By Scott Spreier
As I sit here this morning waiting for worship to begin, I have the strange sensation that somewhere between Sunday School and the Sanctuary, I passed through a time warp and now find myself back in 1958.
I’m timid “Little Scotty,” sitting breathlessly in Mrs. Berger’s third-grade classroom, having just returned from our first fire drill of the year. Or it’s the previous Sunday and I’m sitting in the dank basement of the Jetmore Presbyterian Church, listening to Lillian Billings preside over Junior Missionary Society, drilling us on our biblical knowledge and warning us how easy we could fall into the gates of Hell if, God forbid, we drank or smoked or did some things I’d never heard of.
I’m not sure what triggered these seven-decade-old flashbacks. Maybe it was today’s fire drill, which I found much less exciting than when I was 8. Or perhaps it’s today’s reading from Psalms, which, despite ending well, is laced with threats from Miss Lillian’s vengeful, mad-as-hell God who haunted me well into adulthood.
But today, as we prepare for a new season of study both at church and school, rather than reflect on the past, perhaps we should look to the future. As we worship, let us pray for our Sunday School teachers and aides who volunteer their time and effort week after week to introduce, instill and refine our faith. Whether we’re young or old, these weekly conversations can have a profound impact on our lives. Miss Lillian aside (God bless her — her heart was in the right place even as her message missed its mark), I still carry with me powerful lessons learned long ago that continue to shape my life.
Let us also pray for our public schools, for the teachers and administrators who face challenges unheard of when I was a kid — everything from low pay and limited funding to societal shifts that often make education a daunting profession.
Lastly, let us pray for our children and grandchildren as they head back to the classroom. With active-shooter drills replacing the “duck-and-cover” drills of my Cold War youth, the emergence of AI and the constant distractions of the digital world, and a continually shifting culture, they too face a world far different than the one we grew up in. Let us pray that they be blessed with a fear-free, engaging, supportive learning environment that will shape their lives in a positive way for years to come.
And then, let us all take a deep breath and remember those words from that old favorite we sing again today … we are all “Standing on the Promises of God.”