God is good, all the time; all the time, God is good!! :)

This has been a quiet, but blessed, week. Even though I am currently in another country, on a mission trip, I found myself feeling convicted as I read about the suffering and poverty around the world that I haven’t really paid attention to. Richard Stearns, World Vision President for the US, wrote a book entitled ‘The Hole in Our Gospel’. I started reading it Monday evening and I was done by Thursday (granted, I am a fast reader, but this was definitely one of those hard to put down books). Stearns has a wonderful way of communicating and sharing his story in a relatable way. He did not write this book to condemn people for their lack of support or to simply ask for more support of World Vision; but he wrote the book to talk about how we are missing something in the gospel that we share with others – there is a hole. If you get a chance, I definitely recommend picking up a copy of this book to read, and share with others. Many of the facts and stories that Stearns shared were surprising and humbling. The main thing that I got from the book, though, was a reminder that everyone is my neighbor and I must do whatever is in my power to help; whether that means giving my time, money, material possessions or all of these things. It would be easy to feel overwhelmed by what Stearns shares, but then I remember that I serve a mighty God who has created me for a purpose and has asked me to participate in drawing others to Him! How can I respond but to say, Here I am, Lord. Send me!

It feels like I have just gotten back into the routine of teaching these past 2 weeks, and we are already starting to prepare for the end of the term! We have one more week of regular teaching and then we are supposed to have a week for review, then end of term exams. It seems to go by so quickly and yet there is so much that I want to cover with the students and help them improve on.

Isaac and I were able to try a different approach to teaching Math & English this week; we split the class into 2 groups (each taking about 29 students) for the lessons. After teaching one group, the children would switch places and we would teach our lessons again. It seemed to work fairly well for the most part; though trying to keep 29 learners that have the most difficulty with learning was definitely a little trying at times. It was easier for me to help the learners as they completed the assignments and work 1-on-1 with a few of them. I also felt better about their ability to understand my instructions because I was able to better assess the smaller groups’ responses when I gave directions.

As we draw near to Thanksgiving, Kayla and I wanted to share some of our traditions with the students here. This coming week, Kayla and I are going to create a ‘Tree of Thanks’ for our Standard 4 & 5 classrooms. We had each of the students trace their hand on construction paper and we are going to have them write a sentence about something for which they are thankful. Their hands will be the leaves on the trees and we will set them up in the Church Hall for everyone to see. Kayla and I are both excited to share about Thanksgiving with our students. Kayla started to tell her Standard 4 kids last week about Thanksgiving and she said they were the quietest they’ve ever been, probably because what she was sharing was completely new and fascinating to them. I thought it was a little funny (and a little sad) that when I asked my Standard 5 learners to tell me something they are thankful for, the first boy said ‘Playstation 3’; others chimed in saying toys, XBOX 360, etc. These answers were a reminder that even though these children may not have as much as children in America, they still have much more than most of the children living in rural villages in Malawi (reminding me again of all I read in ‘The Hole in the Gospel’).

On Sunday, Kayla & I were able to attend a PTA meeting. It was supposed to start at 2pm, but not surprisingly, we were about 20 minutes late. There were also people arriving as late as 3:30, so I can imagine they were trying to wait for as many people to come as possible before they got started. We thought that we’d be able to blend in with the teachers and not necessarily be introduced before the whole group, but we had no such luck. Pastor Nihaka had us stand and introduced us to the whole group, but we were glad that he also had the rest of the teachers stand up and get recognized after us. They were also gracious in choosing to conduct the meeting in English rather than Chichewa; which I found to be a little ironic since one of the issues discussed was wanting more English spoken in the classrooms. I guess, though, that just because the parents are sending their children to private school doesn’t mean they feel comfortable speaking English themselves since it is not their native language. As the chairman began the meeting, I thought it was going to be a very formal and stiff meeting. It turned out to be enjoyable and interesting. There were moments of laughter and discussions of legitimate concerns that Kayla and I were both glad to hear being discussed between parents and teachers. We had hoped to maybe meet some of our students’ parents, but once the meeting was adjourned, everyone left in quite a hurry.

Prayers & Praises:

-       Random prayer request for my toe; that’s right, my big toe on my left foot. J On Wednesday morning, I was having the students do an activity in the Church Hall. One student, Kingsley, was heading out the door, so I went to make sure he stayed inside. When I put my hand on his shoulder, I startled him and he stepped back quickly, bending the toenail on my big toe back. Ouch! I’m cringing just typing about it again. I sat down and checked out my toe, bending the nail back into place and checking for blood. It wasn’t too bad and I just had to wait a few moments for the pain to decrease. My toe seemed to hold up okay throughout the day, until it was time for the learners to leave. I was playing with some of the children who ride the minibus home and Kingsley, the same little boy from the morning, was also playing around the minibus… can you guess where this is leading? Yep, once again, he didn’t know I was standing behind him when he jumped back and stepped on injured big toe. DOUBLE OUCH! At first I thought he had bent it back again or that the nail broke off, but it was still intact, but it hurt so bad that I immediately limped down to our house and got some ice for my toe. Once the initial pain was gone, I was able to walk okay and my toe has been healing nicely since then. I had to smile the next morning in class because Kingsley came right up to me and asked me how my toe was – he looked so worried about it! I felt bad because he probably thought I was really hurt since I left quickly the day before. And that’s my adventure story for the week J

-       Our packages arrived! We were actually able to go and pick them up on Monday – thank you for the prayers!! J

-       The Standard 5 teacher whom I work with lost his grandmother this weekend. He will be attending the funeral Monday – please pray for him and his family.

-       The weather has been really nice this past week, but it started to get a little warmer this weekend; I am hoping that is does not get to be as hot as it was a few weeks ago, but only time will tell

Have a lovely and blessed week!