2010

It's the end of another year.  Time to reflect on where we've been and anticipate where we're going.  I spent this morning reviewing my calendar, lesson plans, Facebook statuses, and messages home, piecing together the big and small things that made an impact on my year.  It's been a full year - plenty of disappointment, plenty of joy.  I'm thankful once again for God's provision in my life here in Nairobi, and I'm looking forward to what He has planned next for me.  This was my year...


January.  New Years.  Picked up Lauren, a sorority sister and friend from Miami, from Jomo Kenyatta airport.  Spent ten days enjoying Kenya like a tourist all over again.  Swanky tented safari.  My first leopard sighting.  Kamikaze termites falling from the sky all over our dinner table.  Ate trout in a tree house.  Stood on the equator.  Kissed a giraffe.  Said goodbye.  Started fourth semester of teaching.  Led a discussion on social "tribes" in class and was asked by a nosy student afterwards which groups I was in as a high schooler. When I mentioned my "drama geek" status in HS, another student chimed in: "Wait- drama 'geek?' But drama's cool!" to which several other students promptly agreed.  Felt like a champ.  Listened in disbelief to a phone call confirming a coworker’s tragic death.  Everything and nothing changes. 

February. Teacher appreciation week. In a bundle of notes from students: "Dear Miss Weiant, Thanks for being a great English teacher. Your classes are really interesting. And I think you dress well.”  Valentine’s Day comes and goes.  23 and a half years old, officially. 

March.  Connections with friends-of-friends in Nairobi.  Spirit week.  High school teachers dominate in dress and overall spiritedness.  Hundreds of hours spent in the computer lab, finishing up the yearbook.  Nervous breakdowns.  Lots of coffee, lots of fellow teachers to help.  Finished.  Egypt.  Landed in Cairo, promptly visiting the pyramids in Giza.  Second-hand smoke inhalation from our guide, Ahmad.  Overnight train to Aswan – Nile River cruise back up to Luxor.  Couldn’t believe my eyes.  I’d never had such close encounters with history before.  Absolutely incredible.

April.  Heavily recruited friends to apply with NICS and come and teach with me in Kenya.  Began adding new hires as friends on Facebook so better to stalk them, my dears.  Rehearsals for Steel Magnolias.  The actress playing Shelby quits.  Then returns, two days later.  Nerves shot.  Requested set is never built.  More lessons in making do with the little you have.  Cried on stage with the full cast of girls, who had all “hormonally synched up,” if you know what I mean.

May.  AP exams.  Chronic headaches and eyestrain ultimately lead to the optometrist.  First pair of glasses in my life.  Junior/Senior Banquet.  My first true experience as a chaperone involved eating a free delicious dinner, enjoying a truly great high school band, busting a group of seniors who’d gone on a little adventure away from it all, and climbing into a fellow teacher’s car several hours after the night was over with all the leftover people who didn’t fit on the bus.  Thank goodness the police weren’t out in full force that evening.  Lock-in rehearsal with a group of giggling boys.  Opening and closing nights for The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Abridged.  Final week of class.  Yearbooks arrive.  Final exams.  Graduation.  Year two of teaching complete.

June.  Packed up the house and said goodbye to No. 6 Lampco Court.  Lots of other, more tearful goodbyes.  Packed my bags, and enjoyed over 24 hours of travel back to the US.  London culture shock.  Even more culture shock in America.  A full week of jetlag and resting catch-up, but it was great to finally be home.  Weiant and Huff family dinner at the Red House.  Sundays at Life Community Church. Alumni Weekend at Miami.  Sweet time with my sweet sister.  Creation Museum.  Dropped brother Sammy at Kent State for Arabic studies.  Catching up on pop culture.  Beth Moore Bible study.  Fun times with high school crowd in Hilliard at prayer overnight.  HS girls group over at our house for the rest of the summer for cooking sessions with Señora Weiant and good Bible study with adorable girls.  Put-in-Bay for the weekend to visit Leslie with my parents.  Nostalgia.

July.  More visits with old friends.  Fourth of July fireworks in one of my favorite places – on the dock in front of Gilead Cottage.  A great week of teaching and fellowship at Gull Lake.  Received AP exam results: two “3’s” and two “5’s.”  Ecstatic.  Cedar Point.  Chicago for my friends’ Cheryl and Barry’s wedding weekend.  Great fun and pillow talk with Rosie.  Twelve hours of road time with another good friend, Mike.  Lots of trips to Target and Walmart to prepare for the journey back “home.”  Visits with LCC cell groups.  Anxious packing and more goodbyes.  Columbus International Airport.  I get frisked for leaving a Pepto tablet in my back pocket and scolded for having my laptop underneath my shoes in the bin.  Not exactly the travel expert I thought I was.  Met up with roommate Jen in Chicago.  First flight travel buddy since I was 15.  Landed, all luggage made it.  Moved in to new house, complete with new roomie, Dawn, on Muringa Rd. 

August.  Workdays in my classroom to prepare for year #3.  Picked up my brother and friend at Junction shopping center (surreal) after their mission trip for a few more days of local adventures in Nairobi.  The Kenyan Constitutional Referendum put a bit of a damper on our plans – stayed inside a good deal of the time.  Wear green for yes, red for no.   Yes wins.  Said goodbye to visitors.  Mzuri Monday Madness.  Two and a half hour prayer walk around West Nairobi School campus.  School begins.  Two sections of American Literature, AP English, Yearbook Production and three Theatre Arts classes in the same period.  President Kibaki declares August 27 a national holiday for the signing of the new constitution, but he must have really planned it in honor of Jen’s and my birthdays.  24 years old.

September.  Back in the familiar cycle of lesson planning, reading materials, hunting for resources, and grading papers.  WNS open house.  Boys soccer and girls basketball games.  The Tso family welcomes baby Kansas.  Faculty begins The Truth Project.  Enlightenment.  Juniors read The Scarlet Letter; AP students read No Exit and Hamlet.  Yearbook planning in full swing.  Discovered a streaming video website that enables us to watch live college football games.  Life feels complete.  My Facebook account gets hacked and dozens suffer.  Some message about rapid weight loss.  Staff retreat at Brackenhurst.  Messages on forgiveness and general sense of failure in relationships.  My Rainbow sandals are stolen from my room.  I give a rather sober chapel message on the consequences of sin.  WNS middle and high school have their first biannual Spiritual Emphasis Week.  The student discipleship program gets going and I fell in love all over again with my five wonderful girls.

October.  I continue seriously considering a transfer within our network of schools to one of three schools in restricted nations.  I share these thoughts with my parents, who initially seem a bit taken aback, then within the same conversation seem totally on board.  I have a renewed appreciation and love for my supportive family.  Brother Sam and I conspire to teach/learn at the school in Kabul.  Kenyatta Day.  Found fake Subway in Nairobi with my roommate. Some American must have started the place, because it was a complete knock-off, right down to the green and yellow logo on the paper sandwich wrappers and laminated brick on the walls. Hadn't had turkey in two months.  Parent-teacher conferences.  Two of the longest days of the school year.

November.  I host a dinner at our house with my discipleship girls.  Chicken enchiladas and lots of laughter.  High school staff meeting.  Re-working lesson plans for the end of the semester and writing finals.  Intensive poetry unit with AP students, This I Believe project with juniors, working towards deadlines with yearbook staff, and casting for our production of The Musical Comedy Murders of 1940 with theatre students.  My father reintroduces me to the idea of applying to the Trinity Forum Academy in Royal Oak, Maryland.  Downloaded application packet, updated CV and wrote essays.  Thanksgiving at the Bussell home and a brief trip to Mombasa for some time in the sun.  Students begin asking if I’m returning next year.  I’m not sure how to answer.

December.  WNS talent show.  Jamhuri Day.  Exam week.  Graded thirty five final projects, sixty additional projects, and collected materials for yearbook deadline.  Considered the enormous difference there would be should I ever transition to public schools.  Whole-staff lunch in the bandas on the last day of the semester.  Goat and chapatis. Another dinner with my discipleship group.  Personal pizzas this time, and paper sacks with little gifts for each girl.  Overnight visit with one of my high school girls.  Relaxation and needed rest.  Email from Trinity Forum confirming my initial interview in January.  Dinner with Bevins family and photo slideshow from Afghanistan.  Chinese dinner Christmas Eve and movie on a borrowed projector.  Christmas morning.  Ate breakfast with a missionary family on our compound and watched in awe as three little girls opened their garage sale-bought presents with pure delight and thankfulness.  Gift-opening of our own at our place.  Post cereal, CoffeeMate flavored creamer, Ugandan hand-blown glass and paper bead necklace, and plenty of chocolate.  Delicious dinner and lots of laughs at the Nazarene compound with the WNS crowd.  Good books.  Sleeping in.  Skype dates with family and praying for Grandpa Weiant, in and out of the hospital/ER after surgery, and Nonnie Imboden, struggling in nursing care. 

Depending on, Waiting on, Rejoicing with, and Enjoying the Lord.  Constant flitting between contentment and discouragement, expectation and devastation, hope and fear.  Wrestling.  Looking ahead.  Understanding and reflecting upon what’s past.  Appreciating where I am in the present.  Doing my darndest to surrender what’s in my future.  Thanking God for you, and praying for a blessed beginning to the New Year.   

Conviction

Woke up this morning sincerely believing it was Friday.  It's not.  It's Wednesday.  I feel cheated.

Anyone else feeling like their week is just draggggggging on?  I'm sure it has something to do with the anticipation of next week when school finishes up for the semester and we head into our Christmas break.  The days always feel long when you're looking forward to something.  

Everyone at school is getting sick.  There's a terrible flu making its way around the campus, and the teachers are finally getting hit.  I happen to have an incredibly powerful and crafty immune system that only likes to shut down when I'm suffering extreme stress (April and May of every year) or during summer break when no one should ever be sick.  Otherwise, I'm healthy as a horse.  My poor roommates have both been sick several times each since the beginning of the semester (Dawn even got the chicken pox, poor thing).  We're running out of subs for classes with how many staff have to stay or go home.  

And on top of all of that, I think everyone's officially toast.  Emotionally, relationally, spiritually.  All done.  Ready for Christmas.  The teacher's lounge hasn't exactly been the chipperest of places this week.

But Jesus has really been taking care of me this week in my classroom.  What could have been a "busy work"/filler kind of week has turned into some really sweet time with my students.  

My seniors are working through a poetry unit for their AP coursework and I think they're really learning.  And, bless her heart, one of my students just seriously has been making my day every third period.  This girl LIVES for poetry.  A song-writer, great reader, and wonderfully articulate young woman, she has little ephemeral moments now and then in class where she just gets "in her zone" and revels in the written word.  She literally giggled the other day when she found anthologies of poetry in the school library.  I've told her she's spoiling my future as a teacher with the prospect of never again having another student who's quite this passionate in my class.  I'm sure I'll look back and think, "Why can't every student be like her?"

Today, we went over the Ballad in class.  We read "Sir Patrick Spens" as an example, and I pointed out how the writer of the ballad had written phonetically (as did most writers before Gutenberg), and so it would be best to read it with the original Scottish accent to get the full effect and better understand the story.  And they totally went for it!  I don't think I've laughed that hard in a while.  

And then there's my junior class.  An opinionated and ornery bunch, I took advantage of their love of debate and feistiness and I'm having them complete the semester with a unit inspired by NPR's "This I Believe" radio program that started in the 1950's.  We've spent a good amount of time throughout the semester focused on rhetoric, logical fallacies, and building argument, but I've yet to ask the kids to write truly personal pieces this year.  

So their assignment for their final is to write their own "This I Believe" essay - a personal philosophy statement of sorts.  We read and listened to dozens of examples, and they've written their first drafts.  I've been pleasantly surprised by some of the things they've written about.  

Here are some of my personal favorite lines and excerpts:

• "I believe that if we truly cared about our fellow humans, instead of being concerned about giving money to make ourselves feel less guilty, we would actually help them. Ourselves. In person. Face to face. No matter what mood I am in or what I feel like doing, it’s my responsibility as a Christian. To share the love of Christ is not just a responsibility but a privilege. I know that Christ died for me, and everyone else on earth. I know that He died for that street boy right next to me, who is talking to me and asking me for help. How can I not tell him?"
• “It is beyond my mind how he could make some thing so small and detailed as the eye and at the same time a whole planet. Truly he is a God of awesome wonder. Not only has he made all this things, he has put them together in a way that they coexist, the presence of one helps the existence of another.”
• “At that point I finally figured out what I believe…I believe that Kenya needs to wake up and realize that there’s a lot of abuse happening in this country, especially to children and there’s no social service organization to deal with what’s going on or to help this children that are being abused by their families.”
• “How is it fair that I have been born so privileged and they haven’t? What is different about me? Nothing is different, nothing is distinct between me and them other than the accident of birth place. Nothing is different from them and the people who spend thousands on Christmas items for themselves when they are actually missing the Christ from Christmas.”
• “Truth is constant and does not waiver. For example, I believe in God but unfortunately I go against Him because I am a sinful creature. Nevertheless, He is still there and does not change no matter what I do. I can choose to not believe in Him, but he will still be truth.”
• “I believe I can fly; not in the literal way as there are complications with gravity, but in the hypothetical view, as to overcome what is in my way. I believe that as humans, our mindset has a limit, but when we overcome it we achieve pure creativity. I believe in a God that not only controls even the pathway of fire ant in the savannah, but that is holy, omnipotent, and a million other things our mind can’t begin to understand.” 

Is it just me or does this not give you an incredible hope for the future?  I’ve been so encouraged by some of these students and their newfound conviction in the things they believe.  This is why I’m in education.  I may be in the middle of a much-too-long week, but I’ll tell you what.  This tickles me to pieces.

If you’d like to read the essay drafts my students have written for their This I Believe project, visit this link to our online forum.  Be blessed and encouraged in this holiday season.

27 life lessons, final installment

With the fifth and final installment of my “life lessons” entries, I feel it important to reiterate that each of these lessons has been and continues to be in process.  I wish that I were able to write to you sharing that I am a better person than I was two and a half years ago.  I wish I could tell you that every one of these lessons has been a joy to learn and that I’ve seen fruit of deep, lasting, and complete change already in my life.  But there wouldn’t be a scrap of truth in that. 

Instead, I want to come to you humbly, using my own awareness of my failings and flaws and constant need to call upon the Lord, to do my best to encourage you.  You, dear friends, have been such an encouragement to me in this learning process, and I appreciate your prayers and words of affirmation and wisdom along the way.  You’ve played a bigger part than you know.

My final lessons aren’t necessarily indicative of every struggle and joy I’ve encountered in my time here in Nairobi.  But they’re the lessons I’m learning right now – and I think that counts for something.  These lessons seem to be centered upon a shared foundation – one that remains a great mystery to me.  God’s Will and Sovereignty.  I’m afraid that I’m not a very trusting person by nature, and so it seems fitting that the Lord would be working to build up that trust in my life by revealing more Truth about his Will, piece by piece.

Lesson 2.  Make His Desires Yours: I have no idea what I want.  I honestly don’t.  I’m completely fickle – one day I’ll make up my mind that I want to do something or be someone or go somewhere and the next, I’m considering something entirely different.  I really kind of wish that I had been one of those kids who decides when they’re six that they’re going to become a pharmacist or something and then, twenty years later, there they are – behind a counter in a white coat doing exactly what they always dreamed of doing and loving it. 

Alas, I’ve never had such concrete desires.  I want to do everything.  I really do think that I could sit down and work through a list of every possible career and think of some great reason why that would be a neat thing to do with my life.  I love education, literature, and the Arts.  I find psychology, anthropology, and philosophy fascinating.  Heck, I'd even sit through a biochem class as long as I wouldn't have to sit for an exam and it was free.  I could randomly open up our family Lonely Planet illustrated coffee table book and select any country and get excited about picking up and moving there. In thinking of things I sincerely don’t want for my life, the list is rather small.  I really don’t want … [Nope.  Can’t do it.  I literally sat here for a good few minutes trying to finish that sentence, and nothing happened.  I’d think of something and then rule it out, thinking, “Well, what about…?”  See?]

I’ve found that I loathe making decisions because it limits possibilities.  I knew that Miami University would be a great choice for my undergraduate studies, but I still created an Excel file filled with a highly complex matrix of possibilities my senior year of high school, unwilling to completely commit to just one idea of where I’d spend four years of my life.  The same thing happened in my job search senior year of college.  I applied to thirty different districts.  Thirty. 

It hasn’t become clear to me yet whether this quality is a virtue or a curse.  On the one hand, my willingness to try things, my very broad sense of a “comfort zone,” and my ability to build enthusiasm for virtually any possible scenario could be a great blessing.  I can be content in many different places, doing many different things.  On the other hand, I enter into this tragic little cycle far too often:  I’ll dream up an idea about what the future might look like, then something gets in the way, I grieve a little, consider staying put, then I move on to some other completely different idea, and so on and so forth.  And perhaps, instead of being wonderfully content no matter my circumstances, my excitement in planning and change is actually indicative of a discontented heart.

Another perfect example of this has come with the last six months or so of my life.  I’m in my third year in Nairobi, and it came time to reassess whether this is where God wants me to be for a fourth.  I didn’t feel an overwhelming sense of peace in renewing my contract for another year like I had the year before, so I decided to “crack open some doors” for the Lord to either close or widen.  My wildest (and favorite) idea had been to pursue the option of a transfer within our international network of schools.  NICS has a special set of schools under the name of “OASIS” schools that serve student populations in restricted nations.  In other words, they can’t fall under the “Network of International Christian Schools” umbrella because these nations are closed to the Christian Gospel.  I fell in love with the idea of making a transition to a school where, despite my inability to directly state the name of Christ, that I would be surrounded by a Christian faculty, focused on a character-based mission, all happening right under the nose of some of the most hostile governments out there. 

But in communicating with the NICS home office reps and directly with the administrators at schools in Ankara, Turkey, and Kabul, Afghanistan, it turned out that there were no openings for a teacher like me in either of those schools.  I can’t pretend that I wasn’t sincerely disappointed.  I’d been so willing to dive in to one of these schools head first, excited about the opportunity to be used by the Lord in a powerful place.  My sweet family was even supportive of the idea, which I realized is incredibly rare. 

Then I got used to the idea of staying here in Nairobi another year.

Then my parents threw out the idea of some options back in the States, including the possibility of a job offer back in my hometown.  Or subbing and beginning a Masters. 

Then I realized that I believe I’ve had arguably the most schizophrenic few months of my life.  One minute, I’m considering moving to a literal war zone, then next I’m thinking of moving back to Hilliard, Ohio – something I really never thought would interest me.  But in knowing that God could choose to act in my life and through my life in any of those places, I was comforted.  And now, I have settled upon a course of action for next year, although it still involves some waiting on the Lord. I have applied for a fellowship with the Trinity Forum Academy, a nine-month program for emerging Christian leaders to spend in study, open dialogue, and research to determine how God might use their gifts and skills to change culture.  They only accept twelve fellows each year (six women), and so in praying over the option, I’ve decided that if I’m selected for this program, it will have to be God opening that door.  If He keeps it closed, I’m committed to finishing well here in Nairobi for one more year.  Please pray for me as I wait on this answer from the Lord.

I have decided that my desires will never amount to anything if they’re not firmly rooted in His.  He wants to (and will) be glorified in everything.  I must desire that, too.  He desires my whole heart (including my plans), so that must also be my desire.  He desires my patience, trust, and my will.  I must give these to Him.  Only when I am satisfied in Him will I be fully satisfied.

Lesson 1.  Trust: Mine is an anxious soul.  As long as I can remember, my strongest and most vivid memories involve worry and fear.  I remember shrieking and wailing from the downstairs window of our split-level house on Skipstone Ct. as I watched my dad mow the lawn.  I remember him passing from the right to the left, left to the right, in and out of my sight as he passed that window.  I knew it was an irrational fear.  He was right there.  But something struck fear in me that something would happen to him – that somehow he wouldn’t come back inside. 

It is probably because of this natural unease in my heart that it would be a lesson in trust and obedience that would be my life-long lesson from the God who loves me.  I am convinced that this must be one of the deepest wounds I give my Savior each day: that I profess to know Him, know of His sovereignty, know of His perfect love for me, and yet I still have fear that He won’t provide for me, or that He’ll abandon me in my time of need.  I imagine this must grieve Him deeply.  That His precious daughter, Kate, lives in anxiety and unrest when He chases after Her with open arms.  I picture a little girl, lost in some big crowd, running around in panic, searching for her daddy.  All the while, He stands in plain sight, crouched down to embrace her.  He’s calling, but even though the little girl hears Him, she doesn’t know where to go. 

One of my disciples, Katie, pulled me aside this past Tuesday as I was walking to the office to make copies during my prep hour and asked if we could talk.  Over the next half hour, I watched Katie battle with herself over the fear of the news her family would receive on Thursday.  Her mother was waiting to hear if she has cancer.  And Katie was devastated.  I listened, all the while fighting back my own tears, in watching this bright young woman fall apart.  Katie is our student body president, a straight-A student, a student athlete, one of the brightest young performers in my class, leads worship during chapel, and is a leader in FCA.  She told me that she felt she simply couldn’t survive without her mom.  She felt that “Super Katie” was falling apart.  To her surprise, I agreed with her.  “Yes, Katie,” I squeezed her hand, “You’re right – she is.”

Meeting with Katie reminded me of my own fears and my own “Super Kate” complex.  I live in constant fear of failure and disappointing others.  There is rarely a moment when I feel I can be at peace.  After all, there is always something more I can do.  Something I should have done.  Something I don’t even know I ought to do, but I fail to do it all the same.  I run around, trying to do everything on my own strength.  And it is the most painful thing when God throws something in my direction that I cannot handle on my own, because it is in those moments that I realize how I’ve neglected to give Him room to work in my life up to that breaking point. 

This is what I need to wrap my mind around and then superglue in place, so I never go through those periods in the pit, a modern-day David, crying out to a Lord I only can hope is still there.  He IS and WAS and ALWAYS will be.  There’s no uncertainty.  He’s seen the beginning and He’s seen the end.  He holds time in His hands.  Nothing happens without his approval.  He has a great and marvelous plan.  He will overcome all evil.  He will always be true to His nature, as perfectly Just, Wise, Loving, Gracious, and Good.  Nothing can corrupt Him.  Nothing can remove me from His love.  Nothing. 

This world holds nothing for me, and I have hope of a glorious future of eternity with my Lord. So why worry?  

27 life lessons, installment four

Lesson 4.  Spend Time with Him: Throughout my childhood, my parents modeled an active and thriving prayer and devotional life.  I remember walking downstairs in the early morning to find my mom seated in the big recliner in the family room with a cup of coffee close by and my dad laying on the sofa in the living room, both spending time with the Lord as soon as they began a new day.  Look through my parents’ and grandparents’ Bibles, and every margin is filled with the personal narrative scribblings of a man or woman completely in love with its Writer. 

When I was little, my dad would visit the room that my sister Leslie and I shared and snuggle in between us to read stories from our children’s Bible and pray with us.  I remember a special ritual, even, of spinning a globe kept on a shelf in our room and closing our eyes and selecting a country to pray for that night.  I’ve wondered since moving overseas whether my little finger ever landed on Kenya.  Wouldn’t that have been a trip to know back then?  And every Sunday afternoon after lunch, we spent time in family devotions.  Every family dinner, my dad led us in marathon prayers at the end of the meal, instead of before it – most likely to serve the dual purpose of allowing us unlimited time to talk with the Lord as a family as well as to be able to dive into eating our meals before anything got cold. 

I’ve been remiss in applying this example in my own life as I’ve grown up.  There was always something more pressing – or more appealing – to do with that time.  I’d occasionally sit down for a big date with Jesus and feel deliciously filled up and satisfied afterwards, closing with the line, “We should do this again sometime.”  And then I never called Him back.  And for another few months, we’d chat for a few minutes a day or even go without any communication at all for days on end.  If Jesus were my boyfriend, then I’d definitely deserve to be dumped.  Thank goodness He’s so gracious and forgiving.

I used to be able to get away with that.  Not here.  Here, in a place where I’m reminded that my personal comfort and safety aren’t guaranteed – where I’m constantly suffering from physical, emotional, and spiritual exhaustion – where I’m in daily battle with my Enemy – I can’t screw around anymore.  It’d be like joining up for the Army and developing an eating disorder.  Good luck getting through basic training – let alone battle – when you’re starving yourself of the energy and strength that you need.  I’m constantly reminded of my absolute, desperate need for Him to enter into my life and take over.  Every day.  It used to be that I could get by on my own fairly well.  Didn’t need a Lord to reign over my life in His wisdom and sovereignty and love.  I could manage well enough on my own.  That plan just doesn’t hold any longer.

I listened to a John Piper sermon a few weeks ago, and I remember him saying that in our lives, only about 5% of the things we do and say and think are premeditated.  So only 5% of the time am I actually thinking about making a decision or what I’m going to say to that person or I’m actively checking my thought life.  The rest is unpremeditated.  I don’t go to the store and think about which cereal purchase will glorify God the most.  I don’t rehearse [every] conversation I have before I have it.  Even in my teaching, where I generate lesson plans for every class period each day, I know that when I put four or five little bulleted activities in a box on a weekly chart, that’s merely providing direction for what is generally a spontaneous activity.  So that means that 95% of my life is unplanned and undirected. 

I don’t know about you, but that terrifies me.  To think that most of what I do is just byproduct “fruit” of the root I’m feeding each day.  So that root had better be receiving the nutrients it needs, instead of the toxic waste of anxiety and fear and frustration and bitterness and everything else I choke myself with each day.  I need to spend time with Him daily to have even a hope of growing into what He’s designed me to be.

*The English teacher in me senses right now that I need to apologize for the overuse of unrelated metaphors in my explanation of Lesson 4.  I believe I just paralleled my relationship with the Lord to dating relationships, eating disorders, grocery shopping, and plant root systems all in the same narrative.  Horrifying.

Lesson 3.  Seek and Apply Truth: If you’ve been following my life here for at least the past year, then you’ll know that I’m a total sucker for Truth.  I could hold somebody captive in a room somewhere talking about Truth for hours.  I can and I have, actually.  A year ago, I picked up Nancy Pearcey’s book Total Truth and fell in love.  Having only experienced being a student in a secular classroom, I was completely captivated by the way Pearcey was able to put a finger to the pulse of current culture and philosophy.  I hadn’t been that wrapped up in an academic study of Biblical Truth since the summer before I began college, when I attended Worldview Academy.

This year, our school has adopted Focus on the Family’s The Truth Project.  A fourteen week video course, we’ve learned and discussed such topics as our origins, God and Man’s relationship, history, the Church, the State – all from a Biblical worldview.  Great clips from incredible thinkers like Os Guinness and Ravi Zacharias mixed with excellent teaching by Dr. Del Tackett and little interview montages with “lay people” from various backgrounds.  All excellent food for thought.  Every week, the Lord helps me find some great way to connect my learning to my approach to teaching and I’ve even got my kids on board with Worldview matrices that we fill out for each text we read in class, discussions on ethics, morality, and common philosophy, and one heck of a class session where I watched as my entire class of juniors crinkle their foreheads in disapproval of the pervasive relativism of our postmodern society.  “People think they can make up their own reality based on what they think is true?  And then tell everyone they can believe whatever the heck they want to?” one student asked.  “That’s so stupid!”  I completely agree, juniors.  What a mess.

But even greater than my desire to seek and apply “capital T” Truth in an academic context, emphasizing logic and the study of rhetoric and context with my own students, is my desire to seek and apply the Truth that God has written just for me.  Because the Truth He’s interested in sharing with me goes deeper than satisfying my thirst for knowledge.  I feel I’m finally learning to crave His wisdom - seeking and applying what it is that God has planned for my life and my own ministry and desires. 

It’s easy to get discouraged in the mission field.  Scratch that.  It’s easy to get discouraged anywhere doing anything.  I’m sure you know this to be true.  Maybe a month ago, my roommate Jen picked up a notion that she was going to find a piece of Truth each day, chew on it for a bit, and make sure she told me about it.  The Truths she shared with me varied from things she was learning about relationships, about teaching, about ministry, and about who God is.  And it was a lovely reminder that every day, I have an opportunity to seek and find Him and be changed by Him.  The ball’s in my court every time. 

Only two more lessons to go in this 27 Life Lessons series, but I’m certain that as soon as I post that final entry, dozens more will flood to mind.  Isn’t that just how life goes?  The learning just never stops…

27 life lessons, installment three

As I move away from the lessons I've learned here in Kenya that center around teaching and cultural adaptation and home life, it's going to get a bit more personal.  These lessons are being learned not under purely positive and encouraging circumstances.  They've been learned in the crucible, in pain and loneliness and self-searching.  But there's joy in what I'm learning here, too.  Because I absolutely believe that collecting this knowledge along the way and beginning the process of letting it truly transform my mind and my heart is the principle purpose for the circumstances and calling that God gives to me.  After all, it's very rarely ever about me.  I'm not here on some grand spiritual errand that only I can fulfill.  Most of the work God desires to do is in me, not through me.

So here are the first couple of lessons I'm learning as I grow here with the Lord...

Lesson 6. Love and Serve Others Whole-Heartedly, Unabashedly, and Without Condition: I’ll admit that this has been a lesson I’ve neglected in my time here in Kenya.  In beginning this discipleship program within the high school, I’ve realized that while I’ve said that my purpose here is to love and know my students personally in order that they may know Christ and grow in their knowledge and relationship with him…I’m not certain that I’ve actually acted upon that known purpose.  Sure, I’ve committed myself to teaching my students as well as I’m able.  I’ve tried to make time for them, in and outside of the classroom environment.  I smile as much as possible.  I offer hugs when it looks like a kid’s struggling.  I’ve believed that this was enough.  But in loving, there is never an enough.  I remember at the end of my first year at WNS, I gave my students a course and instructor evaluation form to complete.  I was surprised – and even a little hurt – to see so many students giving me low ratings for the category “Empathy and Understanding of Student Concerns” and “Approachability Outside of Class.”  But they were right.  I was so busy fumbling around, trying desperately to do everything right and please everyone and lesson plan and grade and track things and people and resources down that I lost sight of my purpose.  How does that happen? 

It happens, friends, when we lose sight of who first loved us.  Who compels us to love.  Who invented love.  It happens when we make our lives about ourselves.  How many times have I “punished” someone by withholding affection and kindness because I felt they’d slighted me first?  How many times have I neglected someone who desperately needed someone to listen?  How often have I felt entitled to relationship, but found myself disappointed and lonely?  How often have I felt unlovable myself?  All are instances when I place the “I” in my life above “them” – and more importantly, above “Him.”  I ought to be so desperately in love with my Savior and Lord that I am compelled to love others.  And because He loves to often without even the promise or possibility of being loved in return, how much more should I be willing to love others – regardless of whether I’ll be loved back?  Relationships here on earth are always a catalyst for our relationship with the Lord.  If I’m able to truly love others as He loved me, then it’s only because I’ve learned to understand His love first.

Lesson 5.  Be Still and Listen: I’m an external processor.  I really only know what I think or feel about something once I’ve said it out loud or put it down on paper.  I’ve recently begun calling my roommate Jen “My Journal” because of how frequently she’ll patiently sit with me and serve as a sounding board for my processing.  You’re all my journals.  My students are my journals.  Friendships are my journals.  All of those relationships serve to teach me something, and I love to learn through talking.  I am less adept at learning through truly listening. 

I meet twice a month with my discipler, Kara.  We usually meet at her house after her kids have gone to bed or find a fun restaurant to have coffee or dessert (or both).  A few weeks ago, as Kara and I met, she gently offered some wisdom and a challenge to me.  She recalled one meeting we’d had last year where I had “literally talked for 45 minutes straight” without really taking even the tiniest break.  I hadn’t done so in a while, but the pattern still existed.  Take a breath, she admonished and encouraged softly – let your mind quiet and listen. 

Embarrassed at first, thinking that every relationship I have with people must be broken in some way because I’m an irritating twit who won’t shut up, I realized that there was absolutely truth in what she’d said.  To some degree, this has been modeled for me and is absolutely normal.  I remember sitting around countless dinner tables, everyone talking and talking – sometimes talking over someone else – a joyful, albeit noisy kind of daily event.  There weren’t even that many of us.  But we could sure fill dead air.  Everyone except for my little brother, Sam.  The poor sweet singular internal processor among us, no one ever really understood why he wouldn’t talk and share and debrief.  Shy?  Preoccupied?  Willful?  A teenager?  No, Weiants, that’s just a round peg in our square dinner table. 


But moving beyond the initial embarrassment, I realized that there is deep truth in this.  In constantly allowing the motor of my mind and mouth to run, I ignore the subtle signals in relationship.  I ignore a need.  I belittle someone else's story.  I limit intimacy.  I make assumptions.  I have so many words of my own, I even put some of them in other people's mouths.  

This matters very much to me at present, and I hope it’s a “life lesson” that sticks with me.  I’m already seeing this affect my relationships just in small changes.  Because I don’t need to fill the quiet.  I don’t need to be heard all of the time.  Sometimes I really need to just sit with someone and listen.  But as much as I’m trying to apply this important principle in my relationships here, I feel it’s also meant to change the way I communicate with the Lord.  I talk and talk to God.  I ask Him to give me guidance and answers, and I wait a whole two minutes and I’m on to the next thing.  Listen, Kate.  Be still.  Let me talk to you.  Let me share my days with you.  

27 life lessons, installment two

Lessons in The First Years of Teaching

Lesson 18. High Schoolers are not Adults: No, duh, right?  Ok, I knew this before I started teaching, but somehow, I still managed to come into my classroom with the expectation that high school students could handle managing their own homework assignments, meeting due dates, engaging in effective small group discussion, writing a thesis statement or simple outline for a paper, and going to the bathroom during a five minute passing period.  I was wrong. 

Lesson 17. Lesson Plans are Merely Guidelines: I may think I have an awesome day planned for my high school English class.  Then I sit there, looking into the glassy eyes of 20-some completely zoned out students, thinking, “What the heck happened – don’t you realize how cool I am?”  Life is much better when I let go of thinking I can control fickle and hormonal teenagers and learn to go with the flow.  It is a good idea to have a plan, though.  Best not to completely wing it.

Lesson 16. Don’t Diss the Classics: I know Harry Potter’s magical and the Edward-Jacob-Bella love triangle has swept the nation (including “team” t-shirts and Burger King scratch-off contests), but there’s a reason I don’t teach that junk.  And I already knew that To Kill a Mockingbird was the greatest book ever written.  I mean, come on.  Atticus Finch has to be the greatest hero ever written.  And Gregory Peck was totally dreamy in the movie.  But my own high school English classes totally missed out on some great books that I’m embarrassed I never read before needing to teach them: Huck Finn, The Scarlet Letter, Lord of the Flies, A Tale of Two Cities… they just don’t write ‘em like they used to.  So like I tell my English students: “join the grand conversation” (thanks, Dr. Frager), and pick up these great books.  It's been amazing to watch my students get wrapped up in the high-schooly romance of Romeo and Juliet and fight over who's the bigger jerk in The Great Gatsby.  They're just teenagers, but they can handle it.  And often they'll surprise themselves and connect more with these great works than they think they will.  Who knew?

Lesson 15. If You’ve Been Looking at the Same Paper for Over 30 Minutes, You’re Doing it Wrong: Teaching English is a tough gig, and I’ll admit that I wasn’t prepared for the paper load.  I would pour over a kid’s essay rough draft for 45 minutes, marking every single error and writing thought-provoking questions and stimulating remarks in the margins until my fingers bled.  And then the next day, that kid saw the “B+” at the top of the paper, noticed the purple pen all over their draft, and shoved it in their notebook without another thought.  Used to really hurt my feelings and even tick me off a bit.  But now I realize there are better ways to spend my time, and nice, thorough rubrics are my new best friend.

Lesson 14. It’s Hip to Be a Square: I’m such a dork in front of my students.  I gave up being “cool” a long, long time ago.  Because if being completely ridiculous means that I help kids connect with literature or grasp a writing concept, gives them the courage to take a risk, or brings them closer to knowing Christ, then I consider that well worth the face I’ve lost.  Wasn’t worth much to begin with, anyway.

Lessons Living in Community

Lesson 13. Get a House-Helper: It’s exactly what it sounds like.  If it’s culturally acceptable and within your budget, support the local economy and find someone to come into your home two to four times a week to wash those dishes from cooking dinner the night before, straighten up the house, clean the bathrooms, and do the laundry.  It’s amazing how wonderful it feels to enjoy a clean house together and how much it cuts down on the roommate drama.

Lesson 12. Anticipate and Communicate: Anticipate the things in your relationships that may become issues later on, no mater how strange and premature it may seem to discuss them early on.  Effective and positive communication is essential in any functioning relationship, but these communication lines must be open early on. Never underestimate the power of minor irritations.  Our Enemy loves to stir up dissention, and his greatest tools seem to be the most insignificant trifles.

Lesson 11. Eat Together: This seems really simple, but I’ve found it to be incredibly important.  I think there’s a direct correlation between the simple act of sharing meals and the stability of relationships.  Mealtimes bring us together.  We share the stories of our mornings – our afternoons.  We get the purely physical satisfaction of feeling full and connect that to the relationships with the other people present at the meal.  Life slows down for a bit over a meal, and that’s important, too.  If you’ve got time, cook together.  Even more quality time together when you’re cooking something up in the kitchen and then sharing that together at the table.  Trust me, this works.  If people are making bowls of cereal and opting to go and eat alone in their room while watching DVD’s of American sitcoms, there’s a problem in the house.

Lesson 10. Find Things to Laugh About/At: It’s so therapeutic to laugh, especially with the people you’re close to.  Our house this year has been full of silliness and I feel like we’re all getting the giggles constantly.  But if all else fails, and everyone’s having a crummy day, there’s always YouTube and other cheater’s routes to finding something to laugh about.  Share the frustrations and grumble when necessary, but it’s so important to lighten up now and then.

Lesson 9. Put Relationships First: I’ve found over the last couple of years that sometimes, I need to just take a break from what I think I’m “supposed” to be doing, and just spend good time with people.  It’s always best to elevate people above the “stuff” in life.  Relationships are always more important.  And if saying or doing or thinking something is going to interrupt a valuable relationship, best to reconsider the statement, action, or thought.

Lesson 8. Refuse to Join the Gossip Circuit: It’s so easy to talk about other people and to think that other people’s business is your business and even delude yourself into thinking you're helping by talking about other people or listening to gossip.  Ridiculous.  I’m working hard to ensure that I remain outside of this vicious circuit – as an instigator, participant, and even as casual observer.  It just isn’t worth it to gamble the trust in relationships.

Lesson 7. Forgive Well and Often: At our recent staff retreat, our chaplain, Mike, emphasized the importance of making things right with the people in our lives.  Owning what we’ve done wrong, seeking forgiveness, forgiving others, and moving on in love.  I’ve felt lately that the longer I’m here in Nairobi (or the longer I stay in any place), the more bitterness and pain I carry with me—like sludge accumulating over time.  It’s terrible.  Keeps me from loving the people around me for sure.  And so every now and then, it’s time for a good scrape-down of the sludge.  Get rid of it.  Fix things in relationships that need fixing, and give the rest to the Lord.  Forgiveness seems to be the thing that’s most contrary to our Enemy’s nature.  Probably the reason it’s so hard for our flesh to do.

Still learning and growing.  Hard to be reminded that I'll never grow out of the work-in-progress phase, but glad to know that God is there in the process - and that the process is often what matters most, anyway.  One more installment to come, and it's the big one ;)

a sampler from the yearbook photo file

Uploaded a bunch of photos that we've taken for the yearbook so far this year this afternoon and thought you all might like a little window into the start of our school year.  Enjoy!

Staff introductions at our school open house

Freshman and sophomore boys playing table tennis during lunch

 Football match at the Rosslyn tournament

 Community development project at the Mitumba slum school

 Senior community development project

 U19 Women's basketball players pray before a U17 home game with Coach T

 Student worship team practice with vocal music teacher Mrs. Sampson (new to WNS this year)

 HS students reflect after a chapel on sin

 Yearbook staff members brainstorm ideas for this year's concept

 Students at our first chapel of the school year

Thanks for your continued prayer support and encouragement!  It's been a great start to the year!