E03: Back to school!

Peer pressure. Worldly influences. Are these some things you dread facing, now that you’re getting back into the rhythm of daily life at school? Need some encouragement to be bold and to make the right choices? This episode of our podcast is for all of you going back to school, and an inspiration for the rest of us too!

Transcript: “Living the Gospel” podcast, Episode 3: Back to school!

This is ActiveChristianity’s “Living the Gospel” podcast. Join us as we explore different aspects of the gospel, according to the Bible, and how we can put it into practice in daily life.

Eunice: It’s September 4th and it’s the dreaded first week of school for many. I’m Eunice, I’m not in school anymore, but I work on the editorial team at ActiveChristianity.

Milenko: And I’m Milenko. I’m the editor of ActiveChristianity and welcome to this episode of our podcast of “Living the Gospel.”

Eunice: So, Milenko I know it‘s been a while since you’ve been to school …

Milenko: Yeah.

Eunice: But, if you kind of try to recall back, to that time, did you ever like school?

Milenko: Yeah, actually I did. I quite enjoyed school. I didn’t have many problems. But one thing that often was a bit hard was, when you’re thinking about peer pressure. Sometimes you felt pressured into doing things that you didn’t really want to do or felt wasn’t really right. And that, sometimes, I remember, was quite difficult, that you’d wake up with a knot in your stomach and you didn’t really want to go. They were sometimes hard times.

So, that’s not always easy for young people today either, and that’s something we’d like to talk about today actually. We’re going to do it a bit differently. But I think it’s good not just for students packing their bags and getting ready to go to school and maybe, if they have that little knot in their stomach, but it is also for parents and anyone else. Because we all experience it, you know, peer pressure and pressure from people around us – it’s something that is not unusual. And going back to school can be quite a challenge for a lot people. So, we have this little encouragement today.

Eunice: Yeah, I have a good friend of mine. Her name is Amberly. She wrote an article for a website and it’s actually in a form of a letter. A letter to students. Actually, she wrote it with her own kids in mind. It’s titled: “To my dear high school student.” And we were lucky enough to be able to have a chat with her for this podcast. But first, we’d like to play a recording of the letter for you guys.

(Click to read:)
“To my dear high school student …”

Eunice: So, we’ve got Amberly here with us today in the studio. Amberly, could you tell us a little bit more about yourself?

Amberly: I live in Vancouver, Canada, which is on the West coast and I live with my family. We have children in high school and in elementary school. The youngest is six and the oldest is 21. We have a very busy life. We’re involved in a lot of church activities and we travel a lot and it’s very busy, but very good.

Eunice: So, what were your thoughts when you were writing this article, because you wrote it kind of right before school started, right?

Amberly: I actually really had thought of how I could encourage my own children as they started high school that year. So, I actually wrote it with them in mind, just words of encouragement that I wanted to give to them as they went off to school. So that they could choose the right thing, right from the start of the school year, to choose a good path to walk on throughout the year.

Eunice: You mentioned that starting a new school year is kind of like starting on a brand new blank notebook and it’s my choice, it’s our choice what we want to fill our book with. So, what happens then if I wrote a bad page in my book, and what should I do?

Amberly: Well I think that we’ve all experienced that we have not always made the best choice, when we look back. And maybe we wrote a page that wasn’t going in the right direction, that we wanted. But I don’t think that we can let that stop us from what we fill the rest of the pages with. I think that, we can ask forgiveness and let it work in our hearts, so that next time I’m going to choose the right thing. Next time I’m going to put the right thing on this page. I want to choose what leads me to happiness in my life.

Eunice: But then, what I’ve already written in my book, that bad page; is something going to happen to it, or?

Amberly: Well, I do not think we can go back and write something new on that page. The choices we make, they are there. But we can actually ask for forgiveness and have it … I think God forgives and casts it into the sea of forgetfulness, but that page will remain blank. So, it’s very serious actually the choices we make every day. Every page we make good choices, because we cannot go back and redo that day. But then there’s … It also makes me think of that verse that says, a righteous man falls seven times and gets up again. So, if there is a day where I have made the wrong choices, it should stir something in my heart so that it doesn’t happen again. Tomorrow I will make new choices. From now on I will choose the good, I will choose the right things.

Eunice: You also mentioned in the article, about carrying a great secret, a valuable treasure inside your heart. What is this treasure? What is this secret?

Amberly: This secret is that I believe in God and when I believe in God, I believe He has a plan for my life and it leads to eternal life, eternal happiness.

Eunice: So, in a way then, I align my life and my actions according to that secret that God has a plan for me?

Amberly: Yeah, and there’s a lot of things that will try to distract me from that during the day. I meet things, I meet people who try to draw my thoughts and my goal away from what God has for me for eternity. But this secret I have in my heart is that I believe in God’s Word. I believe that when I choose the good, He will reward me for eternity.

Sometimes when I go shopping and I’m walking into the store and I see people all around, and people are occupied; you can see that, a lot of times they don’t look very peaceful and happy. They’re busy with things and … But I walk in and I just think: I have this treasure in my heart. I believe in God and it’s a bit of a secret, but I think that I can actually be an example to the people around me, if I can be bold and I have a life that shows that I have this secret inside, this secret of happiness.

Eunice: And that’s also what someone can do in their simple situations at school or at work.

Amberly: Yeah, I think that we can be an example, we can be a light, when we live according to this faith that we have in God.

Eunice: Sometimes it doesn’t even take that many words.

Amberly: No, and sometimes it’s no words at all, sometimes it’s just by our actions and our behavior and our care for people, that that speaks to them.

Eunice: Well, thanks for taking the time to join us today, Amberly. Just thinking, do you have any last words for all of us who are listening?

Amberly: Actually, I was just thinking that it’s actually a very exciting life! It’s not heavy and it’s not hard in that way, but we have such a wonderful goal that we are reaching and that we have in our sights and it makes life exciting and fun and hopeful and happy.

Eunice: To all of you who are heading back to school this week, wherever you are, remember that Jesus is with you and He is praying for you.

Milenko: He certainly is, and there is nothing too small or too complicated that we can’t take to God and ask Him to help us with.

Eunice: That’s right. Next week we’re going to talk about another important subject: Purity with regards to the use of media.

Milenko: That’s a really important topic, especially for the time we’re living in. So, remember to tune in next week.

Eunice: That’s all we have for you guys this week, do remember to leave us a review and a rating on Spotify or iTunes. Thanks for listening, bye!