Saturday, May 12, 2007
Please Forgive Me!
I do offer my humblest apology for not posting yesterday. It was an extremely hectic past 2 days.
Thursday night a student brought a gun on campus and hid it behind a bus. We were in the middle of a powderpuff football game when one of the teachers saw the boys behind the bus and was able to find the gun. Authorities were called and everything was handled thankfully!
Friday was school, then a special program at my church for our church school, then I had to go back to my school to chaperon a spring dance. I didn't get home until 11:45!
So, please, please, accept my apology and this lame post, and I promise I will have something more interesting before Monday! Have a GREAT weekend!
Questions, comments, concerns? Please feel free to E-mail me!
Thursday night a student brought a gun on campus and hid it behind a bus. We were in the middle of a powderpuff football game when one of the teachers saw the boys behind the bus and was able to find the gun. Authorities were called and everything was handled thankfully!
Friday was school, then a special program at my church for our church school, then I had to go back to my school to chaperon a spring dance. I didn't get home until 11:45!
So, please, please, accept my apology and this lame post, and I promise I will have something more interesting before Monday! Have a GREAT weekend!
Questions, comments, concerns? Please feel free to E-mail me!
Thursday, May 10, 2007
Seperation of Church and State
I'm very open about my religion at school. It is a way of life for me, and so it's impossible for me to hide it. As a result, a few of my students have come to youth services at my church. One of those students, Harry, has even become a regular attendant.
Harry came in, after declaring himself an agnostic. He got involved, prayed for repentance, accept Jesus as his Savior, and even got baptized. I thought this was great! Unfortunately, things got complicated from there.
I'm one of the Youth Pastors at my church. This put me right in the middle of everything for Harry. He wanted to text me and talk. He wanted to get to know me as a person. This is impossible when I'm also his teacher. There are strict laws about talking to students outside of the classroom.
So after many talks with him and other youth leaders, he had been told several times not to call or text me, but one of the other youth leaders, if he needed anything. We were all beginning to see he had some infatuation with me, not necessarily sexually, but it was as if he was obsessed with me and my opinion of him.
Students talked about Harry and I having this special relationship, and it made things awkward. I found it hard to have control of my class because they felt that I was showing favoritism to Harry. As a result, I finally had to be straight forward and tell Harry in front of the class that I was not his friend nor would I ever be. I am his teacher, nothing more, nothing less.
Today it all came to a head. He couldn't take correction from me, and when I tried to enforce it, he went off about how all of a sudden I decided to be a teacher. Even though he was being completely disrespectful, he was honest. I haven't treated him like a student. I never show my students favoritism, but because I was afraid of hurting Harry's feelings and discouraging him from coming to church, I let him and therefore the other students in the class by with more than I would normally.
It's my first year teaching, and so I'll learn by trial and error. This year and the way I handled Harry was definitely error. I guess I can understand having a separation of church and state now, at least on a personal level. It's just so hard to shut down one area of my life to shield the other area, but it's something I'm going to have to learn fast.
Wednesday, May 09, 2007
Letting It All Out
I feel it is good to rant. It gets everything out of your system. All the anger is gone, and you can move on. So this post is a series of dumb rants...
**Today's Southern Term**
rurnt [ruhrn t]. verb -- past tense of ruin, to mess something up pretty bad.
Those dumb writers totally rurnt Gilmore Girls by having Rory refuse Logan's proposal!
Questions, comments, concerns? Please feel free to E-mail me!
- How do the writers of TV series actually justify their scripts. I'm a huge Gilmore Girls fan. In last night's episode, Logan asked Rory to marry him. Can you believe after 3 years of dating that she says she has to think about it, then has the ignorance to tell this great guy NO! It's appalling. I'm glad the show is ending this season because I just don't have the heart to watch it anymore. You can't completely end a show when one of the major characters was just kicked in the gut like that!
- One of my **cough**stupid**cough** students lost the entire first grade class pictures. Here I am trying to wrap up the yearbook, and one of my staff members misplaced them. How does one misplace 80 pictures? Then on top of that, she didn't even bother coming to school today. That means I was left to try and salvage her mess!
- Why didn't it rain today? It thundered and was muggy all day long, but it just would not rain. I sat at my desk praying for the sky to open up. I love the rain! Plus I have too many things to do tomorrow, and if it rained, it would cancel one of those things.
**Today's Southern Term**
rurnt [ruhrn t]. verb -- past tense of ruin, to mess something up pretty bad.
Those dumb writers totally rurnt Gilmore Girls by having Rory refuse Logan's proposal!
Questions, comments, concerns? Please feel free to E-mail me!
Tuesday, May 08, 2007
Is This What It's All About?
**Disclaimer** Please do not take this as a church/standards/conviction bashing blog. It is strictly healthy, thought provoking material.
The other night, I took a break from church. I was just exhausted, and I knew it was the best thing to do. Instead of going to church that Sunday night, I went out to eat with my brother and I relaxed at the house. I went to bed at a decent hour, and I was able to wake up Monday morning, a bit refreshed.
Why?
Going to church is exhausting! It's even more exhausting when you are involved in almost every ministry. Think about it! I have choir practice, music practice for youth services, and pre-service prayer before service even starts. Then I praise sing during service and actually participate during service. Then after service, I usually do my youth leader duties with the kids, whether that's just spending time with them or chaperoning them out in the gym.
None of that even includes the time spent getting ready to go to church. I have to dig through the closet and find something appropriate to wear, aka, dress clothes. Then I have to curl my hair or put it up in some fashion. That all takes at least 20-30 minutes, if not longer. In total, I've spent about 3 hours preparing for church!
Pile on top of that a full work week as a teacher. That means my job doesn't end at 3:00 or even 5:00. There are after school activities such as sporting events, award banquets, dances, and plays that I have to be present for. Add to that youth obligations such as Drama Workshops, Clean up days, and fund raisers.
Evaluation
Is this healthy? Of course not! That's why I had to take a day off. It would be completely different if I didn't have a full time job. Church would be my only priority. Then I could live my life like the disciples. However, that's not reality.
Sometimes I wish going to church didn't have to be so difficult. I know the things I'm doing are helpful. Our revamped youth ministry is reaching out to new kids, we've had several new families attending, and revival is actually taking place. There just has to be a less demanding way to do this?
Why do I have to dress up for church? Why can't I worship God in my blue jean skirt and pony tail? Why do we have to praise sing every service? Why can't we throw tradition out the door and mix things up? Is this something God really requires? For some reason I thought he was more concerned with our heart and not our outer appearance.
Ruffled Feathers
Not everyone can see this though. There are people who get offended if someone wears jeans to church or, God forbid, has their shirt untucked. Let us not even discuss those who cannot worship without the proper praise and worship song being played.
What we're doing isn't wrong, but that doesn't make it right either. Somewhere we've put up an image of what we think God wants, when in fact we have no idea.
Questions, comments, concerns? Please feel free to E-mail me!
The other night, I took a break from church. I was just exhausted, and I knew it was the best thing to do. Instead of going to church that Sunday night, I went out to eat with my brother and I relaxed at the house. I went to bed at a decent hour, and I was able to wake up Monday morning, a bit refreshed.
Why?
Going to church is exhausting! It's even more exhausting when you are involved in almost every ministry. Think about it! I have choir practice, music practice for youth services, and pre-service prayer before service even starts. Then I praise sing during service and actually participate during service. Then after service, I usually do my youth leader duties with the kids, whether that's just spending time with them or chaperoning them out in the gym.
None of that even includes the time spent getting ready to go to church. I have to dig through the closet and find something appropriate to wear, aka, dress clothes. Then I have to curl my hair or put it up in some fashion. That all takes at least 20-30 minutes, if not longer. In total, I've spent about 3 hours preparing for church!
Pile on top of that a full work week as a teacher. That means my job doesn't end at 3:00 or even 5:00. There are after school activities such as sporting events, award banquets, dances, and plays that I have to be present for. Add to that youth obligations such as Drama Workshops, Clean up days, and fund raisers.
Evaluation
Is this healthy? Of course not! That's why I had to take a day off. It would be completely different if I didn't have a full time job. Church would be my only priority. Then I could live my life like the disciples. However, that's not reality.
Sometimes I wish going to church didn't have to be so difficult. I know the things I'm doing are helpful. Our revamped youth ministry is reaching out to new kids, we've had several new families attending, and revival is actually taking place. There just has to be a less demanding way to do this?
Why do I have to dress up for church? Why can't I worship God in my blue jean skirt and pony tail? Why do we have to praise sing every service? Why can't we throw tradition out the door and mix things up? Is this something God really requires? For some reason I thought he was more concerned with our heart and not our outer appearance.
Ruffled Feathers
Not everyone can see this though. There are people who get offended if someone wears jeans to church or, God forbid, has their shirt untucked. Let us not even discuss those who cannot worship without the proper praise and worship song being played.
What we're doing isn't wrong, but that doesn't make it right either. Somewhere we've put up an image of what we think God wants, when in fact we have no idea.
Questions, comments, concerns? Please feel free to E-mail me!
Monday, May 07, 2007
Don't Get Left Behind!
I hear that anybody, who's anybody, is popping over to the new edition of 90&9! Why you may ask? Because the good people over there are featuring the first ever 90&9 podcast!! This is something you don't want to miss out on. You can be apart of history in the making!
Huh?
For those of you that are not so technologically advanced, I'll explain a podcast to you. According to Wikipedia, "a podcast is a digital media file, or a series of such files, that is distributed over the internet for playback on portable music players or personal computers." In this case, it's basically a recording of something so that you can listen to it rather than read it.
So is it worth my time?
You should definitely stop by and take a listen, and not just because it's the hip thing to do, but because it's actually worth your time. Lance Reed shares the importance of finding our value in God. We should live our life in Christ to the fullest or, as he puts it, in high definition.
**Today's Southern Term**
Ruckus. [ruhk-uhs] -- noun. a noisy commotion.
What's all this ruckus about some new podcast?
Questions, comments, concerns? Please feel free to E-mail me!
Huh?
For those of you that are not so technologically advanced, I'll explain a podcast to you. According to Wikipedia, "a podcast is a digital media file, or a series of such files, that is distributed over the internet for playback on portable music players or personal computers." In this case, it's basically a recording of something so that you can listen to it rather than read it.
So is it worth my time?
You should definitely stop by and take a listen, and not just because it's the hip thing to do, but because it's actually worth your time. Lance Reed shares the importance of finding our value in God. We should live our life in Christ to the fullest or, as he puts it, in high definition.
**Today's Southern Term**
Ruckus. [ruhk-uhs] -- noun. a noisy commotion.
What's all this ruckus about some new podcast?
Questions, comments, concerns? Please feel free to E-mail me!
Sunday, May 06, 2007
Advice from the World Traveler!
I love to refer to myself as the world traveler, although I've only been to 2 other countries. But hey, this is my blog for the month, so just go along with me. There are some important things I can pass along to you.
Rule #1:
In England, the peace sign (Think Nixon) is actually the same as "flipping someone off."
How Do I Know This?
I'm at this Cathedral checking out this statue of baby Jesus. The priest woman inside is looking at me. I smile back at her like the nice American tourist. I go back to observing the statue and mention to my mom that Baby Jesus is trying to give the peace sign. In this statue he has his pointer and middle finger up, but they are together and not parted. So I make the peace sign gesture (fingers apart) while commenting about baby Jesus to my mother. The priest woman is still eyeing me, now with a different expression. I really can't recall what brought the subject back up later that day, but one of my cousins informed me that I was indeed flipping Baby Jesus off. Boy, did I felt like the dumb American tourist for sure!
Questions, comments, concerns? Please feel free to E-mail me!
Rule #1:
In England, the peace sign (Think Nixon) is actually the same as "flipping someone off."
How Do I Know This?
I'm at this Cathedral checking out this statue of baby Jesus. The priest woman inside is looking at me. I smile back at her like the nice American tourist. I go back to observing the statue and mention to my mom that Baby Jesus is trying to give the peace sign. In this statue he has his pointer and middle finger up, but they are together and not parted. So I make the peace sign gesture (fingers apart) while commenting about baby Jesus to my mother. The priest woman is still eyeing me, now with a different expression. I really can't recall what brought the subject back up later that day, but one of my cousins informed me that I was indeed flipping Baby Jesus off. Boy, did I felt like the dumb American tourist for sure!
Questions, comments, concerns? Please feel free to E-mail me!
