I mentioned last week that only three weeks into my teaching career, I wanted desperately to quit. My husband talked me into hanging in there until Christmas, but my anxiety, coupled with sleep deprivation caused, no doubt, by that anxiety, led to an incident that I have called “the last straw.“

I was standing before my third hour class and someone said something funny that made me smile. When it was time to quit smiling, however, I couldn’t. The smile, becoming quite inappropriate, remained.

Even when I told it to go away, it didn’t. Though I’ve never heard of such a thing and haven’t experienced it since, it seems both my involuntary and voluntary muscles had shut down. I actually turned from the class and did what people have been commanding to do for years: I wiped that smile off my face!

Fortunately the bell rang, the kids called out, “See you tomorrow,“ and I walked down to the office and told the secretary to get a substitute for me the next day because I was going to be sick.

I actually went to the unemployment office that Friday. Whomever I talked to looked at me like I hadn’t slept in a week, and I left there and drove to the college where I had graduated with useless honors and spoke to some of my favorite professors. They said I wanted to teach like they do except they’d been doing it for years and years and not to come back if I quit. Or something like that.

You know, I don’t remember exactly what happened. I do know I continued to be encouraged by first one person and then another; I think of them as God’s ambassadors. And I do know, one day at a time, God himself helped me figure out what I could do to survive each class, and as the weeks passed, he helped me figure out how to convey the material.

And daily he gave me courage. I found his mercies were new every morning, just as Jeremiah said.

By Christmas, as Tony had counted on, I had enough success and courage to stay. For three years I taught at that high school, and then with this particular crisis behind me by two and a half years, I accepted a position at Ozark Christian College, where I had the pleasure and privilege of teaching a variety of English courses for twenty-eight years.

Goodness, there are so many things that could have made me give it up-the most recent took place before a new freshmen class and most of my peers the night I flew from bleachers on the chapel stage to the chapel floor, landing at the feet of a former student.

But there have been a string of catastrophes: singing with soloists, having articles returned with a version of thanks but no thanks, handling students badly though I’ve had the best of intentions, or a real favorite through the years, allowing some sin to so easily entangle me.

But in each situation he has come to me.

“Lord,“ I’ve said, “I’m an idiot!“

“Lo, I am with you always, Jackina.“

Of hundreds of themes, this is my favorite. I have a cluster of verses to remind me of God’s faithfulness. These verses are the sheep I count when I cannot sleep: “I will fear no evil, for thou art with me”; “I will never leave you or forsake you”; “Lo, I am with you always”; “It is I, don’t be afraid.“

Okay then.

Wordsworth spoke of a “timely utterance” giving him relief from pain or sadness or regret. I understand that, but as much as I love words, it is something else that gives me relief: He, the faithful one, restores my soul. And I can speak again, write again, teach again, love again, risk again.

The truth is, most of us have challenges to tackle, limitations to overcome or to work around, and failure to face and to forgive and to forget. But just as the disciples were not alone on the hillside to feed the thousands with a few loaves and two fish, we are not alone. He who is able is with us, breaking and blessing whatever we are, whatever we have to bring.

You should not doubt that it will be enough.