How can you start out with trying to explain an amazing trip with just words? Words can’t come close to explaining everything we/I have learnt. But the best place to start is the beginning of today’s entry: Day 9th June 2015, Singapore, 9.
At 10AM this morning, we went to West Coast Park and played Ultimate Frisbee. We got to sweat it out & there was tons of running - it was a blast. The park had an amazing huge, futuristic playground. A bunch of us teachers released our inner child and played on it.
For lunch, we had pattaya fried rice & tom yum.
After a fun morning, we went back to the hotel for my favourite time of the day: Devotion time! How it works
We all get together and our leaders ask us questions and we get into small groups & talk about these questions.
Today, we talked about a super simple but hard question. The thing with the study is that it’s not just a “read a bible verse and move on” type of thing; NO, it’s a study. You need to dig down deep in your soul and be perfectly honest with yourself and your friends.
Today, one of the questions asked was “Are you able to surrender your family, friends, dreams and even your own life to follow and live for Christ? I had never thought of that before.
It’s easy to say “yes” right away, because we know we should be able to say “yes”. But are we willing to say “yes” honestly? It was a mind-boggling question.
After searching our hearts deeply, we were able to say “yes”. It’s so encouraging to have everyone be perfectly honest with each other.
After our devotion groups, we all get back into a big group again. Every team writes down a question and then our leader reads them and we all discuss them. The leader doesn’t answer them, but opens it up for others to answer. Sometimes, the most simple questions can be the most convicting to your heart. But to hear everyone’s opinion and how they explain things is just intriguing.
After devotions, we get our lesson for CI all planned and done. Everyone went into their groups. After being done with everything, we had rest time J
Time flies by like the sun rises in the morning. Before I knew it, it was time to go to CI and dinner! We all walked as a group to the building where we we are having CI. After preparing the crafts for tonight, we ate a delicious dinner.
Then that time of the night came - the kids started to arrive! In my class, we have 5 children, 2 assistants and a leader. The first night of CI in Singapore, all of our kids were super shy and hardly talked at all. But tonight is a different story. They all were talking! We as teachers and assistants were super excited! One of my kids is super shy. He was crying when he first got to class, but by the time all the other kids left to paly a game, he talked to m! I was so excited and blessed by that - even though it was only 3 words, he talked! (:
Then it was story time. Tonight we did a story of Hadassah who became Queen Esther. We were trying to get the point across of Authority – that God uses authority for good. I just happened to have played Esther. All the actors and actresses did a great job! They story of Esther really shows how she respected authority and how obedient she was to the Lord. Even though she was afraid to go to the king and ask for her life to be spared, she knew that God uses authority and how obedient she was to the Lord. Even though she was afraid to go the king and ask for her life to be spared, she knew that God uses authority for good. It was a great skit. Then it as time for small group - we took our kids back to our classroom and taught them about how we are orphans without Christ.
I think that the lesson probably touched me more than it touched the kids. For myself, it opened my eyes to show that without Christ, we are all orphans. God is so good. I personally was super excited about teaching tonight.
At the end, all the kids were happy and excited for tomorrow! When your students are happy, it makes you happy. We had our cool down and everyone shared bout their night. Overall, everyone else had a great night also and they were excited fortomorrow night.
One of the many things I have learned on this trip is perspective as a teacher. Just because you weren’t able to finish the whole lesson or something went wrong, it all turns out for the good. God uses it all for good. I’m thrilled to see what all God is going to do and everything else God is going to teach me.
With a willing heart and an open mind,
Olivia Stano
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