"Problem" Children

This week I had a Sunday School training with Karl Bastian, the Kidologist. The topic was discipline, and I was eager to learn. That's one of the hardest things for me as a Sunday School teacher.

I walked out with a lot of great tips. Grace based tips. Which I love, because I'm a big fan of grace. All new ideas I'd never thought of, heard of, or tried before. I'm eager to try this out.

But the thing that struck me the most wasn't so much a tip as it was a perspective. Which was pretty much the perspective that framed all the tips.

You know those "good" kids? You know, the ones who bring you Christmas gifts and say please and thank you and never disrupt class? You probably aren't going to make a difference in their life. Why? Because their lives are already on a good trajectory. They usually come from good homes, homes where parents are doing a wonderful job teaching them about faith and how to live like Jesus. If you weren't in their lives, they'd probably still turn out to be wonderful Christians.

You know those "bad" kids? The ones who interrupt your class with fart noises and start chanting "no more rules!" (the latter actually happened to me last week). The ones who make you want to use duct tape as a disciplinary measure or pull your hair out because you can't? This is your greatest opportunity to make a difference in a kid's life. Not by punishing them or yelling at them. Not by striving to change their behavior. By partnering with them and being their friend and helping them understand what it means to be a Christian. By helping shape their heart and showing them that Jesus loves them—when they probably feel like no adult loves them.

Karl accomplished his goal (at least for me): to make us want those kinds of kids more than we want the "good" kids. Because if I want to make a difference in a kid's life, it's not going to be in the angelic kid's life. It's going to be in the life of an unloveable 5th grade boy that I loved anyway.