Aches and pains

I’m beginning to feel slightly human again. I’m staying in a different apartment for a few weeks, and I moved during the busiest part of the week. I didn’t even turn my computer on for a few days. I think that I’ve been over-stimulated from trying to get to know a new neighborhood and schedule along with everything else.

Last night I went to bed feeling a little depressed, but when that happens, I always have hope that I’ll feel better the next day. No matter what the problem, the passing of the night always seems to take the edge off. I went to bed praying for the Lord’s joy to meet me in the morning.

The “joy” that met me in the morning was a lingering headache that had been with me since the night before. I had tried to just shake it off, but it had turned into the sort of headache that doesn’t go away until I take a pill and/or throw up (sorry to be graphic). After finding some Ibuprofen, I went back to bed and propped myself up with pillows. I didn’t want to fall asleep and get off schedule. But I did eventually cancel my first appointment of the day, even though the headache was going away.

You know, it's funny how feeling sick can make you forget about all other woes. Canceling the appointment lightened my load and I was able to eat something, finish my lesson plans, and get to work in plenty of time.

So that was my exciting day. I’m on dial-up right now, and I have a few posts underway, but don’t expect anything fancy like photos anytime soon!

Making investments

Last week one of the teachers from my group was sick, so I substituted for a few of her classes.

The classes were in a different company and the facility was very fancy. I had to pass through several security checkpoints and I got a badge that said I couldn’t walk around without an escort.

The woman leading me to the classroom opened a door and said “here it is.” All I saw was a spiral staircase. I had to go up the staircase to get to the classroom, which was sort of a loft. All the students were already waiting, and I wondered what they thought as my head came bobbing up the stairs, followed by the rest of me.




I suddenly found myself in front of a class of 7 men. That was a bit amusing. I hadn’t had more than 2 yet at my usual work location. Tripping over power cords, I quickly tried to get the lesson underway. The students turned out to be a LOT more talkative than my usual students, and a lot more advanced.

When the classes ended, no one came to get me, but I needed to leave for the orphanage. So I made my way back down to one of the checkpoints. “Where’s Alyona?” I asked. The woman looked at my badge. “Where’s the person that is supposed to escort you?” she asked. “I don’t know, but her name is Alyona,” I said, thinking that they could call her. “And the last name?” “I don’t know, I didn’t know that there was more than one” (this is a HUGE company, so I probably sounded like an idiot). The lady reluctantly let me go out through the turnstile and I handed her badge #1. Downstairs, I handed in badge #2 and left. Later, I got a phone call that I was apparently “missing” and people were looking for me. Oops!

Normally I don’t mind being a “guest” teacher, but I have to admit that I didn’t care that much how the class went. I planned a lesson and did my best, but my heart wasn’t in it. After just one week, I looked forward to seeing my regular students each day, but these others were strangers to me. I didn’t exactly walk out of the room hoping that I had changed their lives.

That got me thinking about the investments that I put into my relationships with different people. Sometimes I put less effort into short-term contact, not wanting to waste energy on something that won’t last. In other circumstances, knowing that the time is short brings about a sense of urgency that allows relationships to deepen quickly. I can think of conferences, missions trips, and even plane rides where I found myself sharing a lot about myself almost immediately.

Long-term relationships can go both ways as well. Maybe I feel content enough in the constancy to share deep feelings. Or maybe I’ve gotten so used to seeing the person that I hardly even say hello. I may think “now I can finally share the gospel” or, the opposite, “It’s too late, if the person wanted to hear the gospel it would have happened by now.”

Some of it depends on the Holy Spirit’s leading. I feel compelled to speak to someone whom I wouldn’t approach in normal circumstances. And some of it depends on my human nature: I’m too shy or tired to speak, or else I’m relaxed and feel talkative.

Certainly it would be a bit strange to calculate the potential investment of each new relationship. But, it doesn’t hurt to always be open to opportunities. A stranger may be in need, or may help you unexpectedly. Or, someone you’ve known for a long time may have a change of heart.

But in your hearts set apart Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect, (1 Peter 3:15)

I like this one, too: Do not forget to entertain strangers, for by so doing some people have entertained angels without knowing it. (Hebrews 13:2)

Lesson Plans for Breakfast, Lunch, and Dinner

The teaching isn't so hard, it's the lesson planning that's the hard part!

I can come up with a lesson plan pretty quickly, thanks to my TESOL planning, but then I need another hour for all the copying, printing, formatting, etc. When I was in training, I couldn't wait to be independent so I wouldn't have to fill out that silly planning sheet each time and have the trainer check it. The joke's on me, though; my new employer wants me to email all my lesson plans to her at the end of each month. That means TYPING each one into a special form.

I visited another teaching location, and the teachers there have 3-4 classes a day, all the same level. That's one lesson plan a day. I have 4 classes, all different levels.

Being true to my tendency to make assignments harder than they are supposed to be, I just spent several hours editing all my September lesson plans so that they're in the right font, format, etc. And scanning all the worksheets.

I haven't even sent them out yet and it's already Oct.2nd. Sigh.

Changes

I tend to be wary of ideas that are presented as "new." This especially applies in a church setting, where, it seems, History repeats itself.

Perhaps it wouldn't annoy me so much if they didn't call it "new."

Sometimes it seems that new projects and ideas and approaches to ministry simply distract us from the main thing, our relationship with God.

There are so many "movements" that come and go. New forms of "praise and worship." New ways to evangelize. New ways to "do church." New ways to pursue "purity." Do any of them have lasting effects?

In Lewis' The Screwtape Letters, Screwtape instructs Wormwood on how to entice Christians through dissatisfaction with old things and a thirst for constant change.

"The horror of the Same Old Thing is one of the most valuable passions we have produced in the human heart-an endless source of heresies in religion, folly in counsel, infidelity in marriage, and inconstancy in friendship...Now, just as we pick out and exaggerate the pleasure of eating to produce gluttony, so we pick out this natural pleasantness of change and twist it into a demand for absolute novelty.(116)"

"The Enemy[*] loves platitudes. Of a proposed course of action He wants men, so far as I can see, to ask very simple questions: Is it righteous? Is it prudent? Is it possible? Now, if we can keep men asking: 'Is it in accordance with the general movement of our time? Is it progressive or reactionary? Is this the way that History is going?' they will neglect the relevant questions. And the questions they do ask are, of course, unanswerable; for they do not know the future, and what the future will be depends very largely on just those choices which they now invoke the future to help them to make. (118)"

To be fair, an obsession with Old things can be damaging as well, in the case of things that aren't worth holding on to.


*God