Tag Archives: me

What I pray everyday

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reflection

Nothing fancy, but it’s heartfelt.

Simple.

Honest.

And I think He’s listening, because it seems to be working.

Lord, give me a task that no one else can do.

Then when those instances come, what I might think is a nuisance or an interruption to normal life, I’m more apt to respond with a YES, because I’m getting what I asked Him to give me.

Something only I can do.

Me . . . Monica, a homeschooling mom with a desire beyond the walls of my home, to change the world – or at least a desire for making an impact in the lives of others, to be on the front lines in the battle.

These are only first thoughts on this subject: I have a feeling I’ll be writing a lot more on this simple prayer. I need a way to look back to see how far the Lord takes me on this.

This is another post inspired by The Missional Mom (Living With Purpose at Home and in the World) by Helen Lee.

 

What I learned about myself at VBS this year

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me in Mary costume (aka Mary has an iPhone) for Hometown Nazareth, VBS

This past week, I played the part of Mary, the mother of Jesus, at our church’s Vacation Bible School program. Everyday I told the children a story of Jesus from Mary’s perspective. The birth of God’s son, from far-away Magi bringing gifts, an escape to Egypt, encountering old prophets in the temple, loosing a boy Jesus at Passover and that first water-to-wine miracle at a wedding.

I went to sleep every night with thoughts of how I would tell these stories, getting the words exactly right for the kids. Working into the narrative exactly how I would ask the children questions to pull them along into this imaginary world of ancient Nazareth. We had a script, but I tweaked most of it to fit the needs of our program, taking up a good deal of my mental energy.

Friends, I don’t think I’ve ever enjoyed myself more at Vacation Bible School.

Some days I felt I really nailed the story. I remembered everything I wanted to say (I memorized as much as I could, only going up on stage with an index card of key points.) I’ve done little skits and and plays at church before, but nothing like this. Few props, only one other character who popped out at the very end for me to interact with.

Basically, it was just me as Mary with the job of communicating a story. Each morning a monologue.

For the first time – and this is the part I want to express most of all – people came up to me to say how they enjoyed something creative I had done. On Monday, a church elder stopped me as I left the stage to give me a kiss on the cheek and words of well done. All week I heard pretty much the same thing. I think someone may have said “anointed”. I even got a, “Wow, Monica, you have found your niche!”

Never in all my years as a volunteer in ministry has anything like that happened before. I can’t ever recall a time when people expressed strong feelings of “Hey, you do that really well!” to me about anything.

Can I tell you all this without it sounding like I’m bragging? I hope so. I know where I made mistakes and fumbled a bit for the correct part of the words to come out. There were a couple of days when I came away from the children kicking myself for forgetting a part of the story. I wished a few times that I had more than one opportunity to present each story so I had time to get it right with more emotion and better expression.

But it was fun. Even with all the work, memorization, tweaking the script, nervous energy before the performance, it was a LOT of fun. And the children! Sometimes antsy, often distracted, they were engaged and wanting to hear what Mary had to say. I even had one young girl with her Bible open on her lap to show me where exactly she could read the story for herself.

Isn’t that neat?

So, that’s what I learned about myself this past week. It seems I have a knack for oral storytelling.

Dare I say it’s a gift? I would certainly like to think it is.

Another thought: Could it be that my love for writing, especially true-life stories, is directly related to a gift of storytelling?

This past week has given me a lot to think about. Just like Mary pondered all those stories about Jesus in her heart, I’ve now got something to think about too. Like . . . now what do I do with this gift?

Thoughts?

 

Thoughts regarding online v. offline homeschool community

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As a homeschooling mom, I rely on my online friendships and communities more than my flesh-and-bone relationships. I’m not sure that’s the best thing for me, but it is what it is.

Can you hear the sadness as I type?

When I first began homeschooling officially, when my firstborn turned six, I already had a community of online support I visited frequently. You know how I love books. Using the Five in a Row guides for our early learning kept our days full of fun. We read, did the activities, tinkered with math and lived life. When I needed a mental break, sort of a “Mommy needs to check in with her girl friends”, I logged onto the FIAR message boards.

Don’t you just love message boards? Conversation not reduced to just 140 characters. You can lurk. You can comment. Laugh and cry  together. Lift each other up in prayer. Just the thing for a newbie homeschool mom who loves to talk and write.

After a few years, when I grew more confident in what I needed to concentrate on or ignore with our little “non-school at home”, I left behind FIAR. Reluctantly, I left the message boards too.

Housekeeping immediately improved.

Then I discovered blogging.

Housework again tossed aside to write, meet other homeschool, blogging moms. The blogosphere : joy!

By this time, I plugged into two local groups.  One a co-op with lots of kids, with moms actively engaged in getting the best learning opportunities for their children. The other is a support group for the Christian homeschooling family.

We didn’t last long at the co-op. The story of why is too long to tell in this post; perhaps sometime I will. As I sit here typing all of this I can see the faces of the lovely moms I felt a true kindred-spirit connection. I miss them. We talked when we met together. We had fellowship.

Now I think of this other group – the Christians-only group in which I currently serve on it’s leadership team – and it’s all frustration and disappointment. And I don’t like laying out criticism on the Internet to whine and complain about an all-volunteer organization, so I will keep this rant brief.

Oh, how I wish my homeschooling, Christian friends would be more flexible and took time for more mom-fellowship, pursued opportunities to get together just to talk and encourage each other. I’m so tired of asking these moms to gather together at a park on a beautiful day so our kids could be together, yet all I receive in return is silence.

Yes, I value my online community – all of you reading this blog, Twitter  – far more than the offline world that is nothing like I thought it would be when I began homeschooling six years ago.

It’s online where I know of other Christians learning the unschooling way.

It’s online where I can go with a tweet when I’m having a bad day to get an encouraging word to keep going.

It’s online where I can read the words of a mom just like me and not feel weird, alone or crazy for rejecting government schooling.

I continue to homeschool with the hope that I would find a local, sold-out-to-the-Lord family who doesn’t think textbooks are the only way to learn.

Maybe I need to join another message board.

This week The Homeschool Village is comparing notes on online communities. Write your own thoughts on your experiences with online communities and your homeschooling, then link up. Don’t forget to visit the other blogs participating.