Living Biblically with Dianna Bolling

“I want my students to know I trust God at His Word with every fiber of my being. It’s quite simple. If God said it, I believe it. There is no duplicity with the God of the Bible. His word is written simply so that all can understand, yet infinitely deep, keeping His believers busy for a lifetime of study.”

Dianna Bolling
 

We asked Dianna Bolling, Bible teacher for first and fourth graders, to share with us her passion for teaching the Word of God. When you talk to Mrs. Bolling, you come away with a sense of pure joy. It emanates from all she says and does; her teaching radiates the love of God as she inspires her students to live biblically.

A native Houstonian and lover of Tex-Mex, Dianna Bolling’s family is her home base. When she speaks of her four children and her husband of 25 years, she chronicles joyful experiences of singing and dancing through life with creative family songs, contests and lots of laughter. She describes her children as “hysterically funny, dramatic and loud,” each bringing their own unique dynamic to the family; Joseph ‘18, Claire ‘20, Caroline ‘21 and Emily ‘23. The Bolling family motto is, “All the way, the right way, with a happy heart.” This is how her children learned obedience and what she cultivates in her classroom as well. 

What Mrs. Bolling loves most about lower school students is that they learn and have so much fun together. She says she loves them dearly and treats them like they belong to her. “Don’t tell anybody, but I get paid to teach, study and soak in God’s Word! Could there be a better job?” she gushes. The fourth graders keep her on her toes, and they “get to discuss big ideas and answer big questions about God and the doctrine of Christian faith.” Her first graders greet her with hugs and make her feel “like a rockstar.” She adores their sweet smiles and faithful hearts, saying, “They are small enough to trust God at His Word and are big enough to connect the dots between sin and a hard heart; they desire to follow God wholeheartedly.”

From a young age, students at SBS learn to live biblically from teachers like Mrs. Bolling who model it every day. She says, “Judge everything against the Word of God. If any thought, action, feeling or desire is in opposition to what has been written, it must go.” Life is busy, so Mrs. Bolling has taken a “grab and go” approach to carrying scripture with her and meditating on the Word of God. She suggests taking a verse with you “on the go,” and “chew on it all day long,” whether it’s in the carpool line, the cafeteria, walking around campus or getting in bed at the end of the day.

“Sometimes life is complicated. Solomon figured it out,” says Mrs. Bolling. “In the book of Ecclesiastes, he sums up life.”

The conclusion, when everything has been heard, is: fear God and keep His commandments, because this applies to every person. For God will bring every act to judgment, everything which is hidden, whether it is good or evil. Ecclesiastes 12:13-14.

Mrs. Bolling’s wise advice is, “Don’t complicate life. Fear God and keep His commandments, and the greatest of these commandments is to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. As Jesus says in John 6:29, ‘This is the work of God, that you believe in Him whom He has sent.’"