Dave

I don't know all the reasons why Jesus picked the disciples he did. It would be an interesting discussion thought...I mean, so many to choose from and he chooses those twelve? They seem like a motley crue to me. Doubters, deniers, tax collectors...I mean, those aren't really private sins, if you ask me. But they were the just-good-enoughs. Not really a varsity team, more like the JV team, the B team. If my memory serves me correct, most of the shining stars were apprenticing to be rabbis; these guys were already kicked to apprentice under their dads. And if they were still apprenticing, then they were still pretty young. So Jesus picks a bunch of B-team teenagers/young adults to change the course of history. And they hang on every word he says? Now that is mentoring, if you ask me.

I was thinking about this today as I reflected on the mentors in my own life. I've had a few, most I keep in contact with at some level. In high school I had this teacher named Mr. Boelens who was the first real teacher that I pledged my loyalty to. He kicked me in the donkey when I needed it, but I trusted him like crazy and he believed in me to the bitter end. He is in Ontario now and we email a couple of times a year. When I started teaching a good friend named Randy helped me at a time when I needed some spiritual and professional discipline. I've had some others along the way, but for the last twenty years there has been one constant.

Dave.

An English professor from my college days who came to class with a crooked tie and the back of his shirt tail hanging out. He put his tongue in the side of his mouth when he was trying to make a point or getting excited about a poem or story that I was sure no one else in the literature world found exciting or enthralling. And he drew something out of us that we hung on every word he said. He called us to justice and kingdom living and faithfulness, using the classroom as his church and the literature books as his Bible. And for that I will be forever grateful. I remember after one class he taught us, a friend named Sharon were so motivated to redeem every square inch of this world we clicked our heels all the way back to the dorm room. And he could look you in the eye and speak the truth in love; he just knew our hearts and our minds. He put everything into teaching us and into knowing us.

I still stay in touch with him. I sleep in his basement when I visit and I still hang on every word. And he still sticks his tongue in the side of his mouth. And what a poet, even when he isn't quoting poetry. I fail miserably all the time in the classroom, I talk too loud, I procrastinate in my grading, I over-react, I cut people off when they are talking...but all my successes I owe to his mentoring--especially the one day he pulled me aside and told me the best teacher takes a written lesson plan into every class, even after thirty years, even if it is written on a piece of scrap paper or a napkin. I've never forgotten that and it has saved me many a time.

This great friend of mine retired last year and the institution he was a part of and the students he would of taught are the poorer. But my life, my teaching, my Christ-following and even my parenting is richer because of Dave. I am thankful for his mentoring, for taking some skinny Canadian B-team future English teacher and helping him work through the joys and sorrows of the classroom. And since he is retired and the garden is still frozen in Iowa, Dave started : http://gardener-dave.blogspot.com
his own blog that allows him to cultivate some thoughts in middle of a deep midwest winter. Thanks Dave, for everything.

A poem from Dave on thoughts about hearing George McGovern speak:

"'He stood behind the lectern without a note,
eighty-six years old, tanned, that famous grin
lighting up his face as he made his opening comments.
Then he got down to the serious business of telling us
about world hunger,
about the starving kids he saw when he served in WW II
and the starving kids he still sees today. He talked about ways
to save kids from starvation, about Food Stamps (his creation)
and school lunch programs in America and around the world.
He has always had a heart for young people, this old warrior
against war who once said he was “fed up with old men
dreaming up wars for young men to go die in.”

It was the chapel service at Northwestern College
but he read no scripture, said little about God, except this,
except these five lines, which he sang in a clear tenor voice
with just the hint of an old man’s quaver:
“Jesus loves the little children,
All the children of the world,
Red and yellow, black and white
They are precious in his sight,
Jesus loves the little children of the world.'

So often, less is more."