Thursday I leave for four days to a conference in New York City. I am excited and a bit apprehensive at the same time. I am looking foward to this conference because it is an MYP conference. MYP, or Middle Years Programme, is the middle school version of the IBO. In Istanbul we had the IBO for the 11 and 12 grade students, but we put together our own curriculum for the 9 and 10 kiddos. Our curriculum was designed to prepare each students for a rigorous IBO diploma and that would send them on their way to international universities. The MYP program is similar, but it begins in grade 7 and goes through grade 10.
So...I am looking foward to seeing exactly what MYP teaches and how close we were in developing the 9-10 curriculum at ENKA. Secondly, I am excited about simply being in New York. I have plans to see whatever museums are open after our conference hours and I am determined to see the Statue of Liberty. There are few people who get this opportunity and I am planning to do as much as I can...and still get my rest.
The one thing I am a bit apprehensive about is there are four other teachers going. I like all four of them, but I'm not sure our ideas of spending time in New York will be the same. I'm praying for a good cultural, educational, and uplifting time while I am there. I do not want to get hit with unexpected circumstances so I am already praying for wisdom and insight.
The only other thing I long for is to experience this city with Brian.However,I am thankful for this opportunity that the school has provided for me. NEW YORK...HERE I COME!!!!!!!!!!!
Tuesday, February 19, 2008
Friday, February 15, 2008
Confessions of Weak Faith
Remember the other day? Remember the Shepherd's advice to Much-Afraid that I shared with you on Tuesday? In case you don't remember...and are too lazy to scroll down, it was the Shepherd who gave Much-Afraid the advice not to paint pictures of fear on her imagination? In typical Jodi-fashion as soon as I wrote that post I was confronted with a choice. Would I give in to fear and frustration, or trust in His unfailing love? I admit it...I gave in.
Tuesday and Wednesday Brian and I were trying to make decisions about plane tickets and transportation for our group to China. We have made contact with a person in Henan Province and we are excited about the chance to work alongside him and encourage him in his work. However, for those of you who know me and are also familiar with international time frames...often the two do not mix without the Lord having to teach me a lesson. I was extremely stressed about making the decision to book flights without confirmation and approval from our contact (who we hadn't heard much from in the past two weeks--well really we had only a quick email from him that said he'd be interested in working with us...but that was it). I began painting pictures of fear. Imaginations of being stranded in Shanghai for all three weeks without knowing anyone there...visions of not getting our train tickets to Henan...ideas of frustration and anger because things weren't working as we had planned. All of these ideas were going through my mind...being painted on my imagination and creating fear.
Wednesday was the biggest rollercoaster ride yet...and for one who generally likes rollercoasters, this one was not an exhilarating ride. Up and down...up...up...waaaaaaaaay down...and so on throughout the day. I would get excited while reading about the culture and then I'd remember all of the decisions we'd have to make. Anxiety and anticipation were fighting in my spirit all day long. I allowed it to consume me.
Thursday I simply tried to forget about it. The problem with that was our travel agent found better deals and kept emailing us options. The best option was we'd fly into Shanghai and then take a train to Henan. Problem with that is...everything we read told us that we'd have to have a contact inside China to get the train tickets unless we had five days to wait. We didn't have five days. We barely had a contact...in fact we weren't 100% sure. So last night as Brian and I chatted about whether to buy the plane tickets or not, we decided to step out on faith. Yikes! Buy the tickets and if anything needed changed we'd do it in China. DOUBLE YIKES!
This morning I was reading in Psalms: "I will trust in your unfailing love." Indeed, I had to trust that God would take care of the details. TRUST. This morning there was an email from our contact in China...he said the flights we'd arranged for were great and he'd take care of the in-country travel. Yikes! turned to a slight smile as I shook my head, confessed my lack of trust and faith, and said a prayer of thanks.
Tuesday and Wednesday Brian and I were trying to make decisions about plane tickets and transportation for our group to China. We have made contact with a person in Henan Province and we are excited about the chance to work alongside him and encourage him in his work. However, for those of you who know me and are also familiar with international time frames...often the two do not mix without the Lord having to teach me a lesson. I was extremely stressed about making the decision to book flights without confirmation and approval from our contact (who we hadn't heard much from in the past two weeks--well really we had only a quick email from him that said he'd be interested in working with us...but that was it). I began painting pictures of fear. Imaginations of being stranded in Shanghai for all three weeks without knowing anyone there...visions of not getting our train tickets to Henan...ideas of frustration and anger because things weren't working as we had planned. All of these ideas were going through my mind...being painted on my imagination and creating fear.
Wednesday was the biggest rollercoaster ride yet...and for one who generally likes rollercoasters, this one was not an exhilarating ride. Up and down...up...up...waaaaaaaaay down...and so on throughout the day. I would get excited while reading about the culture and then I'd remember all of the decisions we'd have to make. Anxiety and anticipation were fighting in my spirit all day long. I allowed it to consume me.
Thursday I simply tried to forget about it. The problem with that was our travel agent found better deals and kept emailing us options. The best option was we'd fly into Shanghai and then take a train to Henan. Problem with that is...everything we read told us that we'd have to have a contact inside China to get the train tickets unless we had five days to wait. We didn't have five days. We barely had a contact...in fact we weren't 100% sure. So last night as Brian and I chatted about whether to buy the plane tickets or not, we decided to step out on faith. Yikes! Buy the tickets and if anything needed changed we'd do it in China. DOUBLE YIKES!
This morning I was reading in Psalms: "I will trust in your unfailing love." Indeed, I had to trust that God would take care of the details. TRUST. This morning there was an email from our contact in China...he said the flights we'd arranged for were great and he'd take care of the in-country travel. Yikes! turned to a slight smile as I shook my head, confessed my lack of trust and faith, and said a prayer of thanks.
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
The Rest of the Story--and More
Well...we didn't win. But I wish you could have seen them play. They played very well and they tried to do exactly what the coaches asked of them. I am glad the season has finally come to an end. I will have more time with my husband and family, but there is a bitter-sweet feeling that creeps in when I think of the ending to this season. We may have been 3-11 but these girls were a tremendous group to coach. They taught me more of myself than I thought possible.
Our China trip is still in the works. We now have 8 students committed to going with us the first of June. We are waiting to hear back from a contact in Henan where we hope to be able to pour out our service for Christ. As I read more and more of the Chinese culture and learn more and more about cross-cultural experiences I can hardly contain my excitement to everyone I meet. Although, I do contain it. The one thing that seems to be a pardox is how excitement and anticipation can occupy the same heart as intense fear and uncertainty. When I try to analyze and work through this contradiction of emotion satiating my heart, I am reminded once again of Hind's Feet in High Places by Hannah Hurnard. In this allegory, Much-Afraid is facing a path of uncertainty on her way to the High Place. The Shepherd visits her and gives her this warning: "Much-Afraid, don't ever allow yourself to begin trying to picture what it will be like. Believe me, when you get to the places you dread you will find that they are as different as possible from what you have imagined...if you ever let Craven-Fear begin painting a picture on the screen of your imagination you will walk with fear and trembling and agony where no fear is" (145). The fear that I sometimes have is self-made, self-painted. The real question is do I trust the Most High God to go before me and lead the way? Fear, trembling, and agony are three characteristics that I do not even desire to reflect in my character. So...I will attempt to only look to the One who has called us and remember that it is He who sovereignly sets our paths before us and He will not call us to more than we can handle.
Our China trip is still in the works. We now have 8 students committed to going with us the first of June. We are waiting to hear back from a contact in Henan where we hope to be able to pour out our service for Christ. As I read more and more of the Chinese culture and learn more and more about cross-cultural experiences I can hardly contain my excitement to everyone I meet. Although, I do contain it. The one thing that seems to be a pardox is how excitement and anticipation can occupy the same heart as intense fear and uncertainty. When I try to analyze and work through this contradiction of emotion satiating my heart, I am reminded once again of Hind's Feet in High Places by Hannah Hurnard. In this allegory, Much-Afraid is facing a path of uncertainty on her way to the High Place. The Shepherd visits her and gives her this warning: "Much-Afraid, don't ever allow yourself to begin trying to picture what it will be like. Believe me, when you get to the places you dread you will find that they are as different as possible from what you have imagined...if you ever let Craven-Fear begin painting a picture on the screen of your imagination you will walk with fear and trembling and agony where no fear is" (145). The fear that I sometimes have is self-made, self-painted. The real question is do I trust the Most High God to go before me and lead the way? Fear, trembling, and agony are three characteristics that I do not even desire to reflect in my character. So...I will attempt to only look to the One who has called us and remember that it is He who sovereignly sets our paths before us and He will not call us to more than we can handle.
Monday, February 4, 2008
Basketball
On a less serious note. I have been coaching 8th grade basketball this year. What a ride. What a complete frustrating roller coaster of a season. Great girls. Not-so-great aggression and understanding of the word compete. I guess not everyone can grow up with four brothers where competition and aggression were just part of daily life. Some call it survival of the fittest. So...understanding meekness and fear of physical contact was difficult for me...and hard on my patience. It seemed that early in the season the girls could compete for one quarter. We'd play great...with passion and desire. Then we'd fall flat on our faces and play like scared, confused, and frustrated little girls. About midway through the season we had grown to putting together two, sometimes three, great quarters. We won a few games. We could have won more...as every coach believes. Somehow eveyone kept telling me not to worry about it. These girls just weren't talented. They just didn't have the "court smarts" to pull through and win. True. They didn't...and many of them didn't know what we meant when we said, "you've got to see the court. Look at what's open before you pass, and then pass quickly." But I couldn't help but think about the few great quarters they'd put together each game.
Saturday was our conference tournament. If you can believe it, we went into the tournament seeded third of five teams. There is one team that was 11-0 and all other teams had similar records as we did...2-10. I just knew that Saturday we'd play another great part of a game and go home for the season. My girls proved me wrong! For the first time all season, this team put together a FULL game. OH MY WORD! I've never seen them play so well...and so confidently. They had fun, they played hard, they played aggressively, and they played to win. Even when things started to get a little rocky, they pulled through and got right back on track. I've never been so incredibly proud of a group of girls in my life. Never.
So...when I thought the season was over, my girls smiled and said, "not yet, coach." Tomorrow night we play in the championship game. Smile and laugh because I'm sure it's not the first time a Cindarella team has made it to the big dance! BUT...regardless of how they do tomorrow, I'm still so incredibly proud of them. They played their hearts out for an entire game and that's what I've asked of them all season long! Wooooooooohoooooooooooooo! :)
Saturday was our conference tournament. If you can believe it, we went into the tournament seeded third of five teams. There is one team that was 11-0 and all other teams had similar records as we did...2-10. I just knew that Saturday we'd play another great part of a game and go home for the season. My girls proved me wrong! For the first time all season, this team put together a FULL game. OH MY WORD! I've never seen them play so well...and so confidently. They had fun, they played hard, they played aggressively, and they played to win. Even when things started to get a little rocky, they pulled through and got right back on track. I've never been so incredibly proud of a group of girls in my life. Never.
So...when I thought the season was over, my girls smiled and said, "not yet, coach." Tomorrow night we play in the championship game. Smile and laugh because I'm sure it's not the first time a Cindarella team has made it to the big dance! BUT...regardless of how they do tomorrow, I'm still so incredibly proud of them. They played their hearts out for an entire game and that's what I've asked of them all season long! Wooooooooohoooooooooooooo! :)
Much-Afraid
One of my favorite allegories of our walk with Christ is Hinds' Feet on HIgh Places by Hannah Hurnard. The main character is Much-Afraid. She was called out of her ordinary life in the valley and met by the Shepherd. In the novel, the Shepherd tells Much-Afraid, "to love does mean to put yourself into the power of the loved one and to become very vulnerable to pain, and you are very Much-Afraid of pain, are you not?...But it is so happy to love, it is so happy to love even if you are not loved in return. There is pain too, certainly, but Love does not think that very significant" (25). Even though Much-Afraid was fearful of the journey she was about to take, she presses on with the Shepherd's encouragement.
Later in the novel, a few pages into Much-Afraid's journey, the Shepherd returns to her and says, "I must tell you a great truth, Much-Afraid, which only the few understand. All the fairest beautites in the human soul, its greatest victories, and its most splendid achievements are always those which no one else knows anything about, or can only dimly guess at. Every inner response of the human heart to Love and every conquest over self-love is a new flower on the tree of Love. Many a quiet, ordinary, and hidden life, unknown to the world, is a veritable garden in which Love's flowers and fruits have come to such perfection that it is a place of delight where the King of Love himself walks and rejoices with His friends" (57).
I often think of this quote from the novel. What a pure picture to aspire to...where the King of Love will walk in the veritable garden of our lives and rejoice with us!
Later in the novel, a few pages into Much-Afraid's journey, the Shepherd returns to her and says, "I must tell you a great truth, Much-Afraid, which only the few understand. All the fairest beautites in the human soul, its greatest victories, and its most splendid achievements are always those which no one else knows anything about, or can only dimly guess at. Every inner response of the human heart to Love and every conquest over self-love is a new flower on the tree of Love. Many a quiet, ordinary, and hidden life, unknown to the world, is a veritable garden in which Love's flowers and fruits have come to such perfection that it is a place of delight where the King of Love himself walks and rejoices with His friends" (57).
I often think of this quote from the novel. What a pure picture to aspire to...where the King of Love will walk in the veritable garden of our lives and rejoice with us!
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