Nicaragua

A year or so ago I was sitting at Tuesday night 8:01 when an announcement was made about a Christmas break mission trip to Nicaragua...and I thought it would be kind of cool but dismissed it. I mean, I didn't really know these people or anything and I 'd never been on a mission trip before so I probably wasn't the person for this trip. But then for the next few weeks, they kept making the same announcement that they had a few more spots...and I couldn't get it off my mind. So I prayed about it and took the leap.
Then on that snowy New Year's Eve as we all sat around in the Springfield airport, I realized I still didn't know these people I was about to spend 12 days with and I was so scared that it wouldn't go well. We settled in to our home for the trip, a school in Tipitapa, that night and set to work first thing the next morning. After a long day of work, we sat around and worshiped together and had a devotional time together and discussed the day.
The best part came the next morning when the kiddos arrived at the school for VBS...

We played games, taught VBS, and did a craft with these amazing, sweet children who are so full of love! It was so great and the 3 days spent doing that were simply perfect. The end of VBS was sad for me as I didn't know what the kids were going home to or who would take the time to spend with them and show them that they're so loved.

Fortunately, the trip didn't end there! We had the chance to do 2 more days of VBS in other towns. One was called Tule, it is a very small, very poor, community way up off the beaten path and we were the first group of visitors ever to go there.

One thing that struck me about this town were words from their pastor who told us that they TRY to feed the kids every day but they always make sure they're fed on Sundays...it was absolutely heart wrenching. Not to mention that we later found out that these people had really wanted to cook a meal for us...they have nothing, but they wanted to give what they do have to us. The entire community packed into their tiny church for VBS with some of the older men crowding around the windows just to see inside.

After that we played the biggest game of duck, duck, goose I've ever seen. It was so fun seeing an entire community laughing and cheering over a children's game!

Tule was amazing! Truly a lesson in relying solely on God and about how much joy you can have even when you don't have anything else.

Our other VBS experience happened in a town called Masaya.

There, had lots of time to play games with the kids during the day before attending a youth service at their church that evening. During the service, on of the most memorable moments of my life happened; some of our team were leading a few songs and they started singing Revelation Song, after maybe 2 lines our Nicaraguan brothers and sisters picked up the same song in Spanish. So we had a church full of people all singing the same praises at the same time, in both Spanish and English and it really hit me how big the family of Christ is! Amazing!

Our last day in Nicaragua was spent doing various work projects at the home base for our partner missionary and wrapping up all the we had experienced.

It was such an amazing trip and really pounded home my love for this world and all of the amazing people God has put in it. I learned to trust...I went into the trip scared and not sure about it. I came home with a whole new group of family! And now I'm getting ready to return. The team is different and the experience promises to be different but I cannot wait. I look forward to what God has to show me there, bonding with our team, and wrapping my arms around all of my Nicaraguan brothers and sisters that I've missed so dearly since we left!
So, talk to me if you'd like to partner with me and CCH in this amazing trip, your prayers or support would be greatly appreciated!

Too Cool for School

I don't love studying.

I hate studying.

I like learning.

Learning is beautiful.

-Natalie Portman

I contemplated this today while I was last minute skimming over my educational psych stuff before our first test this morning. I love this quote as it encompasses my feelings about college almost perfectly. 

When I look through the course list for Missouri State, I want to take everything. I want to learn all of the history of everywhere, be at least able to hold a conversation in a whole host of languages, I want to learn about cultures and what the rest of this big old round world is like, I want to take photography and video classes, I want to write and read and learn everything this hub of knowledge has to offer. But that's not how we see college, is it? We see as the means to an end. A ticket to a job that we might not even really want. A piece of paper entitling us to a bigger paycheck. We are supposed to get in and get out and be big kids as fast as we can.

I'm asked, at the very least, once a week how much longer I'll be in school...and I hate that question. I don't know. It really depends how many more times I'm distracted by the draw of learning something that's not part of my degree like when I took French or my Comparative Mythology class. Were they necessary? Nope. Did I study for those classes? Nope. Did I learn new things and love them. YES!

The other thing that absolutely kills school for me are the professors that take what might be awesome learning and turn it into drudgery. Like my edu psych professor who told us to be studying 9 hours a week outside of class...yeah, right. I'm going to take your class, take the tests, and never bother to think about it again. If a professor isn't excited enough to find resources other than the book, why should I be?

Sure, I could read books about anything and everything on my own, but how much more will I learn and how many more questions can be answered if I have a professor who is, theoretically, an expert on a given subject teaching me? 

Let's not forget the fact that my major classes are a colossal waste of time. Yes, Spanish literature is awesome. But let me discover that on my own. Let me go out in the world and start doing something that matters with what I know. Let me perfect my language skills in a place where I have to use them, mess them up, and test them out on my own. Don't make me sit through a class on business Spanish which will bore me to death.

 Blah, where was this originally headed? I dunno. Maybe it was just me ranting. Ask me how school is and I'll tell you it's school. I'm tired of it. I wanna be learning all the things, even those not in my major, or be out and about really experiencing this world and learning from the real world.