Mercy Me

I don’t know how much weathermen get paid, but I’m pretty sure it’s more than teachers. And it doesn’t make sense, because I can guarantee you any teacher can predict the slightest climate change with the accuracy of a NASA GPS program. All they have to do is look at their students. 

Though I’m not currently working in the classroom, I’ve logged enough years as a teacher to know the signs. This morning on the way to take the man cub to school, there was a fender-bender, causing traffic to back up for a mile. When we arrived on campus, it was like a three-ring circus right there in the drop-off zone, and somebody forgot to lock the monkey cage. You’d have thought it was a kindergarten campus with no adult supervision. Those high school kids were all over the parking lot, walking in front of moving vehicles, stopping to chat in front of moving vehicles, laughing and making jokes and throwing paper-wad baseballs in front of moving vehicles. 

Kids aren’t the only ones who are sensitive to climate variations. Just ask anyone with arthritis, or who’s had knee replacement surgery, or any number of ailments if they can tell when the weather’s about to change. Or watch your dog! I guarantee he’ll act as goofy as a newborn pup, no matter his age. 

It seems our bodies are far more accurate gauges than the million-dollar tools used by the local news station. If there were only a way I could cash in on my aches and pains, I’d be a regular cash cow. Or at least a coin cow. 

But the physical weather isn’t the only type of climate we’re sensitive to. Have you ever noticed how the mood in the room can change when a new person enters it? If that person is grumpy or mean-spirited, it’s like a dark cloud has fallen. If the person is kind and joyful and loving, it’s almost as if the sun has broken through, and those around can feel the warmth. Why is that? 

I guess I’m not an actual weatherperson because, though I can identify coming changes, I can’t explain them. I don’t understand the physical variations that cause the temperature to fluctuate, and I can’t comprehend the emotional discrepancies that tell me instinctively whether to give someone a hug or to run and hide. I can’t control others’ actions or motives or moods any more than I can control the weather. 

But I can govern my own mental climate. I can choose whether to be sunny or cloudy, hot or cold. I decide if I’m stable or turbulent. I have the power to dictate the climate I bring to the people around me. And though I can’t regulate anyone else’s mood, I can certainly influence my environment in a positive way. 

If given the choice to be a tornado or a soft summer rain, I choose the rain. Given the chance to be a winter ice storm or a warm spring breeze, I prefer the breeze. If my actions and attitudes can alleviate another’s aches and pains, if I can provide some relief, even for a moment, to someone’s hardships and heartaches, I’m in. We may not have a say in the overall weather, but if we all work together to bring gentleness, kindness and love to every situation, we can bring about the very best kind of climate change. 

“By this, all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another,” John 13:35.