April 30 devotion

You can watch today's devotion here.

Overlooked blessings…teachers

Ephesians 4:11,12

4/30/20

Pastor John C. Berg

¹¹ He himself gave the apostles, as well as the prophets, as well as the evangelists, as well as the pastors and teachers, ¹² for the purpose of training the saints for the work of serving, in order to build up the body of Christ.

This is your daily devotion for April 30^th.  We’ve been discussing overlooked blessings for almost two weeks.  You may have noticed a fairly consistent theme running through these overlooked blessings.  With many of them, God may be using the worldwide crisis to help us not overlook them. Today’s blessing is one of the clearest examples of that.  There are some pretty funny jokes being shared on the internet about how the distance learning is going for some families.  There have also been some very sad news stories about how it’s just too much for some parents to handle and how many lower income and rural kids don’t have the technology to really be able to participate.  There also is a lot of talk right now about parents appreciating teachers more than ever. 

In Ephesians 4 Paul wrote, ¹¹ He himself gave the apostles, as well as the prophets, as well as the evangelists, as well as the pastors and teachers, ¹² for the purpose of training the saints for the work of serving, in order to build up the body of Christ.  To be clear, the teachers Paul is talking about are those who teach the Word of God.  If you are able send your children to a Lutheran school I challenge you to think of a blessing that has a greater and longer lasting impact.  Teachers who teach everything in the light of God’s Word.  Bible history classes, regular chapel services, Catechism classes, memorizing hymns and Scripture.  It’s worth every penny and then some.  Jesus has given us these teachers to build up the body of Christ.  Keep them in your prayers.  Support them with offerings. 

Even though Paul is specifically talking about teachers of the Bible, we can still recognize how God blesses the world with public school teachers.  What would our world be like without free public education?  It’s not very enjoyable to think about, is it?  If you are a teacher, we thank you for serving our children and we thank God for blessing us with teachers.

We pray:  Dear Jesus, thank for blessing us with teachers of your Word.  Protect and provide for them during this difficult time.  Thank you for blessing our country with teachers who dedicate their lives to teaching our children. Amen.