We began by reading a story about a rainbow garden, which elicited many ooh's and ah's as I turned the colorful pages.
Next we watched a short movie on what plants need to grow. Unfortunately, though I had previewed the entire video the week before, I clicked on the "with titles" version not knowing it would be different. The content was the same, but between every "section" a monotone female voice would herald what was coming next... "A boy is drinking water", came the bored narration. This was unsettling to me at first because her interjections didn't blend with the original narrator lady in the least. I had just finally convinced myself not to be bothered, rationalizing that the children wouldn't pick up on it, only to be affronted by Miss Monotone announcing "a white question mark wiggles on the screen" during the Question-the-Class segment of the video, which was just downright dumb sounding. I paused the video (to question the class) and glanced sheepishly at my host teacher before continuing. Oh well.
To conclude the lesson plan each child received their very own plastic baggie with their very own name on it to put their very own seed inside. The idea was to "plant" the seeds (beans in this case) in the safety of a dampened paper towel, and set the bags under the skylight to grow. The lady at Lowe's had told me these beans would grow the fastest out of all the garden section had to offer, so for $3.12 I provided my children with their choice of two different colored beans.
The day concluded without a hitch and I was feeling really good about myself until I got home and read the back of one of the bean packages: "germination 6-8 days"
Well crap.
The thought of my 5-year-olds returning to school the next day, and rushing to their baggies only to discover that nothing had happened was unbearably embarrassing. So I prayed. I thought it was ridiculous at first (so did my parents) but then I reminded myself how Jesus told us to have the faith of a child. That night before bed I picked up my phone and opened my Bible app. The verse of the day was in John 14, so I read the entire chapter for good measure. This is what God gave me:
"Very truly I tell you, whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father. And I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. You may ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it." - John 14:12-15
I don't think I've ever prayed so fervently in my life (except for the time I asked God every night to turn me into a pony, and that other time I prayed every second for my mom to get well enough to come home from the hospital). I must've prayed every hour for those darn beans to change overnight. Anything, God, anything!
I arrived at school the next day, and - just as I was sure my Kindergarteners would - I rushed to the skylight.
There were no sprouts, but a yellow ring had formed on the paper towels around every single bean. Odd. I'm still not sure what it means other than that it gave my kids something to document and rave about in their science notebooks. Either way it was enough for me.
So here I am, giving God the glory through what I prayed for in the name of his Son! God answers our prayers, even if it isn't always in the ways we had hoped for or expected.
