Yesterday, the community college where I work at was operating on a two-hour delay because of the recent winter weather that passed through our area. Not having the usual routine of being at the campus by 9:00, I decided to take the morning to do some things that I’ve put off for a couple of weeks. Although not required to keep office hours because of the two-hour delay, I went ahead and went to the campus during the normal time just so that I could be there if I had a student that wanted to see me. When I arrived, I had a young man, a former student of mine, approach me and ask if he could talk to me. He explained that he had been there waiting for me, knowing that I had office hours; he wanted to talk to me about a problem he was having.
When I began teaching during my graduate school years working on my Ph.D., I decided that I would always make myself accessible to students and would not limit the conversation to coursework or course related issues, but would allow the student, within reason, to feel completely open in talking to me. Since 2006, I have regarded what I do as being a missionary; not to some far off exotic location, but a domestic missionary charged with the burden of taking the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ to the college campus. It is challenging as any foreign field since I cannot openly discuss my faith. Almost every university or college I have worked at has had a policy in place that only allows me to discuss my faith if I am asked questions about it by the student(s) and only during non-academic class time. With this in mind, I have always made my office hours longer than required by college policy and do use the opportunity to share my faith when students do ask me about it.
Knowing I was a Christian, he began to ask me questions about my faith and how I balance the demands of life with what I feel the Lord has called me to do. As we began to talk with one another, he told me that he struggles to get everything done; he is a single father trying to raise his son on his own, has a job, and is trying to be a full-time student – all at the age of 23! He then began to share how the Lord has laid a burden on him which he described as a spiritual calling to not only share his faith more with those around him, but to really study the Bible and to be more faithful in his church attendance. He even began to tell me that he has felt as if he has sinned when he has gone to bed without reading his Bible or praying for the needs of others. As I listened to this young man, I immediately thought of what the apostle Paul wrote: Furthermore then we beseech you, brethren, and exhort you by the Lord Jesus, that as ye have received of us how ye ought to walk and to please God, so ye would abound more and more (I Thessalonians 4:1). This young man was trying to live a life that would please God.
Within my own life I have faced a similar struggle of balancing the things that life requires, the responsibilities that I have, and the spiritual needs and callings God has placed on me. As a husband and a father, I have the responsibility to work, provide an income, to be a friend, partner, and all else that family life calls for. As an employee, I have the responsibilities to be ready for the courses I teach, to devise my own exams and lecture materials, and to treat each student in my course no different from any other student in my class. I have an obligation to faculty members to support their efforts, to diffuse situations where students question or openly critique other faculty members and staff. As a sole proprietor of a small printing ministry, I have obligations to the churches and missionaries that the ministry supports. As a Christian, I have the spiritual responsibility of daily studying the scriptures, in sharing my faith with others, lifting the needs of others to my God and King in prayer, and in teaching my daughter to do as the Lord has commanded each Christian to do: [to] love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind; and thy neighbour as thyself (Luke 10:27b). I also have the responsibility of fulfilling the call that God has placed on me to serve as a servant of the Lord Jesus Christ.
