Before she came to Judah Christian School, Mrs. Behrends was across the world in Africa, in the Kingdom of Swaziland, teaching math and doing mission work. When she returned to the United States, she wanted to continue ministering math and Jesus to students.
So when, in 1993, Mrs. Behrends heard about ACSI schools, she took interest. She contacted some of her friends around the country and landed in Champaign at a small Christian school: Judah. She immediately noticed how family involvement set Judah apart from an ordinary school community. As she puts it, “It’s what makes Judah special.”
Mrs. Behrends has seen Judah grow over the years. “I came before the secondary building was constructed,” she said. “The parking lot wasn’t paved; it was gravel. The school was the old public school building that Judah had bought. We had about 50 students. We didn’t have a principal. We had chapel and PE classes in the area that became the math and English classrooms. The big plan was to build, and the ins and outs of how to do that was a process we needed to learn. When we decided to expand the site, we had to buy and tear down some houses on Sherwood Terrace. We built in stages and kept adding on.”
But while Judah has physically changed over the years, Mrs. Behrends says that the school has stayed true to its core values. She emphasized the importance of how Judah has managed to stick to its biblical roots despite years of difficult building and growing. “It’s still a ministry,” she said. “It’s not just two plus two equals four.”
Mrs. Behrends recalls particularly spiritually active times in the early 2000s, saying, “Students wanted to come early to worship on chapel days. There were daily devotionals. It was all optional, and it spread.” She remembers how chapel services at Judah would sometimes go until lunch, purely out of a devotion to God that the students and the staff shared with each other. Mrs. Behrends said it even went beyond the halls at Judah. “It spread into holiday breaks,” she said, “and outside of school with students on their own time. They would go to other schools.”
Having experienced the spiritual highs that Judah can reach, Mrs. Behrends is encouraged for the future. She believes that such highs could happen again and that Judah’s best days are still to come. “Push the faith forward,” Mrs. Behrends said. “Ask what fresh work the Holy Spirit is going to do next.” Mrs. Behrends says that she is encouraged by students’ passion for Jesus: “Students’ involvement with the Lord encourages me to keep walking with the Lord.”
Mrs. Behrends embraces the challenges that each day brings. She loves finding new solutions. It’s partly why she has stayed at Judah for so long. Quoting one of her own teachers, Mrs. Behrends said, “‘You never know what’s going to happen. You plan for each day, but each day is different.’ The uniqueness of people makes it challenging and sometimes frustrating and discouraging but also makes it interesting. I’m a lifelong learner. There’s always something new. The math will fade away. I have to build relationships with numbers and people.”
Indeed, Mrs. Behrends is at Judah to help students tackle not only the challenges of math, but also the challenges of faith. That is what Judah is all about. Every class is biblically integrated.
Mrs. Behrends describes it as a team effort. She said, “Everyone has different gifts and abilities, and it all plays out. We all strive to bring a biblical worldview and to encourage students to walk with the Lord. We work together for that purpose. We are always learning how to be better at it.”
Subjects like math can be more difficult to apply a biblical worldview than perhaps some other subjects. Mrs. Behrends explains how she brings Christ into the classroom. She said, “It’s the bigger picture. Do you see God as the Creator? Do you see that He has the intelligence to design His creation using math?” Even math can prepare students for life ahead of them spiritually. In fact, Mrs. Behrends hasn’t only taught math. At the start of her career at Judah, she was a Bible teacher. She can combine the two subjects. She describes her approach as “a logical perspective on God.”
Mrs. Behrends has seen Judah grow from an old public school building with a gravel parking lot to what it is now. But she still focuses most on her love for teaching: “I love when students get it, when the light bulb comes on. They work through the struggle and seek to understand. It can be challenging, but it’s about how you persevere through the challenge.” Mrs. Behrends has been at Judah for three decades and has loved it every step of the way. Her impact on the Judah community and on students’ lives is part of the reason that Judah has reached its 40th year.
—Keaton Welch, class of ’25
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