of patience and Indescribable

It's funny how some things come together over here. Thursday night was my night for mother's worship and yes, I left it to the last minute. I'm a procrastinator... always have been--hopefully won't always be! So I began to think about things that have been frustrating me hoping to gain some worship thought from them and such when I was reminded what happened when I was teaching grade one English that day. Some of the smarter kids finish their assignments early and then just goof off and distract the others. And Jehanna, the class clown, had to calm them down. Sad day for everyone... Melanie didn't like this so much and she ran over and ran the glue stick up my arm. Good times were had by all :P

Patience. Ah patience. I could talk about patience. Even though I usually don't have patience, I could tell how patience should work and maybe that could help to cement it into my own life. Having a translator proves to be challenging sometimes, but when you are flying by the seat of your pants [kinda like how my speeches in high school were..] having someone translate allows you time to plan your next sentence or two. In the end, I think my point got across and I hope someone gained something by my scattered ideas on life.

Well the story's not over... The next day was art! Yay! Or not... That hour and a half was a serious test of my self control. To celebrate [American] Thanksgiving, we had the kids cut the paper they had attacked with watercolours a couple weeks prior into "feathers." The "feathers" were then stapled to strips of construction paper and, ta-dah, you have authentic Native American head-dresses. This seemed easy enough but we didn't take into account that there was only one stapler. "Jehanna Teacher, I'm finished" rang out from all parts of the classroom as the poor stapler clicked through feathers after feathers. I was going as fast as the stapler would allow me! Yet, these children had no concept of 'wait your turn'. After getting frustrated by all the pulls on my arms and feathers held in my face, I began to make a list on the board in order of how I would get to each kid. That seemed to work but then some started to ask anyways, in some hopes of moving up on the list. In addition, I had made a couple of the head pieces too big (we're talking by all of half an inch..) so "Jehanna Teacher, boro boro," which means big, arose above the noise. Jehanna Teacher was quickly losing patience.

But somehow we all got through it alive. Looking back I see how I got frustrated but also looking back makes me realize that kids are kids. They are impatient and excited and noisy and rambunctious. They were excited for their projects to be finished. They were getting bored waiting and wanted to play. They are just kids. But if I heard "Jehanna Teacher" again that day I probably would have killed someone lol. Don't worry, things are calm now :)

Sabbath was brought in with another beautiful sunset. We didn't do another rooftop vespers but we had a good evening nonetheless. This morning was another morning of Sabbath school, which was actually pretty fun. I taught the kids about the sea lion and read a Bible story about Abraham (you may wonder how the two go hand in hand, but with me teaching Sabbath school everything eventually fits together lol). We were then off to church for a sermon by one of our visitors here, then back up to the room. Elle and I were exhausted for some reason so we both fell asleep for about an hour before dinner. It was thoroughly splendid :)

After dinner, we headed back to the roof. This time we were armed with blankets, iPods, and some good books. I spent part of my time resting in the sun, reading The Screwtape Letters, and another part with my Bible. Finally the sun began to set in the distance. I wrapped my blanket around me and soaked up the scene before me. I watched as the sun turned from a bright white ball into a stunning red ball. I felt compelled to open my Bible and read the first chapter of Genesis, to experience this sunset as God had experienced the first sunset during creation.

Can you imagine what God would do with a ball of Play-Doh? That's just one of my thoughts as I gazed at the beautiful landscape before me as if it had been perfectly painted on a canvas. Through these thoughts I had Indescribable by Chris Tomlin playing on a loop in my head, especially the part, "Who imagined the sun and gives source to its light? Then conceals it to bring us the coolness of night." I watched the sun go from blood red to a half circle, half circle to a red thumbnail, then that thumbnail turn into just a faint speck above the horizon. As the speck melted away into the pink haze around it, I pulled out my iPod to hear Indescribable again, to meditate on what the words really mean to me and to imagine the creation story.

I felt I could see God saying, "Guys, you've got to see what I just made--it's so cool!" even though the Bible just says, "God saw that this was good." I guess in my head, I now see God like my art students--so excited to show off the what He had just created and wanting so badly to share this with us.

And then I rushed back downstairs to my computer to share my experience with whoever happens to be reading my blog :) I hope you receive a blessing on this Sabbath day!
ami tomake bhalobashi