Bringing the Darkness to Light

Wooooooow. What a difference one week can make! I must say that this past week went way better than week 1.  So, thank you for all the prayers! I've been up here two weeks and have learned so much about myself already.  God is really using this experience to teach me so that's good.  I have talked to some friends about the following earlier this year but God's really bringing it to light.

I have a confession to make:  I fear failure. 

There have been a few circumstances within the past 7 months that has brought this to light.

1. When I accepted the job offer to work as a Day Camp Coordinator up at Camp Perkins I was ecstatic! But, then fear crept in and I was afraid that I would fail at not living up to the expectations of what a day camp coordinator entails. Plus, I had NEVER stepped foot at that camp before.  How was I supposed to lead others if I hadn't even been part of that camp before? However, in the end, it all worked out great.

2.  I almost didn't get a certification in lifeguarding.  I had to swim 500 meters in a lap pool in order to get it. Being a runner I immediately equated that length to longer than one lap around the track. It freaked me out. Then I figured since I'm a runner I probably have enough endurance.  I was probably at the 400 mark when I had a mental breakdown and didn't think I could do it anymore so I stopped. And cried.  Failed.  In my mind I was done. No more lifeguarding.  I still went on with the rest of the water day rescues learning those and at lunch break I was asked if I wanted to try again.  I was too afraid to because I didn't want to fail--AGAIN.  Thankfully one of the guys encouraged me that I could do it.  I tried it.  Only by God's strength did I get through those 500 meters!

3.  In Student Teaching I, I was afraid that I was going to do awful and fail.  Turns out it was one of the best experiences in my life and God really showed me that I do have a passion for teaching English Language Learners.

4.  Here I am.  Fearing that I will fail.  The first week I was thinking in my mind that my co-op didn't like me and that she would probably give me bad reviews resulting in failing student teaching II.

Now, why all this fear?  I had not understood this because I KNOW that perfect love casts out all FEAR. So, whyyyyy was I fearing?  Then I realized that my motivation for not failing has to do with wanting to look good.  I'm afraid that people will see that I too have the ability to fail--then what will everyone think of me?

The reality is that we all fail. Everyday. CONSTANTLY.  Is that not the reason Christ was sent?  The Bible says all have sinned and fall short of His Glory. I now see that this "fear" that I have is not just an insecurity....it's a sin.  Since my motivation is to look good in front of people is that not a branch off of pride?? Oh, I pray that God would teach me to be humble.  Humble enough not to care what people think.  Humble enough not to fear failure because at some point, in regards to trying something out in front of people, I will fail.  Such as the swimming story--boy, was I humbled that day for sure.

I heard a sermon once about how when we recognize our sin we should be praying as though there is cancer inside us.  When someone has cancer they ask the doctor to do anything they can to remove it.   In order for the doctor to get rid of the cancer they have to dig deep below the surface.  Our hearts should be in the state of repentance and crying out to the Doctor to cut out the "cancer" in our lives.  It's not easy and will probably hurt but it will result in being refined and sanctified through Jesus Christ.

There is a song that has been constantly playing on my ipod, stuck in my mind, and being sung from my heart through my mouth this past year on a regular basis.  It's called Only Love Remains by JJ Heller.  There have been several situations where these lyrics have been my prayer and I think it fits for this one as well:

Teach me to be humble. Call me from the grave. Show me how to walk with You upon the waves.  Breathe into my spirit, breathe into my veins, until only love remains.


Like week one, this past week has had some unexpected challanges but SHOWERS UPON SHOWERS of undeserved blessings!

Unexpected Challenges: 

• First grader vocab.  So, I guess first graders don't really know the words "assume" and "increasing" heh. I'm trying to learn how to get down on "frist grade level"  
• My Kinergarten ELL students didn't really know how to read.  But now, these first graders are pretty good a reading.  I'm having difficulty trying to discern what I should let them read (outside of language arts) and what things I should be reading to them. 

Undeserved Blessings:

• Where do I even start?!?! Umm It was only a four day week, so we got Friday off!!
• Brenda Sievert showed me a new beautiful running route! 

I get to run over this beautiful bridge!!

• Wendy and I went and saw the movie "Courageous" on our day off. SO good.  I highly recommend it.  It's definitely an emotional rollar coaster for sure. 
• I played alto sax in the Reformation Services at church yesterday! 

Inside of the church from the top balcony.  It's beautiful!

• On Saturday I was able to drive to Charlotte which is two hours away and reconnect with Heidi (Kohn) O'neill (friend from school) and her husband Peter and meet some of their high school friends. It was very fun and always great to hang out with people around my age!
• Huskers beat Michigan State. So I proudly wore my husker gear around on Saturday. :) 

As you can see, the blessings exceed the challanges.  Praise the Lord!

Now unto the Lamb who sits on the throne be GLORY and HONOR and PRAISE. All of creation resounds with the song. Worship and praise Him, the Lord of lords. 

Prayer requests:

• My supervisor is coming to observe tomorrow (Tuesday, Nov. 1) so prayers that it will go smoothly.
• For God to keep teaching me about His Amazing Love.
• The attitude is getting better but could still use some work. :) 
• I get to teach religion! We'll be doing the story of Caleb and the 11 other spies and then move forward 40 years with Joshua leading the people to the promised land.  So, pray that God will use that time to teach these kids about Him through His Word. 

Willkommen!

It's hard to believe that I already have one week down of Student Teaching II!!  I arrived in Frankenmuth, Michigan (Michigans little Bavaria...hence the "Willkommen!" meaning "Welcome!" in German) last Monday at 1:30 p.m. to meet my new family for the next 8 weeks that include 1 cooperating teacher, 21 first grade students, who I might add are pretty darn cute, and a host mom who is a retired teacher who has never been married.  The first couple days I was just observing but on Thursday and Friday I started to pick up Math and help with Language Arts and will be teaching Math every day for the remaining time and then tomorrow I will be picking up Spelling as well. Eventually I'll be teaching half days and then full days by the 4th/5th week.

Teaching Language Arts with Mr. Lion

Teaching Math

However, I'm going to be brutally honest. It's definitely been a challenge being here in Michigan.  Don't get me wrong, there's been some great moments, but mostly challenging. On Friday after staff devotion and before the kids arrived I went into the bathroom and cried.  It was bad.  I haven't had the best attitude about being in a first grade classroom. Some of you know this but others don't...but going into college I wanted to teach upper elementary (3rd-5th) but my student teaching assignments have been Kindergarten and First grade.  I tried to change it but it was too late.  That's been the biggest struggle because there are thoughts that go through my head of, "I don't even want to teach
this grade. This is a waste of time and I don't want to be here." The other part of why I was crying was because I feel so inadequate.  I just got off of a great experience in a Kindergarten English Language Learners pull-out classroom and absolutely loved it.  By the end I was very confident in teaching in an ELL setting.  But now, a regular classroom, having the same group of kids, and teaching all subjects is VERY different.  I feel like I'm starting back at square one and have had thoughts of how, "maybe I'm not meant to teach in a regular classroom setting...it's so overwhelming and hard to adjust to."  Granted, it is only the first week and will take some time to get used to.  Thankfully the Lord rminded me, "Let nothing move you.  Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain." (1 Cor. 15:58)  I have not been "walking in love" and living up to the title of my blog.  My selfishness has gotten the best of me at times but all in all I know that this is all for the Lord and whether I am fit for this position or not,  if I do it for Him, it will not be in vain.

This first week has been filled with unexpected challenges and yet undeserved blessings:

Unexpected Challenges:

• The transition from a pull-out program classroom to a regular classroom with the same kids all day.
• Living in a community where there's no one your own age. (besides Wendy but we hardly ever see each other because we live in different host homes)
• Lack of independence:  Having a host home has been hard because I feel like I have to tell her every little detail of what I'm doing and I'm just not used to having that person over me.
• Being away from friends and family back home has been harder than I thought it would be and sometimes lonely.

Undeserved Blessings:

• I get to talk about Jesus at school!! I didn't grow up going to any type Christian school (other than sunday school and concordia) so it's been wonderful being able to teach kids about Jesus and bring Christ into their learning experience.
• Every Wednesday is Chapel and the 8th graders put it on. The "Girls of Grace" a liturgical dance group, danced to a song about how God has resurrected our hearts through Christ.  Oh man, Jesus was glorified. I was moved.  It was great. 
• The Sievert family has been really welcoming!! (Some of their children go to Concordia, Seward that I know) 
• Brenda runs and asked if I wanted to go on a run so last Wednesday she took me on a nice 5 mile route around Frankenmuth.
• David is letting me play in the church wind ensemble so I will be playing alto saxophone for Reformation Sunday, Thanksgiving service, and the Christmas Concert (which I heard is like Christmas at Concordia!) 

Here's a picture of the front of the church.
It's HUGE and very beauitful inside.

• I have been able to run more than 3 miles just about everyday!
• One of my routes is next to a river and there's a countless number of WILLOW TREES! (my favorite) Ah, it's so beautiful!
• Also next to the river is a tree that's wonderful to climb and sit in and that has been a great place to ponder and pray.

• Jennette Morrison came up to hang out!! Wendy, Jennette and I went to the local coffee shop and hung out, went around the shopping area, and met up with Chas Chaveriat at a local restaurant for supper.  It was SO good to see familiar faces and reconnect with concordia friends around my age!

hanging out at the local coffee shop

• Of course we had to hit up Bronner's CHRISTmas Wonderland, the largest Christmas store in the United States. 

Bronner's....largest Christmas shop in the U.S.
probably even bigger than a Sam's Club

Wendy and I by the ginormous CHRISTmas ornament
that Jennette was SO excited about. :) 

God is definitely breaking me down up here and I pray that these pieces will then grow in the ground and produce fruit for His Glory.  

Please pray for: 

• God to keep teaching me whatever He wants me to learn and that I would be open to challenges and face them with confidence in Christ and not with fear.
• FOCUS and DILIGENCE when writing lesson plans.
• Change of the tude!! I really need an attitude change...
• That I would WALK IN LOVE.  My feet are in a first grade classroom right now. Pray that these feet would carry a heart full of LOVE.
• I have noticed my selfishness surfice through this so prayers that He would empty me of all my selfishness inside and focus more on Him! 

Teaching the World in One Classroom

At first, I was quite nervous and didn't really know what to expect.  The first day of student teaching I I was able to get in front of the class and teach a lesson.  After watching my Cooperating teacher (co-op) teach the same lesson two times I was asked if I wanted to give it a shot.  I had no hesitation after sitting and observing and was ready to start what I had been preparing to do for the past four years: teach!

I was so excited for this new venture I was about ot take on. However, after the first week, I didn't like it.  I thought, "Really? Four classes of the same lesson eeeevery day?! How boring!" It got really long and I couldn't help but imagine how much of a drag the next six weeks were going to be.  Now, with two weeks left,  I don't think it could have gone any faster.

I have been in a public school Kindergarten English Language Learners (ELL) classroom for the past 5 weeks and after the first week, I have loved every minute of it.  Even though I still teach the same lesson four times a day, each class personality is different.  I have 36 kids I see throughout the day and their backgrounds are quite diverse!

Here's a list of primary languages the kids had before coming to school:  Spanish, Middle Eastern Arabic, African Arabic,  Nuer, Vietnamese, Korean, Chinese, Ukrainian, & Russian.

Everyday, I feel like I'm traveling the world!  I love each one of these kids and am going to miss them dearly once my Student Teaching I experience is up.  I'm excited that God has blessed me with this wonderful opportunity and really affirmed me that teahing is one of the passions He has given me.  Even though it's a public school, every morning I pray that God would use me to touch these kids with the POWERFUL, LIFE-CHANGING, Love of Christ He has feely given all of us by the His Grace!

These next two weeks are going to be bittersweet but I'm excited for the next assignment God has given me: 1st grade regular classroom in Frankenmuth, Michigan. It will be WAY different and a whole new culture. I hear 98% of the school is caucasian, which makes sense since it is a little German town. :-) I guess the phone number for it is 800-FUN-TOWN.  Ha. Check it out: http://www.frankenmuth.org/


Even though it will be different, God is still God, people are still people, and all are in dire need to hear of the grace of God.