Patience

Hello dear friends and family! 

Oh, how I will miss these beautiful faces

It has been quite a while since I have blogged and that is simply because I have been living in the States finishing up with my undergraduate degree at Asbury. For those of you who don't know, I ended up going to Asbury for five years, and although it wasn't my preferred option coming into college to be there that long- I wouldn't have had it any other way. I played volleyball all five years (red-shirting my junior year) and double majored in Spanish (K-12) and Math (Middle and High School) Education. 

The reason for the continuation of this blog is that I am two days from flying down to the Dominican Republic to start teaching there for the next 2 years. How did I ever come to hear of a teaching job in the Dominican Republic, you might be asking yourselves? Well, I thought I might share the story with those of you who haven't heard it, and if you have you may want to skip down a few paragraphs because it is a bit long. :)

Pastor Steve at First Alliance Church always encourages the congregation around Christmas-time to pick a word for the upcoming year. I felt the Lord putting the word Patience on my heart for this year. I knew that there were a lot of big moments that were to occur this past semester. Among them: student teaching, graduation, a niece being born, and starting my first real 'big girl' job. God knows me so well, and he knows that I get very excited when I look ahead to wonderful life events coming my way. Choosing this word to focus on reminded me to be patient in ALL things. It was like God was telling me, 'Just sit back and let me do my thing. Be patient and wait on my timing.' This was especially important when it came to thinking about my job for next year. I didn't know when I should start applying for jobs or how to even go about it. That is when I got a text from my good friend, Cameron.

He studied in Spain the same semester I did, and he'd been finishing up his Masters in Illinois. His family moved to the DR last year and his mom works at a Christian school there. It was about a day or two before the Superbowl when Cam texted me saying that there was a math position opening up at their high school for the next school year. At the time, I wasn't really thinking that I would go, but I figured it didn't hurt to fill out an application and send it in. 

I did, and heard back that they wanted me to continue with the application process, which included a Skype interview. At this point I thought, 'this seems like a wonderful opportunity, but there are so many things happening here (the biggest being that it is my niece, Hazel's, first year out of the womb)- kind of an event I wanted to be an active part of. I guess I will just bow out because I don't want to make them think that I am serious about the job when I am not.' I told this to my dad and he convinced me to change my mind on the basis that if nothing else, it would be good practice to interview with them. 

I went ahead with the interview, and one thing led to another and soon enough they were offering me the job. Even at the point of the job offer, my selfish heart was holding on to the fact that I didn’t want to be away from my family. I prayed about the decision for a good week, and it was amazing to feel God changing my heart. He kept reminding me of all the wonderful people that have selflessly poured love, wisdom, and kindness into my life and influenced me greatly without asking for anything in return. I realized that I wanted to do my best to create that for someone else, to pass it on. God has blessed me immensely with family and friends that have loved me unconditionally all my life. This teaching opportunity at a Christian school in a foreign country (to me) gives me immeasurable chances to provide that for my students. I don’t know if any of that made sense, but basically it dawned on me that what I want to do more than anything else is to simply pass on what has been done for me, and that is to show God’s unconditional love to the future generation.

I also heard someone say recently that, ‘God doesn’t call us to a place, or a people group. He calls us to obedience.’ So, that’s what we’re doing… stepping out on a limb and trusting that God will be there every step of the way. Which I know He will be. 

I encourage you to come with me on this journey. I will do my best to update you on what God is doing and how He is working. Because after all, that’s what it is all about! I leave this Saturday and will be arriving in the DR that night, ready to start the three-week new teacher orientation on Monday morning. That’s all for now. Thank you for your love and prayers. You guys are the best.