Don't Worry, Be Thankful!

Well it's been two months since my last post.  I'll blame it on the holidays, like everyone else does.

I had the joy of going home for Thanksgiving and spending the weekend with my extended family (including my sister's boyfriend, my fiance, and all our pets).  Life was crazy between Thanksgiving and Christmas as we prepared for Christmas at Murphy-Harpst.  The kids performed a spectacular Christmas play; we did an advent bible study; and, the elves survived the influx of gifts, sorting, and delivery.  I then got to enjoy another week home with my sister and parents before kicking off the new year.

January has been cold in Georgia (too cold for my taste, at least), so a lot of activities have been occurring inside.  Track practice at Murphy-Harpst has been inside nearly all month, but we're running our first 5K of the year this coming weekend.  Bible study has been going well, and I'm sharing some of what my Sunday School class discusses with the kids.  Since I volunteered to help teach Sunday School this quarter, it's really nice to look at each lesson and how it effects me, but also be able to hear the kids' takes on things.

The first chapter I shared with the kids was procrastination.  It's a new year and everything we put off until the new year is still waiting on us.  With a couple extra days out of school due to the weather, we joked that maybe the teachers were procrastinating from coming back.  The next week, we talked about stress and how most of us don't deal well with stress.

One of the young men asked me during our discussion, "Ms. Jerrica, why don't you talk to us about things that you deal with too?"  I chuckled and told him that everything I talk to them about, I deal with on a personal level.  Our conversation continued, and we contemplated Paul's words telling us not to worry.  It's hard to read those words, because I think everyone worries.  But, Paul's directions don't just tell us not to worry; they give us an alternative.

Philippians 4:6-7
"Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank Him for all He has done. Then you will experience God’s peace, which exceeds anything we can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus."

The author of Slaying our Giants says that there are two ways to deal with stress and anxiety: concern and worry.  Concern is when you do what you can do and allow God to do the rest.  Worry is when you mull over the same thing over and over for no reason.  Our tendency is to worry about things.  I do it. You do it. We all do it.  Most of the time, our worries are out of our hands.  If you're worried about a friend or family member, you can talk to them and try to help.  But, once you've done your part, you have to give the rest to God and trust that God's will be done.  Only then can we experience God's peace, which exceeds anything we can understand.

On Friday, I was in a car accident, and afterwards I thought to myself that there were several ways I could respond.

1. I could be angry at the person who caused the accident, who was not paying attention.
2. I could be worried about how I'm going to get places with no car, not enough money to buy a new one, etc.
3. I could trust God.  Tell God my needs and thank Him for all He has done.  

With only minimal soreness, I am healthier than most people on a normal day.  That's not something to be angry or worried about.  That's something to be thankful for :)  Have a great day, and remember to tell God what you need and thank Him for all He has done.

God's Sense of Humor

This week has been awesome and super busy.  It's secretly how I like it; I may complain about being so busy and barely having time to breathe, but I agree to do so many things, because I love busy weeks that are full of excitement.  It would take an hour to write all the details, but let me highlight the great adventures of my week.

On Tuesday, I went to Tucker, Georgia - a place formerly unknown to me to speak at the Lawrenceville Road United Methodist Women's Fall Tea.  Of course, I was expecting a small tea with 15-20 ladies and was surprised by the sixty or so women from the Atlanta-Emory District.  We had a great time, and they blessed me and Murphy-Harpst with new books and DVDs for our library, leftover sandwiches and desserts for the kids, and a beautiful love offering.  These women are so passionate about the ministry and speaking to several of the ladies before and after tea was so refreshing for my spirit.

Women at the Lawrenceville Road UMW Fall Tea with their donation

On Wednesday, I traveled to Atlanta for a large career fair with twenty-seven universities and dozens of employers.  I shared with students about the opportunities of the United Methodist Church for service and about possible employment and internship opportunities at Murphy-Harpst.  Once again, I felt inspired to hear so many young people looking for a way to make a difference in the lives of children.

Matt and I at our friends' wedding last week

Now it's Friday, and my week is nowhere near over.  Today is Matt's 30th birthday, so we will be celebrating with his parents tonight, and I'm planning some special birthday festivities.

Tomorrow, I will be sharing with the Rome-Carollton UMW ladies at their district meeting, and on Sunday, I will be in Bremen for a mission event.

Like I said, busy.

Here's where God's sense of humor comes in.  On Monday, I told Matt about everything happening this week.  I even put it on the weekly calendar I got for him to keep up with me. :)  Every Thursday, we have a chapel service at Murphy-Harpst, and I told him that if our chaplain Brother Wayne called and asked me to fill in, I was going to have to turn him down.  Well... last night around 6pm when we were supposed to start, I found out that Brother Wayne's father had been hospitalized due to heart failure and he would not make it.  Was I going to cancel chapel at the last minute with nothing planned?  Of course not.  I chuckled as I walked to my office to get my computer for the service and assured Brother Wayne that we would figure it out.  We lift Brother Wayne and his family up in our prayers because health issues are serious.  However, God laughed in my face last night, saying you said you wouldn't do what? 

We had a beautiful service, full of song, dance, and the Word.  God had plans for the kids to hear a message, and I'm glad I didn't get in the way of that.  To God be the glory, forever and ever, amen.

Planning the Future

I love when God intervenes in my plans for bible study, and this week was one of those weeks.  We were discussing this week what happens when God's plan differs from our own.  I always try to come up with some kind of activity that works with the lesson, so I decided to pair up the kids and have them work together to create something without communicating.  I picked paper airplanes, which turned out fantastic.  Each pair was asked to make a paper airplane by making one fold and then passing it to their partner for the next fold.  They couldn't share what their plan was, and some pairs worked better than others.

My first partner got very frustrated when I made a fold that wasn't in his plan, and actually raised his voice to tell me that I wasn't doing it right.  I laughed out loud as he made the point that I was planning to make later in the discussion.  When God makes a fold that isn't in our plan, we usually get frustrated.  I told the kids beforehand that they were not allowed to unfold what their partner did, and it forced them to adapt to the unplanned fold of their airplane.

Our lives are like the paper airplanes we built.  We build our lives with God, but when our plan differs from God's, we can get frustrated or we can try to work together by following God's lead.  Something we forget is that God is the master airplane builder.  God knows how to build the perfect airplane, but our cooperation is required.

Romans 12:2 states "Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s [plan] is—his good, pleasing and perfect [plan]. (NIV)

God does have a good, pleasing, and perfect plan that is sometimes not what we have planned.  I read a story in a devotional recently about a woman named Linda.  Her story was about her plan to become a medical missionary - a good plan that would probably be pleasing to God.  Instead, when she was fourteen, she acquired bacterial meningitis which put her in the hospital for a large portion of her childhood including an entire year at one point.  This was obviously not her plan, but instead of staying frustrated, she trusted God and God's light radiated from her during her hospitalization.  She tells the story with wisdom, saying that her mission field as she intended was the hospital, but she served God as a patient, not a doctor.

This was hard for the kids to wrap their minds around, as many of them have indicated that they'd like to help kids someday who have been in their situation.  I reminded them that they can do that right here.  They can serve God as a young person in the way that they want to serve God in the future.  Laura Story sings a song that has been so inspirational for me recently.  If you sometimes feel that God has abandoned you, I hope that this can give you a new perspective.  The chorus is below along with the YouTube video.  I hope that its message is as powerful for you as it is for me. :)

What if your blessings come through rain drops

What if Your healing comes through tears

What if a thousand sleepless nights are what it takes to know You're near

What if trials of this life are Your mercies in disguise

Books, Literally!

This past month has been great!  The kids are back in the school routine, and we are busy every evening with a number of activities.  My fall project is to rejuvenate our library and get the kids in there to check out and read more books.  I haven't been working on this project alone, and as a team, we have made significant progress!  After cleaning our collection and doing some organizing, a group of Methodist Nomads came to do some projects on campus, including painting our library.  The hunter green walls got a brighter upgrade to a light yellow, and we received new couches, chairs, and a conference table.  There are a few pictures below of the shelves I have organized and the ones I haven't finished yet.

Complete Fiction Section

Incomplete Nonfiction Section

While the physical appearance and organization is necessary, we also needed a technological update and some increased usage.  In the past month, the kids have had an opportunity each week to come visit the library and check out books.  This is definitely one asset that we had not been taking advantage of, and I'm so glad it was such an easy problem to solve.  The computer system has been upgraded with the current residents' names and next week begins our inventory! :O  We had an entire cart of books that have been recently donated but had not been tagged.  This took more work than I realized, but here is the final result.

Newly tagged books!

Of course, I couldn't spend my spare time with books and not let all those literary analogies influence the rest of my life.  So, this week our bible study had a bookworm twist.  We talked about the dark times in our lives, and on a roll of toilet paper, marked the years in which some negative events had occurred.  Then, we rolled out the paper to represent the average years we have to live.  We compared the first 8-16 years that we've experienced to the first chapter of a book.  Sometimes, the first chapter doesn't get us excited.  Maybe there's a lot of information that we're learning but we're a little bored.  I asked the kids what happens if they keep reading, and most said the books get better.  Some, however, said they tended to stop reading if they didn't like the beginning.  We decided that we all have that choice.  We've seen the first chapter, but we have no idea what the rest of life holds.  We have to keep living life to find out how our story continues.  

I took this quote from a book that I've been reading: "Your life will not be defined by this dark night of the soul.  Never does a single chapter of any book tell the whole story.”

We then stepped back and looked at the marks, the pain, in our pasts.  And, we talked about what God does with our own failures, and mistakes we have made.  We tore that part off and looked at a white slate.  We recognized that we are still going to have marks, times of pain, and times of disobedience towards God, but if we believe and have faith like Abraham, God will see us through the fire.

One year into my service, I still have so much to learn, and I'm grateful for the experiences God gives me every day.  Life is a beautiful adventure; go get it!

School's Back - August Newsletter

School is back in session!  Things are slowing down a little, and I'm working on the library renovation.  We have been without a librarian for years and are in need of some desperate update.  Luckily, I have something to do at work while the kids are in school now!  Yipee!  Here's the August Newsletter detailing some summer adventures.

AUGUST 2013 Newsletter

Surrounded by Your Glory

God uses all things, no matter how big or small.  For example, my freshman year of high school, I was involved in the FFA.  I learned useless facts about the organization, which have still yet to come in handy and competed in some public speaking contests.  After trying the prepared speaking, I decided it wasn't for me.  I didn't like sounding so prepared, because it was difficult to sound genuine.  Now, I'm laughing about that, because I try to prepare sermons for the kids when I preach at chapel.  Last night, I didn't have that opportunity.  Through a little miscommunication I learned I was sharing about 20 minutes before the service started.  So, as we sang some songs, I prayed for God to give me something to share.  This was God's response.

We sang the words to "I Can Only Imagine", and I was reminded that although this song is about imagining heaven and being in the presence of God, we are given the opportunity to spend every day walking side by side with our Lord and Savior.  We may not physically see the face of God, but we can see God's love in the faces of others whom God created.  I reminded the kids that they, themselves, can show people the face of God in the way they treat each other and their teachers as they start school.  The chorus is even more beautiful imagery:

Surrounded by Your glory, what will my heart feel 

Will I dance for you Jesus or in awe of you be still 

Will I stand in your presence or to my knees will I fall 

Will I sing hallelujah, will I be able to speak at all 

I can only imagine 

I told the kids to remember that we all experience God differently.  This is a lesson I have to remind myself of constantly when the kids ask about why people were falling on the ground in church on Sunday.  That's not the way I experience God, but I should praise the Lord that God is reaching that person and they are responding in their own personal fashion.  I asked the kids what they thought their hearts would feel surrounded by the glory of God.  And then, I told them that God is just waiting on them to answer the call.  

“Look! I stand at the door and knock. If you hear my voice and open the door, I will come in, and we will share a meal together as friends."  -Revelation 3:20 (NLT)

What a glorious God!  How will you respond?  Will you dance, or be still?  Will you stand or fall to your knees?  Will you sing or be speechless?  I believe that we can do more than imagine the presence of God.  Open the door and let God in, so you can experience the presence of God firsthand.  Amen.

From the Wilderness to the Promised Land

July has been another busy month with lots of new memories and LOTS of new kids at Murphy-Harpst.  I had one story in particular that was incredibly inspiring, and I wanted to share it with the public.

During our summer program, we have bible study each week.  Some groups will speak up to answer questions or read scripture, but rarely do we have an extensive conversation.  So last week, we talked about Moses' time in the wilderness and in particular the Israelites complaining about their diet post-Exodus.  We talked about the Israelites' three life stages - slavery, wilderness, and the Promised Land.

We made an analogy to our own lives in these three stages.  While we are living a life of sin, we are slaves to that sin.  The day we accept the grace that God offers to us through Jesus Christ, we are freed from our slavery to sin.  The problem is that many of us want to skip the wilderness, and when we accept Christ, we expect to receive the Promised Land instantly.  Anyone who has dedicated his or her life to God knows that the moment you accept Christ isn't the moment you enter the land flowing with milk and honey.  We discussed that in our own lives, if we don't get immediate rewards, we sometimes give up on working towards a goal.  Like some of the Israelites, we are willing to give up our freedom from sin and return to slavery because we crave parts of our past lives.  The wilderness is the trying time when I think our minds are renewed and we truly become one with God.  It takes patience though before we get to experience the peace, the oneness of me/God, that comes from a life lived to serve the Lord.

Instead of the kids blowing off what I said, they embraced it, relating this patience I talked of to their own prayer lives.  One girl even mentioned that she had prayed five years to have a relationship with her mother and it finally happened, but she gave up a few times along the way.  We discussed that God knows when the timing is right, even when we sometimes don't understand it.

One boy asked why we have to walk through the wilderness.  A simple question, but one I had not considered previously.  Before I could answer, another child said that we grow during that time and it makes us stronger and more able to endure when hards time come along.  They even compared it to Adam and Eve being given a perfect world and wasting it, because they didn't appreciate it.  "Maybe we need the wilderness to appreciate the Promised Land," she exclaimed.

After having bible study with three groups, my assistant for the day asked if she could lead the next group.  I hesitantly said yes and was blown away by the wisdom she imparted on the other kids.  Writing this brings a tear to my eyes, because I've been trying to teach and lead the children, but I didn't realize I was teaching them how to lead.  God has bigger plans for us than we do for ourselves, and I am so blessed to be used in such a powerful way.