“Experience is the best teacher.” This phrase is accredited to the great Julius Caesar. While I am eternally grateful to all of the many women and men who have served as teachers in my own life and in the lives of my family and friends, I must say that this statement rings true to me. Education, both formal and informal, provided me with a great deal of information and perspective to help me successfully navigate opportunities and adversities when they have come, but it was experience that most fully-formed my understanding and allowed for practical application. Experience provides the ultimate assessment of what one does or does not know and facilitates further growth and development in most, if not all, areas of life.
Experience provides the ultimate assessment of what one does or does not know and facilitates further growth and development in most, if not all, areas of life.
The number of ways I have lived this truth are legion, but the most clear and constant has been in my development as a communicator. My first experiences in public speaking came when I was twenty years old. I had just completed my sophomore year of college, where I was studying to become a youth pastor. That summer, my uncle, who was already a youth pastor, invited me to come and be the guest speaker at a beach retreat at Myrtle Beach. He needed a cheap speaker and I wanted a free trip to the beach, so I agreed.
I was given a theme and tasked with preparing three talks to deliver over the course of the retreat. At that point in my academic career, I had taken several courses on public speaking and how to understand and communicate with teenagers. I had listened to thousands of talks, messages, lectures, and lessons from skilled communicators and mentors. I understood how to prepare and deliver a message and, still, I felt like I had no idea what I was doing. My performance ultimately validated my feelings.
I spent weeks preparing my messages. I asked several teachers and mentors to look over my notes. My poor girlfriend (my now wife) was forced to serve as my test subject, listening to each multiple times leading up to the event. When I finally stood in front of my audience, I preached my heart out. I was given 30 minutes per talk. I only used about 30 minutes for all three talks combined. I had done the best I could do; It was not good.
That opportunity provided vital experience, much of it uncomfortable, that allowed me to learn and grow in necessary ways. Every good message I have ever delivered grew from those essential experience and the many more that followed. Sometimes, I learned through amazing successes. But equally often, I have learned and developed through experiences in which I fell short. Without question, though, I would not be the pastor, preacher, or person I am today were it not for people, like my uncle, who were willing to give me essential experiences and to walk with me through them so that I could learn and grow into what God wanted me to be.
Jesus, the ultimate teacher, provided experiences that pushed the disciples to apply their understanding with full confidence that what they were was not what they would be after their experience.
I often wonder how long the disciples followed and observed Jesus before He sent them out in pairs to do what they’d seen Him do. In Matthew, Mark, and Luke, the account of Jesus empowering and sending out the twelve to do His work is recorded in the first third or so of each. In Matthew’s gospel, Matthew himself is invited to follow Jesus in chapter 9 and sent out to do the work in chapter 10. Whatever the case may be, we can be sure the disciples felt under-qualified and unprepared for the task that lay before them. And still, Jesus sent them, entrusting them with the most important mission and message the world has ever known. Jesus, the ultimate teacher, provided experiences that pushed the disciples to apply their understanding with full confidence that what they were was not what they would be after their experience.
Education is incredibly valuable, but experience is the best teacher. None of us advances or improves in life without practical, real-world experience. And, none of us gets the necessary experience without gracious people who are willing to look beyond what we are to what we could be. May we be people who open the doors to provide others with opportunities to try, to learn, and to grow by pushing the boundaries of their abilities. None of us are what we could be, and none of us will become what we can be without those who will show a little faith and provide us with opportunities to gain experience and grow into all God has created us to be.
