Messages Magnifying His Majesty

Recently, God has been teaching me a lot.

At work, my class has been very hard to handle, many of them have been absent, so it has been overwhelming trying to get anything taught or any work done, since I am always either dealing with discipline issues or catching students up from missing days or weeks of school. However, through this, God has reminded me of the importance of being completely dependent upon Him. He has shown me how truly, no matter how frustrating a person may be, each individual is made to reflect His image in their own unique way. He has reminded me of the importance of giving my all and having a joyful heart in the midst of hard times.

At church we have been going through the study of Exodus. It has been a good reminder of God's love for us, His power, His atoning sacrifice, and His constant presence even when He seems distant. I was thinking this evening about the Israelites and their 400 years of enslavement and comparing it to the 400 years of silence between Malachi and when Jesus was born. In both situations, I am sure people wondered where God was, as sometimes I wonder in my own situations. Yet, then God comes as the "I am." Christ comes as Emmanuel (God with us). He is existent and present in our lives.

In a staff devotions at school, God keeps reminding me of the importance of living each day bring God the glory. This also connects to the Exodus study, as we have talked about how God delivers the Israelites to demonstrate His glory.

Also, with His little nudges each day, God keeps reminding me that it is not about me. That he prefers me to serve those around me through small acts of love than to work on showing that I am a great teacher or doing things for me to enjoy. He is reminding me that I need to poor myself out in love to serve those around me. As I have been overwhelmed with making sure that I eat and sleep and still get at least some of my work done, I have not spent the energy I should in serving God in this way yet.

God has also been blessing me in great ways.
- While my class has been challenging, they seem to be growing and maturing and this week they behaved incredibly well and we were able to do many fun things in class and get a lot of work done as well.
- Since I broke my foot in May, my foot has either been in a cast or been in pain. This week, I started going to physiotherapy, and it has improved tremendously. This weekend, I plan to go jogging at least once to see how it does.
- God is allowing me opportunities to get more involved with my church, which has helped me feel so much more at home.
- The 4th/5th grade girls' basketball team that I am coaching has a great attitude and loves playing, even if they are playing a team that is much bigger and rougher than they are. Our team was moved to a harder division, which has been really challenging, but I think will stretch them and make them better basketball players in the end.
- Today we had middle school girls help out in our classroom. They were a huge blessing as they helped my students get unfinished work done, prayed with my students, and then played games with them.
- God has allowed me opportunities to get to know my staff members more, through prayer groups and dinners out, which has been phenomenal.
- Even though my class is hard to control, they love participating, even in Bible, which was a struggle last year. 

The road to Emmaus

This past week was the first week that our church started a series on Exodus. I started reading a book called redemption, talking about the story of Exodus through the lens of God's story of redemption. The introduction emphasized the point that we often try to make ourselves the center of our story. However, the story is really about God. I have been challenged to look back on the events of my life and put them in perspective with who God is and his story of redemption; to take each moment and remember that I am not the center, but God is using what I am going through to bring glory to himself; to remember that God has a great plan that I can put my hope in daily. Today, I reflected on different ways God has manifested himself through my life (i.e. as a restorer, through the way he always heals my broken bones and other injuries). How awesome it is to just look and see God in history, even if it is just a small part of His great story. In church this morning, I was challenged to respond to God with a willing and joyful heart, because ultimately every moment of my life is about Him. Isn't that what Jesus was telling the disciples on the road to Emmaus?

Oh, but how I forget that He is the center of it all! Every day, I get overwhelmed with the work I need to do, I put my desires in things other than Christ alone, I fear the future. God has already written the story, and I need to seek Him first. Then everything else will fall into place. I need to realize, that I am insignificant in the grand scheme of things, but God has graciously chosen to weave me into His story.

What a Barabbas I am!

This morning I was reading the end of Matthew and it hit me again how similar I am to Barabbas and how awesome God's grace is. Like Barabbas, I have committed numerous treacheries against God. The only difference, is his were that everyone knew about. Christ, in his grace died and in doing so, saved Barabbas from his death as a criminal, and me from my death as a sinner. How great is God's grace!