Faith-Full Walls

I had the best view on campus. I could look out of my classroom windows past the shaded area of three sequoias to an unobstructed view of the basketball courts and larger turf beyond, past the houses and overpass to our town's water tower almost a mile away. But they told me I had to move.

So for all of the 2012-2013 school year I watched the work occur in real time. Through my windows, I could see the men make plans outside, destroy the basketball courts that had been there since I was a kid, dig ditches, and pour the foundation our new middle school building. I witnessed the end of an era and the beginning of a new one; it was bittersweet. I would be losing the view and relocating to the new building the following year.

A couple of constituents, brothers in business together, both of whose kids I taught, were hired to frame the new building. One special day, we were invited to tour the framed facility with our classes, not just for the fun of it, but for the purpose of "blessing the building". I took my students over, we were handed permanent markers, and we wrote our prepared Bible verses all over the framing. Each student had at least one verse picked out for this purpose, and our entire middle school got involved. The students walked through the "halls", "classrooms", even "bathrooms" reverently penning the verses they had chosen. It was a profound moment for me to watch my sixth graders silently write their blessings on the boards which would become the inner structure of our future building.

Verses like these:

Deuteronomy 6:9

Write [the commandments] on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.

Psalm 118:22

The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone...

Joshua 1:5b

I will never leave you nor forsake you.

Proverbs 1:7

The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, but fools despise wisdom and instruction.

Romans 8:39

...neither height nor depth, nor anything in all creation, 

will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

And many many more...

What happened that day was profound, yes. It was symbolic, definitely. And it was ultimately meaningful to take that step in our Christian walk. By dedicating the building to the Lord, the students and teachers acted in faith that the Lord would be present for their futures, for our future. Even if we had not written Scripture on the doorframes, we know God would still be present with us, but it was in the act of finding a meaningful verse and then writing it that each person involved made a statement to God: "We invite you to surround us every day."

Now it's the spring of the following year, and we have been growing in our understanding and knowledge of Jesus, of each other, and of the world in which he's placed us. We have been literally surrounded by God-breathed Scripture all year. We can't see the passages anymore--they're hidden in the framing. But each day we re-devote ourselves to the Lord, and we know he surrounds us with his presence.

The wall of faith is important to note here. All year I've tried to design my English and Media classes around the analogy of the wall in 2 Kings 18-19. We gather the tools of our foundation behind the wall so that we can stand on the wall of faith and look out beyond the wall to a world that needs redemption.

I am now teaching (and the students are learning) inside the new middle school building surrounded by many walls of faith (faith-full walls, if you will) based on God's Word. This building has a view of its own--ironically, the scenery is comparable to last year's "best view on campus". Regardless of the view, though, we have climbed and are standing on the wall of faith together.