For the month of October, we are answering the challenge John Goldwater, pastor of Christ Community Church in Grenada, MS, laid out — the #DailyWisdomChallenge. Each day, we are going to read through a chapter of Proverbs corresponding to the day of the month.
This fits with what we have studied in Colossians, specifically Colossians 3:1-2, namely that we should seek “the things that are above, where Christ is” and set our minds like a thermostat “on things that are above, not on things that are on earth”. Imagine what a month meditating on God’s Word daily can do for us.
Won’t you join us on this #DailyWisdomChallenge and set your minds on Christ?
This proverb his my right square in my heart.
I spent the bulk of my childhood being the butt of many jokes, and made fun of quite mercilessly. I was beat up and often bullied. The bruises faded and broken glasses were replaced, but the scars — physical and emotional — remain.
This is one of the reasons I wanted to become a teacher. Throughout those years of being bullied, there were a handful that took notice, but most, for whatever reason, were oblivious or chalked it up to that’s just the way kids are. If you have never been treated like this (or were on the giving side of these sorts of encounters rather than the receiving), you do not know what a relief it is when someone notices and helps you. Carrie Mack and Linda Bumpers at Willa Wilson Elementary were blessings from God that helped me see my value despite the efforts of bus riders and drivers who were glad to see it stomped out. These ladies still to this day look for and out for me and are encouragements in my life. Seeing either of them today fills my heart with joy and encouragement and reminds me of light in the midst of darkness.
In middle school, I know teachers saw me being bullied. The example that first comes to mind is Mike Miles. He knew what I was going through without being told. He went and had my schedule changed so that I would be out of the study hall where my misery was always the subject of study to his study hall. He taught me how to play chess. He encouraged me to read books if that’s what I liked to do. In fact, that was the gist of what he taught me (other than the math he was tasked with): he taught me to be who God had made me to be and not let others diminish that. When I see him even today, I never hesitate to tell him how thankful I am that God used him to save my life — that when others worked to convince me my life had no value, God used him to remind me who and Whose I was.
There was one particular memory that came to mind when I read this verse that convicts me still to this day. When I think of this particular memory, I am filled with nauseating guilt even though it has been over twenty years ago.
In sixth grade, Carolyn Swanson saw that I had been bullied and mistreated as well. She also noticed other students who endured the same. Sixth grade back then meant mandatory PE a few days a week (some days library or music). For me, that was like painting a giant bullseye because that meant either getting picked last for teams or not at all (this was the 1990s; participation was not mandatory, and exclusion/mockery were allowed). Even though I did not want to be picked because that would mean I could go up into the stands and read rather than embarrassing myself athletically in a very public way, I really wanted to be picked. Well, I really wanted to belong.
One particular day, a group of the more popular guys approached me and pointed out one of my classmates. Me and this other guy were basically tied for least popular in the sixth grade as well as in who could be made fun of more. Neither of us were athletic. Neither of us came from families with much money. Both of us were quiet and clothed differently than others. The guys convinced me that the surest way to be one of them — to get picked for teams and get to hang out with them — was to make fun of the other guy. He had just gotten some new boots that he was proud of and had worn them to school. It made me sick to my stomach to think of doing that to someone else, but this could have meant that I got bumped up a level and got a reprieve from being made fun of. So, right there in the middle school gym, I let the other guy have it. I was ugly. It was shameful. He cried. And then the other guys started in — on me.
Their plan all along was to embarrass me and show that I was fake. They knew I professed to be a Christian and saw this as an opportunity to cast aspersions on that profession of faith. They gave me every bit of what I gave the other guy and worse. I cried, too, but not so much for what I was receiving but that I had allowed myself to do to the other guy what I knew was terrible.
Mrs. Swanson somehow found out about this, and I can remember what she said to me about it like it was yesterday. She told me that it was worse for me to do that than the others because I truly knew what it felt like to be treated like that. This was not a means for her to belittle me but to invest in me. She fussed at me, and I deserved it. She told me that she expected more out of me and knew that I would learn from this and grow into the man she knew I could be — despite my failure and because I would learn from it.
I am ashamed to say that it took months for me to get the courage to apologize to the other guy, and before I could, he moved away. It took nearly twenty years to get in contact with him again. I won’t tell you a story of apology and reconciliation here because I do not want to paint myself as a good guy for any of this. I want to help you understand Proverbs 17:5.
Everyone you come into contact with is made in the image of God. He created them and formed them in their mother’s womb. Each of us is unique, with unique features and personalities. Some of us, like myself, are more different than societal norms than others. And it is all too easy to make fun rather than to show care and respect.
This is not wrong merely for the human life you did not respect. It is a slap in the face of their “Maker”.
If someone is going through a tough time — some “calamity” — whether it is their fault, someone else’s fault, or nobody’s fault, it is not a time for mockery. Even if you think someone is getting the “calamity” they deserve, it is not a time to mock and make fun; we sure don’t enjoy it when calamities of our own making find us.
I guess this is really a plea to be kind to others and recognize that the same God who made you made them. There is never a time to mock or insult. There is always time to show love and care.
For me, this drove me to become a teacher. The examples of those who took up for me influence how I interact with kids — all of them I have and all that I can — on a daily basis. The example of the one who saw me becoming like the others and intervened has a daily impact, too, on the man God made me to be as well as in ways that I can watch out for others as well. I pray that this little bit of testimony helps you along the way, whether you are the bully, the bullied, or the bystander. Let us look out for others and look to God for how He would have us to treat folks.
Just Keith Harris 