Flashback: Nap Time

"And he said, “My presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.” ~Exodus 33:14

One of my favorite parts of my trip was the children's Bible study I held daily. Bible study was from 1 to 2, kids would start showing up at 12:15 and would leave by 2:45. There would be people ranging in ages from 1 to 19 or so. It was relaxed, casual, and a whole lot of fun.

The one year old boy, Poppe, would come down with the other children from the children's home and would be very fussy every now and then. After all, one year olds need naps. The first time it happened I noticed the other kids talking about taking him back so he wouldn't bother anyone. As they were talking, the crying boy was just wondering around the porch. I picked him up and within a minute he was asleep on my shoulder. So I held him as I taught.

The only time Poppe would sleep in my arms was when I was teaching, and I loved every second of it!

Jesus says, "whoever welcomes little children in my name also welcomes me." So that is what I tried to do. It didn't matter what the child needed, I would do what I could to meet their needs and make sure they knew they were love. Sometimes that meant explaining that they needed to apologize to or forgive another child, sometimes it meant giving them water or a small snack, and sometimes it meant letting a child sleep in my arms as I taught the Word of God.

Flashback: The Joys of Teaching

"A joyful heart is good medicine, but a broken spirit drains one's strength." Proverbs 17:22

Even though I have been back in the states for a little over a month, Sierra Leone is always in the back of my mind. Everything reminds me of my time there and God is continuing to teach me things about Him through my experiences there. I wanted to share one of my favorite memories...

I went up to Hope's Rising for our daily tutoring time. Nothing was set up and the kids were running around playing and doing their chores - a fairly typical scene. I went over to talk with the director of the home and saw the stack of report cards, one for each child.

Before I continue, you need to know that filling out the report cards are not easy for the teachers. I will never complain about having to enter grades into a computer and simply printing them out again. For each child the teacher writes down 3 scores (one for each term). The passing grades (above 50%) are written in blue and the failing grades (below 50%) are written in red. If the teachers make a mistake they either have to find chalk to cover up their mistake or cut out a small square of paper to put over it because there are no extra copies and no white out. Then they have to find the average, which becomes the child's final score. It doesn't end there. Then the teachers have to look at the whole class and rank each child in the class. It is a long process all done by hand and usually done without a calculator.

As I was looking through the report cards I was pleased to find very few red marks and the blue marks were fairly high (60s and 70s) for the most part. A celebration started at Hope's Rising. There were high fives, hugs, kisses, and smiles. I lost count of how many times I said, "I am so proud of you" or "Your hard work paid off" or "You are so smart!"

Morie and Nanah celebrating their end of the year results for school.

We never did get to tutoring that day. Instead we celebrated all of their hard work for hours. This was more important since there aren't many times these kids get to just be kids. They don't get praise for their work very often. They do not have parents that tell them how proud of them they are. The compliments and positive comments just don't happen often. Celebrating large achievements happens at times, but rarely do these kids get to celebrate the small ones (like finishing class 1 and being promoted to class 2). I don't know about you, but I could use a little more celebration in my life and a little less stress. I was reminded that day to stop and enjoy the moments, no matter how ordinary they seem. After all, it was God that said, "A joyful heart is good medicine." My prayer is that God would help me and those I know to stop and take time to celebrate life's blessings.