Vuthy asked us to test our classes once a week on the material we have been teaching them. The first test we gave them the whole class kept talking to each other during the class and they were cheating. I told them that cheating isn’t acceptable and it isn’t honest. The next test we had one of the girls was giving answers to a boy in the class through the window of the classroom! I was so frustrated. Why would they want to teach? How is cheating going to help them learn English? Why did they not listen to me? Why don’t they put more effort into learning English? My frustration was building and turning into anger as these thoughts rolled around in my head. None of my students seemed to understand the concept that cheating was wrong. I was also frustrated for selfish reasons too. Why am I putting so much effort into teaching them English if they aren’t even going to listen to me?
Then it hit me. Vuthy mentioned that the Cambodian government is extremely corrupt; one of the most corrupt governments in the world. My sociology educated brain then went to the thought “they only know what they are taught.” These kids have been taught by the people they know of who are powerful that cheating is okay.
Then another thought hit me. “I bet how I feel right now is how God feels when we disobey Him.” God knows what is best for us and sometimes we choose not to listen to Him. I’m sure when I make the wrong choices God has every right to say, “Why did you do that? I told you not to. That isn’t going to help you, it is only going to make things harder later.” But instead of getting frustrated God says, “You made a mistake and while I don’t like what you did, I still love you more than anything.”
That is how God wants us to treat each other. He wants us to call each other up into being who he has called us to be but when we mess up he also tells us that loves us. Jesus said this even after people had done the worst thing that could be committed against a person. In the middle of Jesus’ brutal execution he said, “Forgive them father for they know not what they do.” The people who murdered God’s son did something so much more atrocious than cheating. If Jesus can ask God to forgive them, there is no reason any of us should not forgive people when they do wrong to us or themselves. Forgiving doesn’t mean that what they did was okay. Cheating isn’t okay and murder is definitely not okay, but we forgive because loving people is so much more important than what has been done wrong to us. Jesus died so we could love freely because we have been forgiven of all we’ve done and we need to forgive others just as we have been forgiven.
