From Stage to Stewardship
When you put the mic down and step off stage, what’s your first go-to? Do you dissect the message you just delivered? Perhaps you seek feedback from your audience. Or do you take a moment to give God the glory, asking for His thoughts about your teaching.
I don’t know about you, but life gets busy, and it’s too easy to move on to the next meeting, teaching session, task, or email without pausing to reflect on the session you just taught. January 2024 was a pivotal turning point for me however. Why? The Lord challenged me. “Nicola, start stewarding the things you are learning”. The word “steward” caught me off guard. I knew God was calling me to better serve my learners by becoming a more diligent learner myself and storing up the insights He revealed to me each time I taught. It was a mic drop moment.
Do you know what the word “to teach” means in the original Hebrew language? Yip, you guessed it. To learn. What does this mean for us? The most effective teachers are those who never stop learning and now that we know this, we have a responsibility to our learners, to walk it out.
I can no longer teach last year's course in the exact same way to this year's intake of university students, nor can I copy and paste past conference content onto a new audience. Every time I’ve relied on old notes without prepping, editing, expanding, or cutting unnecessary content, the session has fallen flat. Why? The content simply wasn’t “alive” to me anymore, so it wasn’t to my learners. “You can’t give them yesterday’s bread, Nicola,” God said to me once, and He was right.
Uncovering new insights as a learner is like striking gold after a long search. Once you find it, you can't wait to share it. You’ve just dug up the treasure, so you’re familiar with the learning journey you need to facilitate for others to access the same treasure. There's an exciting energy because it's fresh for both you and them. When teaching becomes an interactive exchange between teacher and learner, that's when learner transformation really happens. My encouragement to you, dear friend, is the same challenge I received: “Start stewarding the things you are learning.”
So, what does it mean to “steward what we learn” while teaching? Here’s a few practical suggestions:
1. Write down the questions you are asked from learners during your teaching:
It’s human to feel challenged when our teaching is questioned, but if we’ve postured ourselves as learners, we’ll see that audience questions serve us very well! They represent:
Knowledge gaps they might have, which is helpful for us to know!
Areas in our content that need greater clarity
An inward wrestle and desire in our learners to understand as they make personal connections
2. Take note of the new revelations you discover when you teach:
The most effective way to learn is to teach so don’t be surprised if new idea’s surface while you’re up there speaking! Steward them well by writing them down. I use Asana to capture new learnings.
3. Record your sessions if you can:
I tend to tap the voice recorder on my phone (with my audience's permission!) so I can listen back and take notes. Maybe:
A learner’s comment is a new revelation for them and you!
A new example, story or analogy can be used again to explain a point better in a future teaching.
You discover strengths and areas for development as you reflect on the way you taught, which stops you from repeating the same “mistakes” in a future teaching
I'll leave you with this final thought:
Some of the most impactful feedback I've received from students is about teachers who admitted, “That's a great question Bobby. I don't have the answer right now, but I'll find it”' You don't need to have all the answers to teach—being a step or two ahead in many cases is all you need to get started. Let’s get into the business of stewarding!
