Excerpt from 1 Corinthians 3:5-9

"I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth."

Reflection by Martin B. Copenhaver

When I was in high school I taught a church-school class of fifth-grade boys.  I was not a very good teacher.  And I am not being falsely modest here.  Winston Churchill said about one of his contemporaries: "He is a modest man who has much to be modest about."  As a teacher, I had much to be modest about.

Saturday night was usually a late night for me.  I wouldn't look at the church-school curriculum until Sunday morning, and then with bleary eyes.  That's about as far as the lesson planning went.  I didn't know how to make the material interesting.  The boys in the class were bored and were not beyond telling me so.  And a large group of very bored fifth-grade boys is not a pretty sight.  So, much of the time, I felt like I was running out the clock.  When each week’s class finally ended, the boys would run out the door as if freed from prison.

So imagine my surprise some twenty years later, when I got this phone call:  "Hello, Martin?  This is Justin Peterson.  You were my fifth-grade church-school teacher.  I've thought back on that class so many times."  Uh-oh.  I couldn't imagine where this conversation was headed.  "I've become active in the Presbyterian church in our town.  They asked me to be a Deacon.  And I think it all started in that church-school class you taught."  Really?  "Anyway, I’m getting married this summer and I would be honored if you would perform the ceremony."

It was one of the most surprising conversations I have ever had.  I still don't think I was any good as a church-school teacher.  But somehow a seed was planted, and then it was watered and God gave it growth.  You just never know.

Prayer

God, help me to plant seeds with joyful abandon because only you know where they will take root.

About the Author Martin B. Copenhaver is Senior Pastor, Wellesley Congregational Church, United Church of Christ, Wellesley, Massachusetts. He is the author, with Lillian Daniel, of This Odd and Wondrous Calling: the Public and Private Lives of Two Ministers.

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