted honor system that makes it somehow necessary for you and your boys to jump so-and-so because he said something about your girl. One of the students that I’m closer to is highly motivated but I’m afraid of what may happen to her. She is one of my projects because she has a baby and is still attached to the currently less-than-stellar “baby daddy”.

God has broken me again and again because I am powerless to do anything on my own. In my mind, I have been pursuing a social gospel to battle against the problems of the city; educate them and they’ll be better people. More and more, he convicts me that this is not what he asks or blesses. We are to take care of the poor and marginalized; however, we are not to act as if feeding or clothing is enough to solve the real problems. I want to be the hero in the teacher movies that the American people love to watch. We all applaud Erin Gruwell for her Freedom Writer’s success, but at the same time millions of kids are still not being reached. Without God, it is impossible to maintain any sense of hope as I struggle to make any measurable difference in my students’ lives.

My students’ lives are so precious to me and yet so ridiculously messed up in many ways. Many will struggle to finish high school in four years. Few will successfully complete university degrees. Yet for now I feel God has placed me here for a purpose. I want to help my students achieve success in life. I truly look forward to next year and the possible impact that I can have on their lives as I am guided by Christ. My struggle is to find ways to help them see the need to pursue a genuine relationship with Christ as part of this. It has been necessary for God to break me of this “make God’s new kingdom on this earth” attitude. My heart cries out to God for the teenagers of Memphis, but I must confess that most of the time it has merely been that they would stop fighting, stop lying, etc. I have been learning the need to recognize the true source of the problems of the world. God has used Memphis in a very powerful way to teach me these lessons. The devil exists and has power in the world; his lies have proved appealing to many, including my students. Yet the promise of the Bible says that Christ and his gospel are victorious in the end and that we are to run the race hard while it is still today. Therefore, I run on.

May, 2008