I ALWAYS GOT GOOD GRADES—until my ninth-grade geometry class. When I started high school a year ago, I was accepted into a unique program called the Academy of Science and Technology. This means I get to attend a special school where I take advanced courses in science and math. But freshman geometry just didn't sit well with me. And to make matters worse, the teacher expected a lot from us, but she didn't really teach. So my friends in the class would go home, figure out the homework on their own, and then do fine. But me? Well, I felt horrible, because as hard as I tried, I felt like I was the only one who still didn't get it.
When my grades started going downhill and I got my first-ever C, a 76, for my final, first-semester grade, I got scared. I thought I'd have to go to summer school—or worse, be kicked out of the Academy. But one day I had the idea that I should trust God. I've been going to Christian Science Sunday School since I was little, and I've learned how helpful prayer can be in a lot of situations. In this case, I felt like I had nothing left to trust except prayer.
I talked with my mom about the class, and we both determined that God would never give me anything I couldn't handle. I decided to focus on the fact that my intelligence comes from God, and He is the ultimate source for understanding. I really had to give up the idea that the answers, the ability to do anything, originated with me. Mary Baker Eddy wrote in Science and Health, "Mind is not necessarily dependent upon educational processes." And later in the same paragraph is the helpful idea "We are all capable of more than we do." Science and Health, p. 89. To me this meant that no matter how tough this class was and how fearful I was of failing, God was right there, and He would show me the way.
