The Evolution of a lesson

This past week I experienced something that I have experienced a lot in my ministry career but I never thought about it very much. If you’re a preacher or a teacher you will understand, and if you know one of us then maybe this will give you a little insight. I was preparing for my Wednesday night class this week. At the start of the week I was pumped about the class I thought it was going to be great. I felt points were good and I was also using a video clip from “water boy”. Can’t go wrong with “water boy.” Man was I wrong by Tuesday it just wasn’t working the lesson felt really choppy and not good at all. By Wednesday morning I was ready to through it in the trash and start over. The problem was I was T-6 hours from class time no way I was going to rewrite now!! Well I did the class and in my opinion it stunk. For those of you who know me well I don’t do well with stunk, matter of fact it really screws me up in the head if something I do is not a 100%.
So I asked myself the question today why? Why do I kill myself mentally over these lessons? Here is what I came up with. I think it’s because I feel it is so important to do what I do. I mean I get a change every week to teach kids about God. To me that is very scary and exciting at the same time. I also realized that no matter what anyone says to me I will always be my worst critic. I think that has everything to do with not feeling worthy to teach. So after a lot of prayer today here is what I came up with. First, no matter what happens in my class room I have to understand that as long as a message from God’s word comes out it was worth it. Don’t get me wrong I am not going to stop trying to teach a good lesson that’s just not in my personality. I guess what I am saying is I just need to trust that God will use me the way He wants to in that situation. Second, I realized that the more I beat myself up over a lesson the less time I spend thanking God for giving the gift to teach. Finally I realized that the more I pray the better I teach. So let’s see trust, praising God, and prayer. Hmm maybe teaching youth group kids isn’t really about me at all.