grades. or sleep. or planning. or apartment maintenance.  or dishes. or sanity. … something’s gotta give.

every.day.is.a.battle.

phew—–

my gospel is expanding.

these past two sundays i have actually made it to church. it has been great. although i’ve walked in sorely late each week, i was still challenged by pastor paul’s messages. they have been of the gospel. but not just the gospel as i have known it: we are all sinners, but christ came for sinners and through christ we are redeemed. pastor paul and renewal presbyterian church have been pushing me to understand that the gospel is not just about living saved by grace, but about living in a community saved by grace. i have been reminded that the church exists as a body, and i must play my part in the body to serve. i have been convicted of and thus repenting of my consumer-church-mentality–one that says “i go for the teaching and for ‘what the church can do for me’”. church has been good these last two weeks.

but then there’s this question. then there’s this facet of “life” that challenges me and confuses me: how do i connect my ever-expanding gospel with the realities of everyday life? work is still hard. every other day i feel like a failure (hey, this is better than everyday!).  christ calls us to use our talents and gifts to glorify his kingdom, but i continue to doubt these “gifts” and/or maybe it is that i cannot help but doubt the “call”. when i think about even a portion of the injustices that exist in our nation — let alone our world! — i am frustrated and have to wonder, what is our role, gospel community, in bringing justice to our neighbors? (and why is it so difficult for me… to deliver on this role?)

ask not what the world needs. ask what makes you come alive… then go do it. because what the world needs is people who have come alive. [h. thurman]

what makes me come alive? what makes me feel that i am doing that which god has purposed and designed for me to do? how does my current location/job stand in this? how does my relationship back home play into this? how will i navigate this in the future?

reading.

Tony asked me one time if there was anything I would die for. I had to think about it for a long time, and even after thinking about it for a couple days I had a short list. In the end there weren’t very many principles I would die for. I would die for the gospel because I think it is the only revolutionary idea known to man. I would die for Penny, for Laura and Tony. I would die for Rick. Andrew would say that dying for something is easy because it is associated with glory. Living for something, Andrew would say, is the hard thing. Living for something extends beyond fashion, glory, or recognition. We live for what we believe, Andrew would say.

If Andrew the Protester is right, if I live what I believe, then I don’t believe very many noble things. My life testifies that the first thing I believe is that I am the most important person in the world. My life testifies to this because I care more about my food and shelter and happiness than about anybody else.

I am learning to believe better things. I am learning to believe that other people exist, that fashion is not truth; rather Jesus is the most important figure in history, and the gospel is the most powerful force in the universe. I am learning not to be passionate about empty things, but to cultivate passion for justice, grace, truth, and communicate the idea that Jesus likes people and even loves them.

[Donald Miller, Blue Like Jazz, 111-112]

–

My best friend, Paul, married my friend Danielle. …

“Marriage.” He looks me in the eye. “It isn’t fulfilling in the way you think it is.”…

“Well, maybe I can’t say what you think marriage is. Maybe I should say it isn’t what I thought it would be. I thought to be married was to be known. And it is; it is to be known. But Danielle can only know me so much; do you know what I mean?”

“There are things you haven’t told her?” I ask.

“I’ve told her everything.”

“Then I don’t know what you are saying.”

Paul pushed himself up a little to the pitch of the roof from which you can see the Portland skyline. I joined him. “We all want to be loved, right?”

“Right.”

“And the scary thing about relationships, intimate relationships, is that if somebody gets to know us, the us that we usually hide, they might not love us; they might reject us.”

“Right,” I tell him.

Paul continued.  “I’m saying there is stuff that I can’t tell her, not because I don’t want to, but because there aren’t words. It’s like we are separate people, and there is no getting inside each other to read each other’s thoughts, and each other’s beings. Marriage is amazing because it is the closest two people can get, but they can’t get all the way to that place of absolute knowing. Marriage is the most beautiful thing I have ever dreamed of, Don, but it isn’t everything. It isn’t Mecca. Danielle loves everything about me; she accepts me and tolerates me and encourages me. She knows me better than anybody else in the world, but she doesn’t know all of me, and I don’t know all of her. And I never thought after I got married there would still be something lacking. I always thought marriage, especially after I first met Danielle, would be the ultimate fulfillment. It is great, don’t get me wrong, and I am glad I married Danielle, and I will be with her forever. But there are places in our lives that only God can go.”

“So marriage isn’t all that it is cracked up to be?” I ask.

“No, it is so much more than I ever thought it would be. One of the ways God shows me He loves me is through Danielle, and one of the ways God shows Danielle He loves her is through me. And because she loves me, and teaches me that I am lovable, I can better interact with God.”

“What do you mean?”

“I meant that to be in a relationship with God is to be loved purely and furiously. And a person who thinks himself unlovable cannot be in a relationship with God because he can’t accept who God is; a Being that is love. We learn that we are lovable or unlovable from other people,” Paul says. “That is why God tells us so many times to love each other.”

[Donald Miller, Blue Like Jazz, 145-146]

reminder.

The LORD has done great things for us,
and we are filled with joy.

from Psalm 126

–

i am an erratic blogger.

i cannot get myself to be productive today. last night was tremendously unproductive as well. i have a paper to write by tuesday and two others that i must make progress on by next week. [snap out of it, gena.]

PSSAs are next week! at least the kids learned “length times width times height” and practiced surface area. what have i been doing wrong all these days???

after PSSAs, my kids don’t get to rest. we have got to learn ALGEBRA. hooty hoo. i was not able to cover polynomials, quadratic equation or factoring.. so here it comes. we are going on a field trip, which will be superbly fun and is well deserved. i need to decide what objectives the kids need to learn..

howard 8 is going to do the fraction activity — where they create fraction mats. i’m excited about that, really.

on monday we are going to review the homework 3 that the kids turned in.. and percents.

ebony gets a cookie if she can get a PATH score of at least 101 next week. i am going to find the biggest cookie in the city to take to that child. leonard is doing better in class and on his homework. i need to check in with darnya to see how she’s doing. i think i should hang out in columbia 8 more. if i had money, i would bring more things to my kids. i need to get myself involved with a church again. quickly.

i need to intercede on behalf of my kids more. there’s a couple in the eighth grade that were recently caught texting about oral sex. in EIGHTH GRADE. now whenever i see them together, i get a little nervous in my stomach. and the reality is that a lot of my kids are probably much more sexual than i would have initially expected. it’s such a disturbing fact for me. eeeek… stay away from each other, boys and girls. ack. on another note, tyrique and glenraya and breyanna could do so much better in school if only they would actually come to class! so what am i doing about all this? what am i doing about my kids that have poor attendance? what am i doing about my kids that are getting caught up in distracting activities? what am i doing to really care about and love on my kids? these are the things that are keeping me from doing my work. unfortunately, doing my work is probably the most practically effective thing that i can do on behalf of my kids. so…

things were going really quite well. but now tonight is one of those evenings in which i cannot wrap my head around the fact that i am really responsible for the education of 60 some eighth graders, whom i call my students. the fact that i am a college graduate seems inconceivable to me, even. why did i get hired at young scholars? a school where a truly highly qualified (not just nominally “highly qualified” because a test was passed) teacher should be working. i feel like a big zit on the face of an otherwise promising, vibrant, pubescent young scholars charter school. i am the blemish that keeps this teen out of the competition for “best school in the city”. i know that God wouldn’t bring me here if it wasn’t in His will. but the promise seems so far away sometimes. and i am so weak in being faithful at trusting that the seeds sown will bear fruit. the matter isn’t my faith. i’d go through the fire willingly (at least, i profess). but the fact is — my students are suffering because of my lack of craft. several of my kids are going to strong independent schools next year — they are going to have such a hard time in their accelerated math classes. i have been doing them such a disservice this last school year.

i know what it comes down to: i am not leaving for the rest of this school year. we’re too close to the end and it would not be helpful for the kids to get a new teacher at this point. so i have to figure out what i can do in the next six weeks (until the pssa) and the next two and a half months after that to get my kids to where they need to be. to help them get themselves to where they need to be.

at the least: gm will pass with at least a B and tw, km, scb, sh, and pt will get some sort of accelerated math in the meantime.

The lasting value of our public service for God is measured by the depth of the intimacy of our private times of fellowship and oneness with Him. [O. Chambers]

prayerchangesthings.

the startling reality

… is that it’s happening exactly the way it’s supposed to be happening. in it all. in school. in work. in my relationship(s). in my family. the Lord is sovereign. and good.

i am trying.