Monday, June 6, 2011
a dome of many-coloured glass...
I finally took the time to google how to compress photos. I know, I know, I'm from the Stone Age, but I finally caught on to technology. I now can finally put photos on my photo blog (the internet is too slow here to upload without first compressing the file size). So, I will be updating my photo blog and outside of mobile uploads, that is the only location I will be uploading photos. I am more than a little through with Facebook and hold it as an inconvenient, convenience. So, I will do my best to be updating those (truth be told, I rarely take photos anymore) and hope that you enjoy the updates. Cheers.
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
Genesis 1:26...
A few weeks ago, S.W. was gone and someone needed to ride down to his cattle and check on them and so I volunteered. It was a either a Friday or a Saturday morning (we had a long weekend) and I caught his horse on a frost covered morning and rode down to count cows and make sure nothing was wrong (nothing that would be obvious to a city boy). I do not fancy myself a horseman and though my nickname here is “cowboy,” a name I got as a boy that stuck, I fear I do not live up to the nickname.
I struggled a little with his mare. She wasn’t used to me, I wasn’t used to her and the saddle he uses is the equivalent of a string bikini for a horse and doesn’t leave one feeling very secure. She was everywhere but where I wanted her to be, but I could control her to a point. I checked the cows and headed back to the house and a thought struck me.
The horse I was sitting on was significantly stronger than I and yet, with a simple bit and a God-given fear, I was able to ride and control this magnificent animal. Then I thought of the cattle. I thought of how I could walk right through them (minus one rather nasty bull) and they, though four or five times my size and much more than five times my strength, would step aside and even run away.
Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over…the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” Genesis 1:26
It was one of those little moments where God almost whispered, I told you so. I know there are animals that will take on a man without fear, but even them, a man can have dominion over; I cite the elephants in India, the Orcas at Sea World and a man that lives here in South Africa that has a lion farm where he walks freely among them and plays with them. These little moments where God shows me in a practical way the truth of His Word, are precious moments and to have such a moment on the back of a beautiful horse on a white, frosty morning as the earth began to wake from a night’s rest, was even more special.
I don’t know if this will mean anything to anyone but me, if so, that is okay. It was just one of those times when God knew I needed a little sign, unsolicited but freely given, to show me that He knew exactly where I was and what was going on in my intricate, yet finite mind.
I struggled a little with his mare. She wasn’t used to me, I wasn’t used to her and the saddle he uses is the equivalent of a string bikini for a horse and doesn’t leave one feeling very secure. She was everywhere but where I wanted her to be, but I could control her to a point. I checked the cows and headed back to the house and a thought struck me.
The horse I was sitting on was significantly stronger than I and yet, with a simple bit and a God-given fear, I was able to ride and control this magnificent animal. Then I thought of the cattle. I thought of how I could walk right through them (minus one rather nasty bull) and they, though four or five times my size and much more than five times my strength, would step aside and even run away.
Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over…the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” Genesis 1:26
It was one of those little moments where God almost whispered, I told you so. I know there are animals that will take on a man without fear, but even them, a man can have dominion over; I cite the elephants in India, the Orcas at Sea World and a man that lives here in South Africa that has a lion farm where he walks freely among them and plays with them. These little moments where God shows me in a practical way the truth of His Word, are precious moments and to have such a moment on the back of a beautiful horse on a white, frosty morning as the earth began to wake from a night’s rest, was even more special.
I don’t know if this will mean anything to anyone but me, if so, that is okay. It was just one of those times when God knew I needed a little sign, unsolicited but freely given, to show me that He knew exactly where I was and what was going on in my intricate, yet finite mind.
Tuesday, May 17, 2011
when it rains it pours...
I wrote nearly a month ago and it seems life here has taken on an odd cyclical quality. I will not say it has anything to do with karma, but there is a continuity to the fact that the late summer rains have continued into winter, against all odds. Last week we were treated to three days of nearly unbroken, soft rains that fell with seemingly Biblical results. The lower fields of the farm lie under water and a horse sinks to the knees as you ride. Roads were nearly impassable and seemed to change everyday, adding novelty to every morning drive. Today has been clear and we hope the precedent to the days to come.
Despite the rains, winter is here and morning finds us hunched in coats and breathing clouds into the dawn. The children complain of the cold, even though it is all they've ever known and they know it isn't about to change. In their defense, it is very cold here in the Free State and our particular classroom feels (literally) like stepping into the walk-in fridges at the Schmul Center in Hobe Sound, FL. Fortunately, the sun quickly warms the room to an almost uncomfortable temperature. It seems that all things in Africa are linked to nature, including our thermostat.
I am enjoying teaching. This term has had its particular challenges in that the South African government decided to give about a quarter or more of it away to holidays. If a holiday should be so unfortunate as to fall on a Saturday or Sunday, which of course they already have off of work, they move it to a Monday and give the day off. This makes getting any progress done, rather difficult. I have seen remarkable improvements in some of the students I was most worried about and I give God the praise. He has been giving me wisdom where I need (everywhere) and patience that I didn't have in myself.
I know this is hardly an adequate blog post, but it is hurried at the end of a day of school and I really don't have the time. Perhaps I'll write more soon. Thanks to all who continue to read and if any of you happen to be at Hobe Sound and happen to be seniors, like my cousin Doug Wiseman, Congratulations! Also a big Congratulations to Chris Shillington, Hannah Stence, Lamont (I hope I got that right), Bryan, Katherine, Joe and Andrew. If I left anyone out I am very sorry. Cheers.
Despite the rains, winter is here and morning finds us hunched in coats and breathing clouds into the dawn. The children complain of the cold, even though it is all they've ever known and they know it isn't about to change. In their defense, it is very cold here in the Free State and our particular classroom feels (literally) like stepping into the walk-in fridges at the Schmul Center in Hobe Sound, FL. Fortunately, the sun quickly warms the room to an almost uncomfortable temperature. It seems that all things in Africa are linked to nature, including our thermostat.
I am enjoying teaching. This term has had its particular challenges in that the South African government decided to give about a quarter or more of it away to holidays. If a holiday should be so unfortunate as to fall on a Saturday or Sunday, which of course they already have off of work, they move it to a Monday and give the day off. This makes getting any progress done, rather difficult. I have seen remarkable improvements in some of the students I was most worried about and I give God the praise. He has been giving me wisdom where I need (everywhere) and patience that I didn't have in myself.
I know this is hardly an adequate blog post, but it is hurried at the end of a day of school and I really don't have the time. Perhaps I'll write more soon. Thanks to all who continue to read and if any of you happen to be at Hobe Sound and happen to be seniors, like my cousin Doug Wiseman, Congratulations! Also a big Congratulations to Chris Shillington, Hannah Stence, Lamont (I hope I got that right), Bryan, Katherine, Joe and Andrew. If I left anyone out I am very sorry. Cheers.
Wednesday, April 20, 2011
the roads became a threadbare carpet...
The late summer rains are still coming with a dogged persistence. Despite this effort, the grass continues to turn a pale gold and leaves drop off trees in lazy intervals scattering the muddy roads like a threadbare carpet. The rains create rivulets of water that cut shallow canyons in the roads and create an ever-shifting landscape. Monday, the inconstant weather of the hotter months shouted at us once more and clouds ‘threw down their spears ’ in an out-of-season thundershower, but for the greater part, I believe the softer, and more constant rains have replaced the violence of the summer thunderheads that build up like dark towers against the late afternoon sky. There is a chill in the morning and evening air and ‘is not night and more night coming on all the time ’ as the days grow continually short.
It has been eight school days since the holiday. Already it seems like some time ago that I walked the cool, flat sands of the Strand along False Bay just around the west side of the Cape Peninsula; my feet numb in the frigid waters of the southern Atlantic as the constant blast of air swept across the waters and mixed with Delani’s remonstrance to the temperature of the water on her feet. Her idea of walking along the ocean being a hundred yards further in shore where things are a little less…liquid. I being of the opinion that if one is to walk at the ocean, one is shorting oneself a bit of soul-food by avoiding the surf.
It was a week of spending time with her mother and father and friends. We took a drive around the Cape peninsula and parked the car staring out into the windy driven waves of False bay as we neared the unprotected tip of Cape point. We stopped in at Cape point and made the steep walk up to the lighthouse with Japanese, Dutch, British, American, etc. Cape point is one of the few places in the world that is not ruled by the equation that number of tourists = loss of wonder. The enchantment never ceases and each time I’m there, leaning against a stone wall etched with a history of fickle romances and high school match-ups from all over the world, I am like a small boy in a pair of new rain boots and staring at the biggest mud puddle he has ever seen. We continued on around the peninsula and stopped in Hout Bay for a supper with some friends and slipped back out into the night with the sand whipping against our legs and our faces turned away like Bedouins in the desert. We had a nice supper with our semi-bohemian, translator, professor, poet and friend, Marius Swart and his fiancé Elsabet. I failed to mention he is also a fantastic cook and made us a lovely chicken dish of which I am completely ignorant other than it contained lemon grass and had a pungent and mouth-watering aroma.
Michelle, Delani and I left Cape town at our backs and climbed the pass out of the Strand and through mountains and spectacular valleys and along the coast to Mossel Bay. We passed through the city of George and up through one more pass with breath-taking vistas and dizzying heights. Delani has an affinity for liver paste that comes in a sausage-like tube and so I casually struck up conversation as we headed up the pass and I said, “Hey, you know what would be really nice?” “No.” “If we had some of that liver paste and some crackers, we could stop along one of these lookout spots and throw it off the cliff.” She didn’t laugh. I still haven’t tried liver paste to say the least.
I don’t wish to bore you with endless descriptions of the weather and my week in the Cape, but it was a wonderful time to rest and unwind after the school term, but now that is in the past and I am fresh from training (during the first half of the holiday) and realizing just how little I knew about what was happening in my classroom. The students are an endless stream of questions, funny stories, laughter, complaints and explanations. They find wonderful reasons for unfinished work (including a dead-serious, “the dog ate my detention slip”) and make waking up at a quarter to five in the morning a non-event. I spend the time in class running between offices and answering questions and the times in between, swinging from monkey bars with a sandwich in my mouth or breathlessly racing from an outstretched hand in an endless game of tag that takes recesses for school and sleeping.
God is teaching me many things. To be careful of what I say, or perhaps the more ugly term, gossip. To enjoy a walk for what it is and not to for what it might do to help my blood pressure. To realize just what it meant for Jesus to die on the cross for my sins and to face the full, unchecked fury of God’s wrath towards millennia of rebellion and sin in one moment on Golgotha. No wonder the sky turned black and the earth shook, no wonder they call Him Savior. Good Friday is nearly here and I am trying to bring my students to a realization of what was in the cup that Jesus spoke of in His prayer in Gethsemane, but I must confess, I feel so inadequate to explain the wrath of God and I do not think that I begin to understand it. I have been reading in Exodus and am now in Leviticus in my devotions and I am wonderstruck at the life of Moses. To take counsel with God Himself for forty days and nights on a mountain consumed in fire. To have your face so incandescently lit with the glory of the Almighty that you have to put on a covering so people can look at you. To be buried by the hand of God. No man knew God like he did, face to face. What a legacy.
Well, I must finish this post somewhere. So, goodnight.
It has been eight school days since the holiday. Already it seems like some time ago that I walked the cool, flat sands of the Strand along False Bay just around the west side of the Cape Peninsula; my feet numb in the frigid waters of the southern Atlantic as the constant blast of air swept across the waters and mixed with Delani’s remonstrance to the temperature of the water on her feet. Her idea of walking along the ocean being a hundred yards further in shore where things are a little less…liquid. I being of the opinion that if one is to walk at the ocean, one is shorting oneself a bit of soul-food by avoiding the surf.
It was a week of spending time with her mother and father and friends. We took a drive around the Cape peninsula and parked the car staring out into the windy driven waves of False bay as we neared the unprotected tip of Cape point. We stopped in at Cape point and made the steep walk up to the lighthouse with Japanese, Dutch, British, American, etc. Cape point is one of the few places in the world that is not ruled by the equation that number of tourists = loss of wonder. The enchantment never ceases and each time I’m there, leaning against a stone wall etched with a history of fickle romances and high school match-ups from all over the world, I am like a small boy in a pair of new rain boots and staring at the biggest mud puddle he has ever seen. We continued on around the peninsula and stopped in Hout Bay for a supper with some friends and slipped back out into the night with the sand whipping against our legs and our faces turned away like Bedouins in the desert. We had a nice supper with our semi-bohemian, translator, professor, poet and friend, Marius Swart and his fiancé Elsabet. I failed to mention he is also a fantastic cook and made us a lovely chicken dish of which I am completely ignorant other than it contained lemon grass and had a pungent and mouth-watering aroma.
Michelle, Delani and I left Cape town at our backs and climbed the pass out of the Strand and through mountains and spectacular valleys and along the coast to Mossel Bay. We passed through the city of George and up through one more pass with breath-taking vistas and dizzying heights. Delani has an affinity for liver paste that comes in a sausage-like tube and so I casually struck up conversation as we headed up the pass and I said, “Hey, you know what would be really nice?” “No.” “If we had some of that liver paste and some crackers, we could stop along one of these lookout spots and throw it off the cliff.” She didn’t laugh. I still haven’t tried liver paste to say the least.
I don’t wish to bore you with endless descriptions of the weather and my week in the Cape, but it was a wonderful time to rest and unwind after the school term, but now that is in the past and I am fresh from training (during the first half of the holiday) and realizing just how little I knew about what was happening in my classroom. The students are an endless stream of questions, funny stories, laughter, complaints and explanations. They find wonderful reasons for unfinished work (including a dead-serious, “the dog ate my detention slip”) and make waking up at a quarter to five in the morning a non-event. I spend the time in class running between offices and answering questions and the times in between, swinging from monkey bars with a sandwich in my mouth or breathlessly racing from an outstretched hand in an endless game of tag that takes recesses for school and sleeping.
God is teaching me many things. To be careful of what I say, or perhaps the more ugly term, gossip. To enjoy a walk for what it is and not to for what it might do to help my blood pressure. To realize just what it meant for Jesus to die on the cross for my sins and to face the full, unchecked fury of God’s wrath towards millennia of rebellion and sin in one moment on Golgotha. No wonder the sky turned black and the earth shook, no wonder they call Him Savior. Good Friday is nearly here and I am trying to bring my students to a realization of what was in the cup that Jesus spoke of in His prayer in Gethsemane, but I must confess, I feel so inadequate to explain the wrath of God and I do not think that I begin to understand it. I have been reading in Exodus and am now in Leviticus in my devotions and I am wonderstruck at the life of Moses. To take counsel with God Himself for forty days and nights on a mountain consumed in fire. To have your face so incandescently lit with the glory of the Almighty that you have to put on a covering so people can look at you. To be buried by the hand of God. No man knew God like he did, face to face. What a legacy.
Well, I must finish this post somewhere. So, goodnight.
Sunday, April 3, 2011
R&R in the Cape...
I'm sitting in Delani's mother's house in the Strand. A suburban off-shoot of Cape Town right on the coast of the beautiful False Bay. I just finished a week of ACE teacher's training in Ladybrand so I only get one week of the two week school holiday. The training was worth the loss of a week. ACE is a good system when implemented correctly and there were significant deficits in my ability to properly administrate the procedures.
I don't know how many know just how ACE curriculum works, but let me just give you a quick overview. The students work in a PACE, which is a small booklet (generally around thirty to forty pages in the elementary grades). This PACE is the teacher and the children work individually at their own pace (although we do try and help them in the setting of goals). The students set within a determined framework, how many pages to do a day etc., we as the "teachers" are merely facilitators to that learning process and clear up any confusion from the PACE instructions and with more abstract concepts. So, for this week we were students. There were twenty-five of us who were taking the training and for the week we worked in individual offices just like our students, had to raise our flags for the supervisor or monitor just like our students and worked in PACEs just like our students. I think with the wrong facilitators it could have been deemed condescending and trivial, but our facilitator was great and it was just a fun time to learn with other educators and to get a feel for what our students do everyday.
The training was held in Ladybrand, which was fortunate for me, I could go home every night. It started at 7:30 am and went to 4:30 pm everyday. Since I live 30 minutes out of town, that meant waking up at the same time as I do during school, but that was no problem really...I was already used to it. The training not only sharpened our procedural skills, but the devotional times and the times of sharing really helped us to refocus our mission. It was stressed all through that this was a calling and the number one reason for being there was to bring the children to Christ. It is so easy to get into the necessary academic pursuits of the day and forget this number one impetus to waking up and making the thirty minute drive, five times a week.
I was able to finish the training early and take Michelle Waterson's (a colleague at the school) car to Graaff-Reinet where she was already visiting with Delani. I arrived in Graaff-Reinet (about a seven hour drive with all the road construction) and on the way at one of the construction stops I saw a Ron Jon Surf shop sticker on a truck in front of me. This at first made no impression as I am very accustomed to seeing these...in Florida. It suddenly hit me what I was seeing and I was so shocked that I did something very uncharacteristic of me; I walked up and tapped on the guy's window. He seemed somewhat annoyed, but rolled down his window in any case. I asked him if he had been to the surf shop and in an unmistakably South African accent said, "yes." I began to explain I was from near there when the girl in the passenger seat said in an unmistakably American accent, "I'm from West Palm Beach." The more I travel, the more I find this world is very, very small these days.
In any case, Michelle and Delani and I all rode together to the Cape to split fuel costs. Michelle is originally from the Cape and her parents are here and of course, so are Delani's parents. So, back to the beginning, I am sitting in Tannie Melinda's sitting room and tapping out a few words here to bring you all up to date. I am about to start working on my newsletter for this past month, or perhaps it should be for April...I guess I'll work all that out before I send it. I realize that this may be a bit rambling, if so I am sorry, but I'm tired. It has been a good Sunday with a good service this morning at Delani's old church. We will be having tea with the Pastor and his wife at some point in this week.
Well, goodnight all. I know this has been a bit disjointed, but I hope it is understandable at least. Thanks so much for all the prayers and support.
I don't know how many know just how ACE curriculum works, but let me just give you a quick overview. The students work in a PACE, which is a small booklet (generally around thirty to forty pages in the elementary grades). This PACE is the teacher and the children work individually at their own pace (although we do try and help them in the setting of goals). The students set within a determined framework, how many pages to do a day etc., we as the "teachers" are merely facilitators to that learning process and clear up any confusion from the PACE instructions and with more abstract concepts. So, for this week we were students. There were twenty-five of us who were taking the training and for the week we worked in individual offices just like our students, had to raise our flags for the supervisor or monitor just like our students and worked in PACEs just like our students. I think with the wrong facilitators it could have been deemed condescending and trivial, but our facilitator was great and it was just a fun time to learn with other educators and to get a feel for what our students do everyday.
The training was held in Ladybrand, which was fortunate for me, I could go home every night. It started at 7:30 am and went to 4:30 pm everyday. Since I live 30 minutes out of town, that meant waking up at the same time as I do during school, but that was no problem really...I was already used to it. The training not only sharpened our procedural skills, but the devotional times and the times of sharing really helped us to refocus our mission. It was stressed all through that this was a calling and the number one reason for being there was to bring the children to Christ. It is so easy to get into the necessary academic pursuits of the day and forget this number one impetus to waking up and making the thirty minute drive, five times a week.
I was able to finish the training early and take Michelle Waterson's (a colleague at the school) car to Graaff-Reinet where she was already visiting with Delani. I arrived in Graaff-Reinet (about a seven hour drive with all the road construction) and on the way at one of the construction stops I saw a Ron Jon Surf shop sticker on a truck in front of me. This at first made no impression as I am very accustomed to seeing these...in Florida. It suddenly hit me what I was seeing and I was so shocked that I did something very uncharacteristic of me; I walked up and tapped on the guy's window. He seemed somewhat annoyed, but rolled down his window in any case. I asked him if he had been to the surf shop and in an unmistakably South African accent said, "yes." I began to explain I was from near there when the girl in the passenger seat said in an unmistakably American accent, "I'm from West Palm Beach." The more I travel, the more I find this world is very, very small these days.
In any case, Michelle and Delani and I all rode together to the Cape to split fuel costs. Michelle is originally from the Cape and her parents are here and of course, so are Delani's parents. So, back to the beginning, I am sitting in Tannie Melinda's sitting room and tapping out a few words here to bring you all up to date. I am about to start working on my newsletter for this past month, or perhaps it should be for April...I guess I'll work all that out before I send it. I realize that this may be a bit rambling, if so I am sorry, but I'm tired. It has been a good Sunday with a good service this morning at Delani's old church. We will be having tea with the Pastor and his wife at some point in this week.
Well, goodnight all. I know this has been a bit disjointed, but I hope it is understandable at least. Thanks so much for all the prayers and support.
Monday, March 14, 2011
concrete for brains...
Twenty-six. Some of the students seem to think that age tremendously old and I suppose that at 11 and 12 it looked fairly old to me as well. I remember thinking Mr. Hausman was so old in eighth grade when he turned 29...hmm, funny how perspectives change in such a short amount of time.
While the rest of the world was reeling in shock over the events in Japan, I remained in the dark and content at Fraaiuitzicht farm. It was not until later in the day on Saturday that I heard the news and began to worry about my sister in S. Korea. My birthday on Saturday was a non-event; my favorite kind of birthday. I spent the day working cows from horseback with S.W., making a leather holder for my iPod and watching a film with the van der Merwe family. Tannie Hessie van der Merwe made me one of my favorite desserts, a grenadilla tart, mmmhmmm.
Sunday was church at Hobhouse where there is a little boy they call Mugabe after the infamous dictator in Zimbabwe. I suppose the reason is because he takes great delight in terrorizing the other children in church. Sunday afternoon and night I began to feel really congested and unfortunately it did not go away.
So, today was a sick Monday. I still was at school, it just felt like someone replaced my brains with concrete and my energy with lethargy. I am thankful that I was able to still come since one of our teachers is out and Mr. Philip Geise had to go to Bloemfontein for supplies. God is good. This week is busy. I am going with the other teachers on Thursday and Friday to a seminar in Bloem and then leaving immediately after for Cape Town to attend the wedding of Delani's father and I have to be back by Monday night. So, I'll let you know how it all goes; should be interesting. Cheers.
While the rest of the world was reeling in shock over the events in Japan, I remained in the dark and content at Fraaiuitzicht farm. It was not until later in the day on Saturday that I heard the news and began to worry about my sister in S. Korea. My birthday on Saturday was a non-event; my favorite kind of birthday. I spent the day working cows from horseback with S.W., making a leather holder for my iPod and watching a film with the van der Merwe family. Tannie Hessie van der Merwe made me one of my favorite desserts, a grenadilla tart, mmmhmmm.
Sunday was church at Hobhouse where there is a little boy they call Mugabe after the infamous dictator in Zimbabwe. I suppose the reason is because he takes great delight in terrorizing the other children in church. Sunday afternoon and night I began to feel really congested and unfortunately it did not go away.
So, today was a sick Monday. I still was at school, it just felt like someone replaced my brains with concrete and my energy with lethargy. I am thankful that I was able to still come since one of our teachers is out and Mr. Philip Geise had to go to Bloemfontein for supplies. God is good. This week is busy. I am going with the other teachers on Thursday and Friday to a seminar in Bloem and then leaving immediately after for Cape Town to attend the wedding of Delani's father and I have to be back by Monday night. So, I'll let you know how it all goes; should be interesting. Cheers.
Thursday, March 10, 2011
rambling thoughts in the late summer twilight...
A grey cloud is over Lesotho in the gathering twilight of this late summer evening, hanging low over the plateaus. Thunder peals long and soft like tympanis in the distance and the lights begin to twinkle around Maseru. Fraaiuitzicht (which means “beautiful view”) I am sure had a beautiful outlook when the first small, stone house was set here over a century ago, but now most of what remains of the view towards the Caledon river and Lesotho is the ever stretching, slowly sprawling metropolis of Lesotho’s capital city. Still, if you like the lights of a city and the quiet of the country, the view—though hardly Times Square—is the proverbial, ‘best of both worlds.’
The quiet. The stillness here, as I think it is more aptly named, is deafening. I lie awake at night sometimes and if no ‘bumps in the night’ have set the dogs going, the silence literally roars in my ears. It is for me more unnerving than peaceful and yet at some point my mind becomes once more acclimated to it and I can sleep without noise. At this point I still need at least a fan and preferably music.
It’s strange that I dread the silence. Silence bares the soul and leaves our thoughts and desires naked to our introspective gaze. Its like having that dream come true where you are standing in the middle of your school or on a busy street corner and suddenly you look down you have no clothes on. It is not a matter of needing to hide anything, it is the same as that busy street corner or your school; everyone knows what is there, but you still don’t feel comfortable with it being scrutinized. I know, the analogy has gotten perhaps a little out of hand, but all the same; I have nothing to hide and yet I balk against self-scrutiny. Perhaps it is a part of looking on the finite side of the mirror that is now hazy and darkened, but then “face to face…”
When we shed this mortal coil what dreams may come, must give us pause .
It doesn’t seem to matter how much I think I know about God and eternity, the sheer vastness of Him and the void that is a timeless, and endless scope, leaves me feeling shaken and insignificant. C.S. Lewis said that we are like children pulling levers on a vast machine, unaware of what frightful consequences we may be enacting on the other side of eternity,
The days at the school allow no time for introspection. The quietest moment of the day is the few minutes of staff prayer before we open the doors and are over run with laughing, smiling faces (usually) that keep us occupied for the next several hours of our day. They are a joy, a vision of eternity in their limitless capacity for wonder, for discovery, for joy, for hurt, for loss and for disenchantment. Some of these children have already lived more hurt than I can fathom in my nearly 26 years on this earth. It slips out in little moments…a flash of anger, a look that breaks your heart, a flinch when you go to place a loving hand on their shoulder, or quietly sitting and crying at their desk sans explanation.
G.K. Chesterton said that part of God’s infinitude is manifested in a child’s ability to exult in the monotonous and every day we are reminded of this with endless games of tag and the same songs chosen for opening exercises. Their capacity for wonder and joy is truly limitless.
The town here has banks that truly hold to banker’s hours, coffee shops that close at four in the afternoon and a pace that moves as only Africa can. I don’t know if Africa is the land that time forgot or the land that just forgot about time, regardless, to the newly adapting American their complete lack of punctuality can be maddening. Once you settle into it, it becomes somewhat addicting and the thought of switching back to all-night Wal-Marts and 10 pm grocers seems ridiculous.
Well, I suppose that is all of the rambling thoughts I have for one evening. It’s time to eat and then I suppose sleep is next on the docket. Goodnight all.
The quiet. The stillness here, as I think it is more aptly named, is deafening. I lie awake at night sometimes and if no ‘bumps in the night’ have set the dogs going, the silence literally roars in my ears. It is for me more unnerving than peaceful and yet at some point my mind becomes once more acclimated to it and I can sleep without noise. At this point I still need at least a fan and preferably music.
It’s strange that I dread the silence. Silence bares the soul and leaves our thoughts and desires naked to our introspective gaze. Its like having that dream come true where you are standing in the middle of your school or on a busy street corner and suddenly you look down you have no clothes on. It is not a matter of needing to hide anything, it is the same as that busy street corner or your school; everyone knows what is there, but you still don’t feel comfortable with it being scrutinized. I know, the analogy has gotten perhaps a little out of hand, but all the same; I have nothing to hide and yet I balk against self-scrutiny. Perhaps it is a part of looking on the finite side of the mirror that is now hazy and darkened, but then “face to face…”
When we shed this mortal coil what dreams may come, must give us pause .
It doesn’t seem to matter how much I think I know about God and eternity, the sheer vastness of Him and the void that is a timeless, and endless scope, leaves me feeling shaken and insignificant. C.S. Lewis said that we are like children pulling levers on a vast machine, unaware of what frightful consequences we may be enacting on the other side of eternity,
The days at the school allow no time for introspection. The quietest moment of the day is the few minutes of staff prayer before we open the doors and are over run with laughing, smiling faces (usually) that keep us occupied for the next several hours of our day. They are a joy, a vision of eternity in their limitless capacity for wonder, for discovery, for joy, for hurt, for loss and for disenchantment. Some of these children have already lived more hurt than I can fathom in my nearly 26 years on this earth. It slips out in little moments…a flash of anger, a look that breaks your heart, a flinch when you go to place a loving hand on their shoulder, or quietly sitting and crying at their desk sans explanation.
G.K. Chesterton said that part of God’s infinitude is manifested in a child’s ability to exult in the monotonous and every day we are reminded of this with endless games of tag and the same songs chosen for opening exercises. Their capacity for wonder and joy is truly limitless.
The town here has banks that truly hold to banker’s hours, coffee shops that close at four in the afternoon and a pace that moves as only Africa can. I don’t know if Africa is the land that time forgot or the land that just forgot about time, regardless, to the newly adapting American their complete lack of punctuality can be maddening. Once you settle into it, it becomes somewhat addicting and the thought of switching back to all-night Wal-Marts and 10 pm grocers seems ridiculous.
Well, I suppose that is all of the rambling thoughts I have for one evening. It’s time to eat and then I suppose sleep is next on the docket. Goodnight all.
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