My 9th Grade English teacher and God's conversation with me today

So today they made yet another announcement at church...they took interim off the title of David Pray, and so now, well, I guess we are stuck with him (or maybe I should say he's stuck with us). Either way, it is an awesome thing to be stuck with...I am soooo excited.
It has been very different than what we are used to, but it has been exciting and challenging and today (when I was having a moment of distraction during Pastor Ron's wonderful sermon) I started thinking about this whole transition in a different light.
I thought of this English teacher I had in high school. Her name was Mrs. Porter. She is one of the few teachers that I actually remember her name or anything she taught me. She was an amazing women, incredibly talented and indescribably passionate about Shakespeare. I am pretty sure she served for our military as a backup for boot camp in her off time as well because she showed no sympathy, no compassion, and absolutely no tolerance for excuses or lack of effort.
Before entering her class, my English teachers had always praised my writing. I was pretty comfortable with my ability and had no desire to get better...I was content to be an A/B student on little to no effort. I mean what teenager do you know is going to work harder if they are already getting good grades.
When I met Mrs. Porter, let's just say she was not so easily impressed. She kicked my butt, put me in my place, and pushed me. If I saw anything that even remotely resembled a B on my paper that year I did a "thank ya Jesus" dance. I tried, worked hard, and still made many more C's (a few other grades I won't mention)than I thought I desired. I'd look at other's papers and think "my paper was better than theirs, so why did we both get Cs.
The truth is I probably desired every C I got and then some. Maybe my paper was better than someone elses, maybe it wasn't but what Mrs. Porter realized that I couldn't see at the time was that what I had produced wasn't my best. And she saw something other teacher's before hadn't seen, she saw the potential that needed to be developed.
When I entered her class, I hated Shakespeare, understood little about diagramming sentences, and didn't think any of that mattered because I was a pretty good writer. I left her class impressed and comfortable with Shakespeare, much more confident with diagramming sentences, and a lot more aware of my need to continue to develop my writing skills.
God was making a connection...it made perfect since to me, but if you are completely confused, you'll have to come back later to get "the rest of the story"