Book Reviewed: Christina Bieber Lake (2020), The Flourishing Teacher: Vocational Renewal for a Sacred Profession (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press)
Journal of Christian Teaching Practice, Volume 11, 2024 (January – December)
Reviewed By: Donna M. Elkins
Reviewer Affiliation: Campbellsville University
Total Pages: 224
ISBN-13: 978-0-8308-5284-0
No one in higher education needs to be cautioned that we are in a difficult time for our profession right now, one that can easily lead to burnout. What we need is resources to help us navigate this challenge. In The Flourishing Teacher, author Christina Bieber Lake has provided one such resource: a book for seasoned teachers, those who have faced the cycle of the academic year multiple times and know the points of challenge and frustration. The book is hopeful about renewing passion during the academic year yet realistic enough to meet us where we are, beginning with the acknowledgement that teaching is a “magnificent” yet “incredibly difficult” job (p. 2). Because of both the magnificence and difficulty, Lake’s goal for this work is to inspire teachers to remember that “a life spent teaching others is a truly fulfilling life” (p. 4).
Lake’s approach is to focus on the benefits of mindfully engaging and even enjoying the repetitive nature of the academic structure as one moves through the parallel calendar and liturgical seasons. Early in the book she quotes Friedrich Nietzsche’s famous words that the essential thing in life is to cultivate a “long obedience in the same direction” (p. 4). In that regard, this book reminded me of the recently published Generation Awakened: An Eyewitness Account of the Powerful Outpouring of God at Asbury by Sarah Thomas Baldwin[1], which argues that there are blessings that come only after long years of prayer and sacrifice and labor in the “same direction.” With a similar focus on commitment and perseverance, Lake’s book is designed to walk with university faculty through the academic year and encourage them to see the blessings amid the challenges and hardships at each point.
While it’s obvious that college and university faculty live their lives in academic seasons, Lake points out in the introduction that they also live their lives in environmental seasons and, for Christian faculty, even in liturgical seasons. Therefore, this book is organized into months, beginning with the typical start of the fall academic year in August. The reader can choose to read it straight through from start to finish, read based on the month they are currently in, or read the book based on a list of topics with corresponding chapters. When I began reading the book over the summer break, I chose to start with the chapter of the month we were stepping into—July. Therefore, I began the book at the end.
The chapter for July focuses on the topic of gratitude for the simple things that we too often ignore. Lake interweaves some powerful stories from outside of the academic world about being grateful for things while we have them, and even once we’ve lost them. She provides some practical examples of how she carries this into the classroom, such as choosing a psalm to read with her class in a lectio divina (“divine reading”) style at the beginning of class at least once a week throughout the semester (p. 209). The practice of lectio divina is simple: reading over the text slowly, waiting in silence, and then reading it slowly again. This practice deliberately leads students into the mindset for learning and also introduces them to reflection in silence, contrasting the constantly connected electronic world of today. As a practice that centers the mind in silence on the present moment, this amplifies how ordinary time is “shot through with the grace of God” (p. 209) and models how to deal with anxious and isolating thoughts through gratitude, faithfulness, and love in daily practice (p. 210). At the end of July, as she does in all the chapters, Lake offers resources for additional encouragement including apps, books, poems, or other sources related to the chapter topic.
Next, instead of moving forward to August, I decided to read the preceding chapter, June, which was the month I was experiencing at the time. Like most faculty, I have a long list of writing projects to tackle each summer. Lake acknowledges that summer academic culture typically views the break from the regular semesters as writing time, extra teaching time, and/or a hiatus from scholarly conversations. Her reaction to the shift imposed by the school year break is to first acknowledge the common feelings these months of extra work and separation can bring to academics and second, to offer some practical advice and resources for dealing with these expectations. In June, her advice is not only about protecting your time for a true break, but also about fighting discouragement generated by negative feedback on your work or caring too much about rising to the top of your discipline. In this chapter and throughout the book, Lake provides encouragement and advice (e.g., creating your own writing group for fun) as well as more theological connections, such as releasing the results of both teaching and writing into the hands of God.
In the chapter for each month, Lake focuses on the emotions and struggles of teaching, as well as the rewards. What seems most helpful is her honesty about the emotions we may feel even if we love our work. Her writing style feels as if you were chatting with a trusted colleague over a cup of coffee or tea about how to renew teaching and passion for students after experiencing the seasons of the academic year over and over again. For example, in the month of August, Lake acknowledges that even if you love teaching, returning from the summer is “one big, long Sunday night” (p. 6). She cautions us not to spend all summer preparing for classes (because preparation will always expand to fit the time you give it) but to rely on our experience. Her practical advice for August centers around ideas for the first day of class and ways she engages students so they are doing more of the work than she is. She also describes how she books a local hotel for an overnight retreat to pray for students and classes before the beginning of each semester, taking only her student roster and her fervent hopes for students as persons, beyond just their academic success.
In sharing practical classroom activities, philosophical orientations to the classroom, and theological connections to our relationship with God through our vocation, Lake makes it clear that she is not encouraging readers to copy her exact methods (p. 20), but instead striving to inspire them to teach using their own personal gifts that can meet the needs of their students as whole beings created in the image of God. For example, her message in September is to let the students bring the energy to the classroom, as their college years will be a four-year new experience for them while it may be a 30-year-old experience for the teacher. This chapter also goes into some detail about how to find what brings you energy and how to set habits that will increase that energy flow.
From dealing with how to say “no” to all those committee requests (October), to the yearly onslaught of grading during the season of Advent (December), to dealing with the “deadwood soul” (February), and on to celebrating the Christian seasons of life in the spring (leading to Easter), Lake admits some of the hardest thoughts and emotions faculty go through but likely do not openly share. She drives home the point that every person’s situation is different and “there are no easy answers to be found anywhere” when it comes to balancing work with home life and handling disappointments (p. 90). Lake faces the hardships of life head-on and encourages other teachers to do the same. A theme that recurs throughout the book is asking the question: “Is what I am doing right now the best thing for me to be doing?” (p. 91). This mindfulness of what we are doing, how we are doing it, and the impact it is having on ourselves as well as others around us is her key to recovering passion for the sacred profession of teaching.
Because this book was written and published before the COVID 19 pandemic, there is no specific month dedicated to meeting the pandemic’s challenges, nor any guidelines for addressing the various increased pressures lingering in higher education even now. Thus, I would love to sit and talk with Lake about how she managed through those difficult times herself, what new habits or classroom activities they inspired, and how the continued effects are playing out in her own life and classrooms now.
In conclusion, Lake has managed to provide a work that encourages and brings renewed hope even to college professors who are on the edges of burnout without sugar-coating or ignoring the hard parts of their profession. She does this by framing our work in terms of love, joy, commitment, and fulfillment. Indeed, The Flourishing Teacher begins with Romans 12:9 (“Love from the center of who you are; don’t fake it” [The Message]) and ends with Frederick Buechner’s famous quote about vocation: “the place God calls you to is the place where your deep gladness and the world’s deep hunger meet” (p. 216). Though the book is written to renew teaching passion for those who have been in the field for some time, it also can be valuable to new faculty who are facing some of the academic year rhythms for the first time. In short, The Flourishing Teacher is a helpful book to pick up when you are looking for some fresh practical ideas, a theological reminder of the importance of what you do, and a friend who will tell you in realistic terms how to face where you are in the academic season.
Notes
[1] Baldwin, S.T. (2024). Generation Awakened: An Eyewitness Account of the Powerful Outpouring of God at Asbury. Invite Press.