Cleaning up your act?

I think I am definitely a people-pleaser. It makes me cringe.

I'm finding my kids on Facebook and letting them add me. I'm over shying away from 'no workplace' on Facebook. I guess I can't do things by halves and when I let people in, I let them in! And my kids are definitely 'in' :) In fact, I asked my mum to make sure I was awake one day when I needed to get to the airport ridiculously early and she said I woke up sleep-talking about one of my students. *I kid you not.* He's the kid that eats 'chocolate chicken' for breakfast and he deserves a whole blog post unto himself. He crackes me up! Well, that and he makes me want to tear my hair out but seriously, the two emotions co-exist.

I really came here though to write about God-time. I find when I blog I veer from making it a journal to writing for others to indiscriminately talking to God. My blog URL has assumed an amorphous, flexible identity that probably doesn't help readership. When has that worried me? Answer - always. I think I am a people-pleaser who is conscientious about being herself. It makes me cringe. Trying to please people is okay, you know. I'm not shooting it down. It's what makes social interaction bearable for those socially awkward of us. It's also what makes relationships happen. It's something God wants us to do in our relationship with Him;. But the coinage, 'people-pleasing', verb and compound noun is something else. It becomes our driving aim in interaction, the process which creates and maintains a facade that is rarely recogisable as self... And the horrible thing is I do that to God too.

Anyone hearing me out there?

You know, you walk up to your chair with your Bible/computer/other books for God-time and you feel distinctly unworthy. Fact. It's like this creeping, gnawing sensation of inadequacy. It's fine. It's actually pretty normal when you're faced with the God of the universe, I should think. Except instead of humbling yourself and surrendering to this God who waits longingly for your heart, you decide it's too shaming to go present yourself that way before Him.

Ever had that important meeting with your boss or principal or supervisor? Or if you are the boss, ever had that important meeting with a client or a prospective partner? Or if you're the top gun, have you ever had to meet the cutest guy you've seen this week and you kinda sorta think he smiled at just you that time when you were all walking? Well, what do you do? You do what any red-blooded, twenty-first century female would do (yes, yes, I'm subverting the cliches just a little) - you wash up, make up, pull the skirt down to perfect angles, makes those shoes gleam and wish desperately that the fly-away hair will repent.

But no, scrub that. All those examples don't come close to the magnitude of meeting your Maker. That's right - face to face, in the privacy of your room. And whether you're in your pyjamas or in your best suit, you still have that familiar inadequate feeling. What do you do? You do what any red-blooded, 21st century person would do. You try and scrub up. You put your best foot forward... and fall slightly flat. Because what's different about God is that we're never going to match up. With all those other people, we sometimes forget to understand that we are precious and valued as much as anyone else and equally able. And then with God, we forget to understand that we are precious and valued and God makes us able. He gives us righteousness, because our own is like filthy rags. Yet the righteousness He gives us is impeccable. No, we don't have the satisfaction of making a blood sacrifice, inflicting pain upon ourselves (as some religious systems do for penance) but He actually finds us precious enough to redeem us for eternity. And because His kind of holiness and just pure goodness is impossible to match. I have got to accept that instead of trying pompously to better His offer.

And this is His offer:
He "is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you before his glorious presence without fault and with great joy"... W-o-w. To This God be glory, majesty, power and authority, through Jesus Christ, now and forevermore!

And yet, so often, I just don't get it. Before I can come before God for my God-time that I so desperately need, I try to clean up my act. Unsuccessfully. Of course. God, forgive me for the many times when my misplaced sense of responsibility has prevented me from coming to you just as I am. Help me to accept your love without condition, just as it is given. In Jesus' name, Amen.

With Love from Dubai

I am at the NESA conference at Maggie Moon's engaging workshop on Writing Workshops and making them work for you and the kids. Literacy - hurray! ;)

If you know what the balanced literacy model is, then this is something teachers and students worry about a lot - and learn from even more. I tried to put this up right after we had our own little balanced literacy workshop complete with mini-lesson. Maggie conferred with me and researched my clumsy writing, complimented it and taught beautifully... I had a false start. And Miss Maggie suggested I try being in the moment.

Anyway, as a souvenir from Dubai, here's what came of it:

I have a list of nouns running through my head and the one that sticks out is fear. How Greek of me, even being quite Indian! I think fear is different from nervousness because it cripples you. Nervousness is annoying but sometimes, possibly, maybe even energising. Its familiar buzz creeps up on you in an exam, and you think you just might pull this one off. It’s there when you’re playing a team sport and yet you’ve still got all your faculties working.

AFTER THE CONFERENCE
In the moment...

Looking up the trees, with their still leaves, I can see nothing except spots of sunlight here and there. I am wondering where they are and if they’re still floating. Do they have wings? Or do they just look like ghosts? How will I see my mum if she is shapeless? More importantly, I couldn’t talk to her if I wanted to. And I have so much to say to her. I want to hug her and bury my face in her skirt. I am mad at her and I want to yell back and cry and say it wasn’t fair to say ‘Get your homework done or else…’ or ‘Well, we’re inviting the neighbours for the party even if you and D don’t get along!’ And then I want to say sorry. But mostly, I want to cry except right in my chest, it’s too lumpy and knotty and tight for tears. Ugh.

I am ten. I am standing on the pavement on a road in Madras, with vegetable shops lining one side and little hardware shops lining the other. We were walking along and we had had a pretty peaceful afternoon. There were actually clouds to alleviate the burning heat – yay! My mum had exclaimed at the great price for cabbages somewhere and I had managed to nod knowledgeably. We were talking about stories, after that. Little Women, maybe, and how I wished my cousin hadn’t spoiled the ending for me.

And then…. gone. Just like that. I have looked in all the shops nearby and I can’t see her familiar figure or the colour of her dress. I am convinced this is it. Something’s happened. If there’d been a kidnapping, it would have been noisy. This is something weird – the end of the world. And I cannot move off the pavement. Aaaaaaaaaahhhhh.

Miss Moments

I was going to write about something else entirely. I promise. But I was reading this article and the precociousness of the writer's son struck me... I'm thinking about all the other little kids that have said the strangest things to me. And after a good laugh, I find my nose tickles and my eyes are close to embarrassingly wet. These are my Miss Moments because ever since I started teaching, I've been called Miss ocassionally and, now, more regularly. My adult students called me Miss too, sometimes. But they weren't half as wise. Or lovable... ;)

Way back, when I volunteered as a teacher in Vacation Bible School for the first time, I had a mischievous little 8-year-old who was always yelling and being rowdy and running around drenched in sweat, when he was supposed to be in class. He had the cutest smile. *lip curl~* They always do! :D Anyway, Miss Me was giving Little J a lecture on how painful it was to be running after him all the time, how he was choosing things that weren't going to help him... then Miss Me got a little sneaky and decided to use the old conscience to prod him into good behaviour. So I said, 'J, do you know you're choosing to do everything else but hear the stories about Jesus and how very much He loves us??' I meant it. I truly prayed they would find the passion of God young, if that was what God chose. And then he looked really sorry and said 'Sorry' again and again! Poor little guy - but what made me cry was when I told him he didn't need to be sorry to me. I didn't mean right then, right there... But Little J took one look at my face and raced up to the altar. He stayed there for a good five minutes. And not one of the other kids who'd skyved could call him back or even get his attention.

They can be pretty funny too! I'm in the classroom teaching eco-systems and food chains. And a lot of hands go up. They're shaking those hands about hoping to get my attention before I call on someone else who might 'steal' their answer and say it before them. I look around measuredly. I pick one hand. 'Yes, K, you have a question?' 'Yes. Miss, is teaching your job? Are you a doctor in real life?'. Wow, didn't see that one coming ;)

Haha, and recess time one day, F came running across the playground to me in tears and flapping hands. '*Sob... gasp... heave SOB* Do you know what happened?' I put my hand to my heart, go down on my knees, widen my eyes appropriately and ask the wailing six-year-old, 'No, what happened?!' And in between those sobs, out comes a barely decipherable complaint: 'She's breaking (broken?) my heart!!!!' and he pointed accusingly. 'Break__ *gulp* ... what?! How?' I'm struggling to keep a straight face, by now, of course, and hoping they haven't got some wild maggot of an idea of love into their heads at this age. 'She kicked me in it'... The defendant had been letting go of some mighty kicks that landed in the vicinity of that organ... LOL much?!?!?! In the interest of fairness (although they both got time out because 'We do not hit!'), he'd been bullying the girls and she was part of a concerted effort to rally back ;) You go, sistas?!

Then there was a special needs child in a class of three who were under my care... This little boy refused to go out to recess. He stayed at the altar in the old, colonial church with the large marble slabs and the broad steps to the altar. He just kinda sat there and hugged himself, y'know? And usually, I would repeat myself patiently with the same tone and the same smile three times at least for these kids. Then they would often repeat instructions after me. Then they would move to follow them, and I would lead them along - whether it was to the water filter, or the snacks section or picking up the crayons. Well, I said it. Three times, just like I'd trained myself to. And M said no, and rocked. And I said it again, expecting and dreading a tantrum any moment now! Eek. So I said: 'Don't you want to go, play with your friends? Run and catch? See? It's fun! This is boring. It's snacks time!' Maybe I wanted to just get out, you know?! Out of that classroom for five minutes. And so I think, I repeated, rather like an idiot who knows she's not being heard, 'Play, go, with your friends...' And M said what I never expected him to say. It was the lesson the previous day, but of course, Miss Me thought these kids may not have 'got it'. M said to me: 'But Jesus is my friend'.

Inadequacy

All the reasons I feel inadequate and probably am:

1. My current boss doesn't want to give me a reference for something I want to do AFTER my contract ends because they don't want me to leave. But I really want to do college next year and go back to Oxford!

2. I feel called to do something, and have no idea how I can. I don't have any academic knowledge in the area.

3. I don't know how to make sense of the past two years.

4. I feel I need to do this PD for the sake of the children. And my co-teacher cannot, and I can but intend to leave next year. And they hope PD-doing people can stay.

5. I always feel like I'm less than the other.

6. I'm always thinking self and other.

7. I just don't have what it takes to eat all the chocolate in the world.

8. There's not much I can do about 7.

9. My dogs are too heavy to carry around comfortably but they still look at me pleadingly. And I know what they're saying.

10. 2 Cor 12:9

Monday moods

There's a lot of talk about money. Even in Christianity. In fact, why not? The gospel is for all of life so we should be discussing wealth and/or the lack of it if it applies to our lives... and it surely does. The Bible is for how to live life, and a lot of our life deals with money management... huh?

That said, I have doubts about both sides of this argument... The hate-all-telly-preachers camp and the get-rich-quick camp. Prosperity is productive. Trials are productive. The purpose is God's glory and the way is God's will... But what annoys me is when we are afraid to talk about money because it is evil.

Here I'm going to say something. Wealth is good. Abundance is good. What do we do with it? Serve God, share it. Bottomline.

Now, on a completely different note, before I got sidetracked, here's what I'm thinking about RIGHT now:

Woooaahh, baby! huh?

Things I learned from my Father

I have a bad relationship with my father. I love him. But is there respect? I keep having to remind myself. Don't get me wrong - I am in awe at the way my parents have stayed together despite all odds, personality-wise, financially or family-wise. They belonged to a different era than now, better because 'compatibility' was simply not reason enough. Commitment was always the bigger word - defying arithmetic ;). I appreciate it so much. It's definitely what I want to do myself. But my father was never someone who knew me. He still isn't. That seems like a shameless plug of my own post, but it's not. Trust me.

I learned that knowing from my Father. I learned that discipline comes in love not in anger. I learned that when I make a mistake and am sorry, there are tears in my Father's eyes. I learned that to go to your Father with your problems means that you get a big, fat hug first. And He holds you until you're warm again. When I had a painful operation on my toe, I was old enough to be on my own. I was 21. But the power went out that night and all through the night, my toe throbbed in just the most cry-worthy way. I'm pretty stoic. I never cried when I fell off my bike and had a compound fracture - I insisted I'd go to church first because it was why I was on my bike in the first place. But this night... I cried. Also I didn't go to bed because there was a slight breeze in the living room so I tried to sleep on the sofa. This night, my father sat behind my crouched body (I couldn't lie down because I was jumpy with the pain) and bade me lean on him, so I could sleep. And I remember thinking Wow, this feels like Abba. It was strange that it should and just for those moments, I shut my eyes against the pain and stopped crying and leaned back for more of this unusual, lovely moment. But I already knew what it felt like. God has held me so many times. The first time He held my hand on a  long journey while I was thinking about a big decision, I didn't want to join the others on the camp bus. I didn't want to speak, to break the spell. It felt like... home.

My Father also taught me that He won't give up. By this point in my life, I know that He knows that I'm gonna stumble. We've got to that stage we can roll our eyes at each other about my little mistakes and nod. Unfortunately, they are not all little. But I know and He knows I know that He's gonna pick me up again. And set me right back on my feet and get me to walk again.

I learned that He's always going to ask me what I want, and why I'm crying. Even if He knows. Which, let's face it, He usually does. He knows I want Him. And - here's the amazing thing - He lets me know He needs me and wants me. Oh, not for support or to help Him carry the water back into the house or even to be there when He's talking to other people. He uses me sometimes then. Sometimes I actually get to translate - if the other person is waiting to understand. Sometimes someone else has translated for me. Still that's not what He needs me for. He needs me. And when I crawl back onto His lap after a long day, even if I'm late, He's waiting for that cuddle. I love Him. And He actually hurts when I forget. 

These days there's been a lot of relationship advice I've needed my Father about. I wonder sometimes if He smiles indulgently. Sometimes my eyes are so blurred with tears that I can't see. Happy tears, mind you. Thinking tears, about how it should be when it does happen. Still I always hear Him. Even with my headphones on, He makes sure... I don't ever remember my Father yelling at me. He's been stern though, firm, sad, decisive... No-nonsense... But no - I don't think He's been mad at me and not in love with me - ever. He never once raised His hand or any other thing in anger.

I know from my Father's eyes that He thinks I'm pretty important. Baby, does that work wonders for my self-esteem! He's kinda that parent rooting for their kid every event. He knows what grade I make, He knows what I want to do next - yet He's not the nosy kind at all. He'll wait for me to tell Him because He knows I trust Him and He expects it. But still He just knows, y'know... Perceptive, my Dad. But when I'm ready to talk - I can just tell He so wants to listen. Of course, He has different ideas from mine. Often. But what's weird is that I talk to Him and I know that I just want to make Him proud. Then again His ideas are so much better - He's known me and the world for longer than I have ;) Sometimes I've been stupid enough to dump His idea completely and do just mine. All these hormones ;)! I've never regretted anything as much. Sometimes what people said has been more important than my Father - He knows now that I am so so sorry. It was wrong for me and it hurt Him. I wouldn't be surprised if the first caused the second. Usually everything I have wanted to do from the bottom of my heart comes from a childhood passion. That passion comes from my Dad's passion. That glow in His eyes when He talks about it. And I know that I know that I'd be good at this - because I'm getting the vision from the wisest, most intimate person I've known in all my life. My Father isn't an old fogey - He's got my name tattooed on His hand. The only tattoo that doesn't turn me aaaalll the way OFF! ;) 

I learned that all this is what Fathers do. I learned to look for these things in my father here. And to remember them. I learned that I have to keep remembering to forgive myself and everyone else because I'm nowhere near as good at it as He is. I learned that if I ever have children, I want my husband and me to love them like my Father did and will. He'll be simply awesome - as always - when they're around, if that should be a blessing I will one day have! I just know this! I learned that who I am grows in Who my family is. I learned that no one else will ever be able to define love for me in the way that my Father does.

No Shadow of Turning

I'm copying my random Oswald Chambers' reading today because it ties in to what God's been whispering gently into my heart this Saturday. Desensitised to sin anyone? Some sins become normal, don't they? Oh, that's not so bad - look at this! Or she's okay but look at him! I cringe when I hear people saying things like that - am I hearing myself?

THE MASTER ASSIZES "For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ." 2 Corinthians 5:10 Paul says that we must all, preacher and people alike, "appear before the judgment seat of Christ." If you learn to live in the white light of Christ here and now, judgment finally will cause you to delight in the work of God in you. Keep yourself steadily faced by the judgment seat of Christ; walk now in the light of the holiest you know. A wrong temper of mind about another soul will end in the spirit of the devil, no matter how saintly you are. One carnal judgment, and the end of it is hell in you. Drag it to the light at once and say - "My God, I have been guilty there." If you don't, hardness will come all through. The penalty of sin is confirmation in sin. It is not only God who punishes for sin; sin confirms itself in the sinner and gives back full pay. No struggling nor praying will enable you to stop doing some things, and the penalty of sin is that gradually you get used to it and do not know that it is sin. No power save the incoming of the Holy Ghost can alter the inherent consequences of sin. "But if we walk in the light as He is in the light." Walking in the light means for many of us walking according to our standard for another person. The deadliest Pharisaism to-day is not hypocrisy, but unconscious unreality.