PE and the Kingdom of God

No, I'm not kidding. I'm seriously going to relate my PE experience to the Kingdom of God. And no, I'm not trying to be silly by intertwining these two areas. I love to receive fresh thoughts about God, truth, and life, and sometimes God uses my daily life to communicate ideas to me. PE just so happens to be a constant part of my life right now, so God even uses it to speak to me. I know it's weird, but hear me out. I had just finished reading the last chapter of The Secret Message of Jesus, and this chapter was talking about seeing glimpses of the Kingdom. After the chapter, I was wishing that I would recognize the subtle beauty of God's Kingdom more often. Then, all of the sudden, this silly but profound little PE thought hit me. My main goal, my will, my dream as a PE teacher is to provide a fun, inclusive, and healthy (physically, socially, and emotionally) environment to my students by introducing them to fun, inclusive, and healthy physical activities. I couldn't be happier if my students were having fun and enjoying each other's company and freindship. I do my best to create this environment. However, I have this one class. We don't exaclty see eye to eye. I have communicated my goals to them, but they never really responded they way I hoped they would. Their will for class directly opposes mine. Their idea of a good time is organizing into little groups excluding people they don't "like." Once they are in these groups they battle for the spotlight, and most of them are willing to do whatever it takes to achieve center-of-attention stauts. It hurts me to see the lack of fun and the exclusion when I know how good their experience could be. Of course, I could force them. I could make them participate in every activity and punish every student who refuses to smile or who doesn't take turns or share, but that would never accomplish the goal. The students would merely be robots who obeyed only out of fear. There would be no fun, inclusion would be faked, and there would be no personal growth. In fact, force would only breed rebellion and hatred. The only shot at making this ideal PE experience work is for the desires of the students to match the desires of the teacher. How could that happen? I could model it for them. Maybe, just once, they could catch a glimpse of the good time I hope for. Perhaps, they would have to get sick of the way they think PE should be first. I think that this is similar to the Kingdom of God. God has a dream and will for us and this earth. It is a perfect will, a beautiful dream. It is a pure and peaceful world filled with people who love each other. There is no injustice or hatred. God knows that His Kingdom is a glorious experience. However, we as humans haven't really got on board with God's holy plan. We want to fulfill our own selfish desires, sometimes even if it hurts others. We want to be number one, and we might just do anything to get to the top. Of course, God could force us, but that wouldn't be a Kingdom of Peace. It would be a Kingdom of Fear. So how is God going about making this Kingdom happen. First of all, He sent Jesus to model it for us. Jesus showed us the beauty of the Kingdom, but we didn't recognize the beauty. We killed Jesus, the Kingdom's perfect representative. God knew we wouldn't want the Kingdom, but He did believe that to be a part of His Kingdom is the most glorious experience there could ever be. He never scrapped the idea of of His perfect kingdom. He just created a plan to help us joyfully enter His Kingdom. His plan is to transform our lives from the inside out. His plan helps us see the beauty of the Kingdom, but first we have to realize the ugliness of our kingdom. Then we can call out to God, be forgiven through His son Jesus, and begin the process of belonging to His Kingdom. This is only the beginning. We don't immediately love the Kingdom of God, but we start wanting to. We trust God now that He knows the truth, and that He has our best interest in mind. However, we find ourselves still trying to live our own way. So we must be taught and trained to love and see the beauty of the Kingdom. Therefore, we must be humble and teachable. We must listen to God and accept His discipline when we get off track. It's good news to know that we are now on the right track. One day we will fully appreciate and enjoy God's beautiful world. Maybe one day, my PE class will enjoy class for what it could be, but I think the Kingdom might be a little more important, huh?