This week has been so, so amazing! Well, in little Pamela ways, that is. Which is to say, I realized many new things about myself and God and the relationship between the two. I also had several *really* good conversations.
Basically, last Thursday was a really low point for me. From the minute my alarm started beeping I was feeling negative for no reason at all. Which was annoying. I don't like hanging out with me when I'm being negative about life. But I've realized over the past few days that it was a negativity that had been building for perhaps a month or more over a thousand small selfish decisions. And in general I 'learned' that it is a bad idea to ask God for something, have him give it to me, and then decide it is inconvenient so try to run away from it. A *really* bad idea. It is also a really bad idea to sit in a corner waiting for God to do something, anything. He does much more work in churches and streets and conversations than in corners.
I was really hit by a Bible verse this week:
We proclaim him, admonishing and teaching everyone with all wisdom, so that we may present everyone perfect in Christ. To this end I labor, struggling with all his energy, which so powerfully works in me. ~Colossians 1:28-29
The "struggling with all his energy" part was what hit the hardest. It is amazing to think about someone having all of God's energy and still struggling. It is sometimes sad to realize how much I am integrated into the "instant" aspect of American culture. But to struggle means that things will not be instant. It means that sometimes my work will have more failures than successes (from my perspective); that sometimes it will be painful; that sometimes I will have to learn how weak I am. But I decided this week that I was ready to start struggling again.
And with that decision...it's like everything came back! Joy was back; peace was back; hope was back. I had the strength to go and talk to my pastor about starting a prayer group, and so we were able to start the week at Hongo with all the staff members praying together. That night one of the girls who had expressed an interest in Christianity weeks ago was back after being absent for a couple weeks, and she ended up waiting for a friend, so we got to talk for maybe 20 minutes. She asked about the basic beliefs of Christianity, so I explained them. She still wanted to know more about Christianity, and had wondered about books, so I gave her Mere Christianity in Japanese. The next night another girl who had seemed interested in Christianity reappeared after a couple weeks, and we were able to talk after class when she confessed how much she wanted to have lunch or something with me because she had a lot of questions but she had been afraid to ask since she was my student. I'm really excited about her...she's my age, we've both been to Africa, and she has a lot of depth. What more could you ask for in a friend? ;)
In addition, I've been fighting a lot with my Thursday morning class about my teaching style. Fighting is only a little bit more extreme than the truth...maybe two classes we've spent half an hour or so with them just complaining about my teaching style and me attempting to defend it (in the most diplomatic and sympathetic way possible). One of my "problem students" from this class came to my Wednesday evening class. She started trying to bring up the same arguments there, and my Wednesday students (to my immense relief) took over my defense. That student couldn't be in class this morning (which was why she had been there on Wednesday) and the class went so well! We played "Two Truths and a Lie", which is a game where you come up with three things about yourself, one of which is a lie. The goal is to guess which of a person's statements is a lie. The most beautiful thing about it was that one of my other problem students, who has never looked happy in my class, won the game and was successful at something for the first time. So she was smiling! It was so lovely!
