Several years ago, back when I was a substitute teacher at the local high school, I had a student in class who would always come in late. He would lay his head down on his desk with his hood pulled over his head and sleep. He was never rude to me. In fact, he was very polite. However, he would still ignore my pleas to pay attention and do his work. One day, I mentioned this to one of the staff hoping to gain some guidance and her response was, “Oh, yeah, he’s a slacker. Just a stoner. He’s got a messed up home life. Just overlook him. We are just hoping he can make it to graduation.” I kid you not! Those were her words verbatim. Being a once misunderstood teenager myself back in the day, I couldn’t just “overlook him”. I was so bothered by her statement that I slipped off into the office bathroom and cried in the dark. It crushed my heart.

All I could do was pray…

It was a week night. Not sure which one. Does that part even matter? Hold on, we shall find out later. Our oldest son was having a great deal of stomach pain. I gave my best motherly advice, “Go poop.” He did and that just and it made it hurt worse. As the evening dragged on, his symptoms became more intense and a fever crept in. Concerned that it might be his appendix, our oldest daughter and I took him to the emergency room while my husband stayed home with our two younger children. We spent several hours waiting for him to be seen by a doctor, then we waited a while longer for him to get an ultra-sound which led to waiting a little longer still on results. Fortunately, the results from tests and ultra-sound showed nothing really out of the ordinary and he was diagnosed with gastritis. He was given something to help ease his pain and lower his temperature and then sent home with some dietary instructions and a prescription for bacterial infection. By that time it was very late. We had skipped dinner earlier that evening.

We were tired and hungry.

Shreveport can be pretty sketchy after midnight. Okay, pretty much anytime these days. Also, there aren’t many decent places near the hospital to grab food that late. Add to that, we lived several miles outside of town where, at that time, we had no local restaurants and the gas stations closed up around 9:00 pm. We were thrilled to see that the Taco Bell drive-thru was open. Our son was not hungry for obvious reasons. He curled up in the back seat and went to sleep. We pulled up to the menu and looked it over as if we were going to order something different from the bazillion other times we had gone there. We placed our order and then proceeded to drive up to the window. It was around 1:15 am. I just wanted to get our food, eat on the way home, and go to bed. I had agreed to substitute at the school the next morning and I was already dreading how tired I was going to be and how long the day was ahead of me after what would be only a few hours of precious sleep. That’s when I heard the most excited voice coming from the other side of the drive-thru window shouting a long drawn out, “Mrs. Kuuuuuuntz!” There in the window with the biggest smile on his face was the sleepy “slacker” and “stoner” I had been told to “overlook”. We had a very short conversation. In that little moment, I learned a lot more about that young man that most of his teachers had in years. Oh, had they only taken the time to ask questions. If only I had. He wasn’t a slacker and he wasn’t stoned! He was just tired!! What we didn’t see was a hardworking young man and that matters.

There was so much more to this young man’s story.

The next day at school, I was assigned to the same Algebra class where I had first met the “tired” student. Being rather consistent, he walked in late, went to his desk, pulled his hood over his head and attempted to sleep. But this time I knew why he was late, so I didn’t get on to him. After the class settled down with their assignments, I walked back to his desk as few of the other students ‘oooo’d‘ thinking that I was about to send him “down the hall”. Instead, I tapped him on the shoulder and told him that if he would take 15 minutes to complete the assignment sheet, he could go to sleep without being disturbed the remainder of the class. His eyes lit up and he smiled. I told him that even young people get tired. He thanked me, took the assignment sheet, did the work -correctly I might add- and then pulled his hood over his head and went to sleep. From that point on, we did this routine every time I subbed that class.

But wait, there’s more!. Stay with me, now, this is good stuff!

The next year, I was standing in the school hallway in between the library and the breakroom waiting for someone to bring the elusive breakroom key that was not privy to lowly substitutes like myself. As I stood there patiently waiting, I noticed two female students a little ways down the hall having what appeared to be a pretty intense conversation. Ones of the girls walked away while the other stayed behind and started crying. Anyone who knows me knows exactly what happened next. I walked over and asked her if I could hug her. Yes, I knew that was against the rules. No, I didn’t care.

A crying female almost always needs a motherly hug.

I didn’t ask any other questions right way, but rather I proceeded to break another rule. I told her that God loved her and that He had a plan for her life. Then, I offered to pray for her. She pulled back, sheepishly smiled and shared a small piece of her story. She explained how she had just checked in late and received detention for excessive tardies. Not sure the reason for the previous tardies, but this particular time, she was late because the family car would not start. This latest tardy earned her a Saturday detention. She was really upset about it. You see, her dad had lost his job the year before and had been financially struggling to provide ever since. He would work odd jobs to keep the bills paid and even her brother worked to help the family stay afloat. Add to that difficult challenge, family had only the one shared vehicle. What little money they had would be needed to fix the car. In addition, he had a job to be at that Saturday and didn’t have the time nor the means to get his daughter to detention. Naturally, I offered to take her.

What happened next was truly a God moment. A reminder of Divine Appointments.

As she started to walk away, she paused and looked back. She said, “You’re that sub my brother told me about last year. You looked for him. He said that you were really cool and that you had his back.” Completely flattered, I asked who her brother was. Have you guessed yet?

Fast Forward

Years later, our youngest son is now the student who is often tardy to school because it’s a struggle to get out of bed every morning. Unlike the students’ in the story, he doesn’t have to work to help out the family finances. He chooses to work. He has been like that his entire life. He worked a very tough job this past summer and was able to save up and buy the truck he is now driving. I should mention that he had mono during this whole time making that tough job even tougher. He pays for his own gas and he uses his own money to fix up his truck or to go eat with his friends. He gets up each morning, gets ready, takes care of the dogs on the three mornings his dad is out of town working, and then he goes to school. After school, he goes home, checks on the dogs, changes clothes, grabs a bite to eat, then heads off to his job. Depending on that night’s schedule, he returns home around 10:30-11:30 pm, gives me a hug, gets the dogs (they sleep with him), hits up social media one more time, then goes to bed, only to start the whole process over again the next day. He requested as many hours as they would give him because he wants to fix his truck up real nice. If you work in the school office or are one of his teachers, you might not know that about him. You might think that he is a “slacker” or a “stoner”, or “spoiled”. He’s not. (Okay, maybe just a little spoiled. But in a good way, not rotten). He is a hardworking, determined young man who does his work behind the scenes.

This week, the Bible study group that I am in is studying about Jehosheba. (“Faithful” -by twelve contributing authors) Her short story is found in 2 Kings 11:2. Like a town with only one stop sign, there is much to see here, but if you blink, you’ll miss it. Here, let me show you what the New International Version Bible says:

But Jehosheba, the daughter of King Jehoram and sister of Ahaziah, took Joash son of Ahaziah and stole him away from among the royal princes, who were about to be murdered. She put him and his nurse in a bedroom to hide him from Athaliah; so he was not killed. 2 Kings 11:2

So, here’s the gist of this significantly huge short story found snuggled in 2 Kings 11. Jehosheba’s stepmom was married to her daddy, Jehoram, the king. Jehosheba’s mother was Zibiah in the lineage of Judah. Athalia lost her ever-loving mind when her son, Ahaziah died. In a fit of rage she ordered all the royal sons be put to death. Jehosheba and Ahaziah shared the same baby daddy, so that made his son, Joash, her nephew and the grandson of the crazy grand-mammy. Jehosheba takes her nephew and his nurse and hides them to spare their lives. Six years later, a high priest named Jehoida gets wind of this and, along with a team of guards, helps get the rightful and very young heir to the throne, back to where he belonged, and Athalia is killed. Seriously, how bad is your family really? What she did in secret helped save an entire bloodline that would one day lead to Christ Jesus himself! That’s her story. Oh, and Joash went on to have a son named Gideon.

One little verse of recognition, one ginormous story!

Why is her story significant to mine? Because there was not big production, no social media worthy comments or pics, but what she did was absolutely huge even though most might overlook that little nugget of history about the line (and soon coming Lion) of Judah. What seemed like a simple act of courage was really quite impactful on so many others.

Every thing we do will either lead us and others to Christ or away

There are so many people around us every day who do so much more than you see on the surface. They don’t advertise or draw attention to themselves. They don’t post their every move on social media. They just do what they feel led to do. That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t give praise reports or offer testimonies to bring about awareness and change. It also doesn’t mean that there is anything wrong with sharing your life’s snapshots on social media. Just be mindful and compassionate, not boastful or attention seeking. Be discerning, yet slow to judge.

What you don’t see matters!

Now, go do what you know is right even when others can’t see you doing it.

For further study and insight, check out 2 Kings 10:11, Judges 6-7, Isaiah 40:30-31, Jeremiah 29:11, Matthew 6, Proverbs 9:17