reflection

You know, sometimes when I sit down and really think about my whirlwind life in the past six months, I can't believe I'm at Penn. I'm studying at a school that has been a dream for me since high school. When I'm caught up with the busyness of student teaching or frustrations with a somewhat disorganized program, I forget that I've always wanted to come to this school. Best of all, Penn is where God wants me for now. The blessings that I have received from this experience thus far is completely undeserving--I have a solid church to attend, a wise older woman to be discipled by, sisters in Christ to turn to, and an awesome fourth grade student teaching placement (I love going to Cynwyd every morning!). I have so much to be thankful for.

thank You God for showing and reminding me that it is because of Your grace that I can sit in my room, look outside the window, see the wintery campus, and remember that I'm living out one of my dreams. thank You for making this dream come true.

on a similar note, I'm graduating in less than four months!!! :-D and then, Lord willing, I'll be home in the bay area. :-)

Updates

Praise God for (in no particular order):

• beautiful 60 degree weather in Philly in January (I'm actually scared for how hard real winter is going to hit us here...)
  
• a week of just student teaching before classes start tomrorow
• opportunity to hang out with people before real busyness hits
• parents who are forgiving and patient
• alarm clocks
• winter sales
  
• God teaching me to have self control in terms of spending money
• a sister-in-Christ who isn't sick of me yet after spending 3 straight days together (haha)
• a boyfriend who isn't jealous of the forementioned sister :-P
• cell phones and free weekend minutes :-D
  
• God-honoring music (and a Ruckus system that allows me to download that!)
• a roof over my head, bed to sleep on, blankets to keep me warm
• gloves, ear muffs, and hats that will be used eventually
• home-made sorbet
• tiramisu
  
• visitor deals at a mall because my driver's license is from California ^_^
• food to eat
• Happy Hours
  
• Trader Joe's
• encouraging classroom mentor
• smart fourth graders (lol)
• time to spend with God
• church
  

and much more that I can't think of right now

Joy

Wow, it's been a long since I've last posted.

I came back to Philadelphia on Jan 1 and it has been crazy busyness since. And the sad part? Classes haven't even started! I started student teaching at my new school (fourth grade) and I love my teacher, class, and school. I actually like fourth grade! The only downside to this is that I have to commute to the suburbs (meaning, outside of the city of Philadelphia)--which means I have to wake up by 6 to do my morning routine before heading out to the train station at 7:20. I now have a bedtime of 9-9:30 (so if you're thinking of calling me after that time, esp people in the west coast :-P, don't get mad at me if I don't pick up). I have seriously done nothing since I've come home from school because I've been so exhausted. I've been hanging out with my roomate, which has been good, but I'm still getting back into the swing of things.

Over winter break, I realized that I didn't have joy in my life. Sure I was happy, laughing, and enjoying my time off, but I just didn't have a constant joy that I think should exist in every Christian's life. We have an eternal salvation from God that cannot be taken away... isn't and shouldn't that be enough to put joy in our lives!?! Alas, there's sin and Satan that tries to take this joy away from us (at least me). Anyhow I went home to face a trial that I had been avoiding and I have to admit, it was really hard. The Lord was teaching me to love others because He has first loved me. Because God loves me, I can love others--I don't have an excuse not to. And the cool thing? The Holy Spirit gives us grace and strength to love others selflessly!!

God was also teaching me to be kind to those who may frustrate me. Basically growing up as the only child (my two siblings are wayyyy older than me), my parents spoiled me--and I mean spoil because there was no competition in terms of being my parents' children. So if I wanted things one way, they were my way. Unfortunately, that also meant that if anyone did stand in my way, I would view them as my "enemy" even though they weren't! All this to say that God showed me this weakness that I have. People who complicate my life or frustrate me are not my enemies! They probably do those things because of sin--both mine and theirs. I'm not held accountable by God for other people's sins (not directly at least), but I am held accountable for my own sin. I needed/need to repent from my sins.

I read in The Excellent Wife about sin and ways to battle sin. One thing that I was really convicted and humbled by was this:

"A person may be somewhat successful at modifying outward behavior, but the only real way to glorify the Lord Jesus Christ is to think according to His Word (Romans 12:2)...Changing sinful thoughts begins with recognizing thoughts that are selfish or unloving, vengeful or bitter, or in any way unblibical. After realizing that your thought is wrong, confess it to God (agreeing wth God that the htought was sinful). However, since repentence means to change your mind, the repentance process is not complte until you replace it with a goldy, righteous thought. Then you will have "put off" a self-honoring thought and will have "put on" a God-honoring thought. It is a process that takes work. How hard you work at putting on the right thoughts and actions will directly affect how much like the Lord Jesus Christ you become in this life. If you work at it, you will be "training yourself for the purpose of godliness" (1 Timothy 4:7)

It's not good enough to know that certain thoughts or attitudes or behaviors are not pleasing to God and merely repent of it via words. Repentance takes a lot of work--conscious effort I must say because it's not natural with my flesh to do so. I really need to repent by replacing sin with Biblical thoughts--and the only way I'll know things are Biblical are by reading my Bible. As Rick Holland (college pastor at Grace Community Church) likes to say, it's another Read-Your-Bible talk. Yet, it's so true.

I needed to be kind to the frustrating people in my life. I also did not have an excuse not to be kind because God calls us to love Him (with all our heart, soul, and mind) and love others as ourselves. Through salvation and the gift of the Holy Spirit, we as Christians are capable of repenting from our sins and being kind to others (even if they weren't kind to us). The Bible calls us to overcome evil (and I'm not saying those people were evil) with good (Romans 12:21).

*Sigh* Humility. That concept alone goes against everything that this world preaches. Yet, it's the only way that we can love others, be patient, kind, and most important of all, it glorifies God because it takes the undue credit from us and puts it where it is due: God.

This is going to be a long trial. Time to stop resisting what I know is true. Time to stop feeding my fleshly desires. How much do I love God and how does my life reflect that? Am I being a hypocrite? Who am I that God would save me? I have done absolutely nothing that would deserve the salvation that I have.

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on a completely different note...

Happy anniversary to my bestest boyfriend! :-)