Life is moving at a much slower pace now than at the beginning. At first I struggled immensely with that fact. However, I am starting to see the blessings of our situation. When moving to a foreign country for service I expected to be constantly busy doing good things. At the beginning life was very much as I thought it should be. After many changes and disappointments I began to be disillusioned. I thought: "If we have come so far why are we not doing more, why are we just wasting time?" I'd like to share some things I've been learning.
First, God often does not move quickly. I read last night a quote from the Encounters with God Bible by Blackaby. He said that perhaps God isn't so much waiting on time as He is waiting for a heart that is ready to fully obey as soon as the answer comes.
Second, just because things do not appear to be working out that does not mean that God has ceased working. It is easy to say that, but hard to believe what we can not see. I guess that is why faith is so difficult.
Third, with a different perspective this time has now become a blessing. I am thankful for the extra time to spend in the Word and with the Lord. During this time we are making preparations for next school year. These preparations are not interesting but are necessary and I, therefore, must remind myself to work wholeheartedly even when writing a teacher's handbook. (The upside is that since I'm writing the handbook I can make any rules I want. My roommate thought it would be funny to include that teachers must enter beauty pageants for community service, but that is a different story.) We are actively seeking and planning how to best reach the community. It is also possible that we will receive training on community outreach and information pertinent for working with children. We might also be able to continue working with the children that were attending our school by tutoring or other activities. We are also looking into working in Thai government schools teaching English for the semester. I realized the other day that part of my frustration with our work for this next semester revolved around the fact that I felt highly incompetent and unprepared for some of the work I may end up doing. The realization of this fact caused me begin praying that God would prepare my heart for whatever work I would be asked to do and that He would enable me to do each job well so that I will glorify Him.
Besides, today I can say that I watched a Scottish English teacher and a Thai secretary play a fascinating game with rubber bands. I saw a huge frog that looked as if he had been burnt (maybe he narrowly escaped becoming someone's dinner). I also learned how to drive a manual motorcycle (just in case ;)) And had time to download sermons from my old church in Lubbock. (Today is the last day of vacation before 2nd semester starts, therefore, only a limited about of staff is here today and no new projects were started.) Big praise: we had one of our team members who had left rejoin us today. Our situation is not much different but with a better attitude things are looking up.
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