"show me how I should live this,
show me where I should walk..."
-Brooke Fraser, Faithful

"Let me hear Your lovingkindess in the morning;
For I trust in You;
Teach me the way in which I should walk..."
Psalm 143:8



i want so badly to walk the way well.

dear restless heart

Dear restless heart, be still; don't fret and worry so;
God has a thousand ways His love and help to show;
just trust, and trust, and trust until His will you know.

Dear restless heart, be still, for peace is God's own smile,
His love can every wrong and sorrow reconcile;
just love, and love, and love and calmly wait awhile.

Dear restless heart, be still! Don't struggle to be free;
God's life is in your life, from Him you may not flee;
just pray, and pray, and pray, 'til you have faith to see.

-Edith Willis Linn

what a sweet poem!!
one of the things i love most about it is the last line of each stanza- the repetition there seems to say that you can't just trust once, or love a little bit, or pray one time...you keep on trusting and loving and praying consistently and through anything, good or bad! it's like in thessalonians when Paul encourages us to "excel still more"...love still more, pray still more, trust still more. and thus, the restless heart is stilled.

beautiful day

so i'm posting a lot.
but there's a lot going on.
and i just can't help but share.
after all, have any of you ever known me as a girl without SOMETHING to say!? :)
actually, when i think about it, recently, there have been a few times where i've been at a loss for words.
but that's a different topic of conversation.


first:
another fun quote for the day!
Riley: "Ms. Cochran, how do you say "I like your dress"?"
Me: "Me gusta tu vestido."
Riley: "Yeah...um me gusta...well whatever you said."
Me: "Thank you, Riley."
Other student: "The polka dots make it look like a Twister board!"
Student 2: "YEAH! We could play Twister on you!"
Me: "Hmmm, that's kind of awkward."
Jarech: "Well you can just take your dress off!"
this is my life. and i love it.

i really do teach the kids Spanish. te prometo.

here's the deal:
i am kind of ridiculous. one day, i'm totally and completely sure that every bit of faith that i have is in God and that i'm trusting Him with everything, and i'm feelin' great. the next day, i wake up and i can't even remember what it felt like or looked like to be in that place...even though it was just the day before. i'm whiny, and i complain, and do all those other things that silly human beings do. i let myself get overwhelmed because in some twisted way in my mind, i DESERVE it because of "everything i'm going through." well, the Lord has been teaching me...over....and over...and over again....that faith doesn't FEEL. it just IS or it ISN'T. faith doesn't leave at the first sign of trouble. and faith doesn't second guess truth. it doesn't wait for me to FEEL like believing. it just believes. it's the deep breath during those times of overwhelmingness (made up word!!) and it's the written Word that never changes. why can't i get my mind around this!? it's so awesome! shoot.

anyways..........that's all. :)

highs and lows

rough day.

but these at least made me laugh:

Student 1: "What color are the ducks in Mexico?"
Student 2: "NO! Duck in Spanish is TACO!"
Me: "I am so confused right now."

Me: "Cole, take the sweatshirt off your head."
Cole: "IT'S A TURBANNNN!!!"

Evan: "Ms. Cochran! Tell Joe not to throw my book off the desk anymore!"
Joe: "A demon did it!!!"

I give a kid 1 minute to go get a drink of water...another student thought he was going to the bathroom and said this upon his return:
"Dude, he did that in a minute!? I can't even get my pants down that fast!"
Me: "He only went to get a drink AND that's a little more than I needed to know, thanks though."

and the quote of the day:
Student: "How do you say, like, "I am doing something"?"
Me: "For example: Estoy haciendo mi tarea- I am doing my homework."
Joe: "Wait can you say that again?" (with mischievous look on his face)
Me: "No, Joe, we're talking about doing SOMETHING not doing SOMEONE."
Joe: "How did you know I was going to ask that!?"
Me: *shaking my head* "I have an 8th grade mind."


when i can't feel You,
i have learned to reach out just the same
when i can't hear You
i know You still hear every word i pray
and i want You more than i wanna live another day
and as i wait for You, maybe i'm made more
faithful

firsts

i gave my first quiz today.

...it was a disaster.

so now we go from here, and i re-think my teaching strategies and think of ways to get the kiddos to pay more attention.

at first i was frustrated. very frustrated. and then i thought about it on my nice long 46 1/2 minute drive home, and i thought "no. this is good. the only way i can get better is from learning from the disasters!"

thank the Lord that He has put His own better attitude in me than leaving me to be negative in my own!!

:)

simply

"rejoice always;
pray without ceasing;
in everything give thanks; for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus."
1 thess 5:16-18

my heart has been humbled by grace.

singing

Heal my heart and make it clean
open up my eyes to the things unseen
teach me how to love like You have loved me
break my heart for what breaks Yours
everything I am for Your kingdom's cause
as I go from earth into eternity

-from one of my favorite songs EVER...
Hosanna, Hillsong/Brooke Fraser

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=we4t0fAnGBA&feature=related
that's the song, give it a listen! good stuff!!!


as a side note...Brooke Fraser has pretty much written all of my favorite songs ever, you know the ones that basically say things that you could never find a good way to say/pray for yourself. yeah, she's stellar.

teaching is just funny

this was a great quotes day.

"Ms. C...did you know that using anti-bacterial hand sanitizer can actually cause some bacteria to build up an immunity to it?"
"Yes. I did know that."
"Did you also know that anti-bacterial hand sanitizer tastes like Ever-Clear?"
"I'm sorry..what?
"Ummmm...."
"Riley, how do you know what hand sanitizer tastes like?...better yet...how would you even know what Ever Clear tastes like?"
"Well...I...um...well Ms. C you went to college right!?"
"Yeah......but you didn't."
"Didn't you drink Ever Clear?"
"No, I didn't drink a thing until I turned 21."
"WHAT!? But you went to COLLEGE!"
"Yes."
"Were you in a sorority?"
"Yes."
(other student) "Those are drinking clubs!!!"
"Ok we are not talking about this anymore."
(trying to move on)
5 minutes later...
"Ms. C, you seriously have not ever had Ever Clear???"
"NO! Just play your Bingo Riley!"
hahahahha...oh man. hilarious.

LATER:
I taught the kids how to say "What are you going to do this weekend" in Spanish.
"Ms. C, what are you going to do this weekend?"
"well, I have to take an important test tomorrow morning, a teacher test."
"And then are you going to party?"
"Hmm, probably not."
"WHY NOT!? You should party Ms. C!"
"OK."
"No, seriously. You go to the club this weekend and you get yourself some dudes! You need some dudes!"
UN.REAL.

Then I had a kid tell me he loved me.

Students have started to say hi to me in the hall.

I got a "Happy Gram" from one of my students saying that she was so glad I was her Spanish teacher and that I was really nice. :) :)

I got a note from the principal saying I was doing a good job (that was HUGE to me)

I got the most ADD kid I have ever seen who never participates in anything to play Bingo today. and he won. it was awesome.


I'm starting to settle in...and I think I like this whole "teacher" thing!

after blessings

So I love the movie The Dark Knight. I won't even mention how many times I've watched it over the last 10 days (In my defense, 5 of those days were spent inside because of ice and sleet and whatnot). Yeah, I know. It's ridiculous. And I hardly ever watch "comic book movies". But seriously...stick with me. I'm going somewhere with this.
I was thinking the other day about why I like Batman so much. What is it about him that is captivating? I came up with a few answers.
1. He fights people/things that are evil.
2. He protects people.
3. He's fierce.
4. He's pretty consistent.
There's this part, where the new District Attorney and his girlfriend (who also happens to be the object of Batman's affection) are each tied up and strapped to multiple explosive devices and a bomb timer by the Joker, who is actually at this point captured and being interrogated (or tortured) by Batman. The Joker tells Batman that he can only save one of them, and then tells him the addresses of where they're at. With no hesitation, and absolute determination he is going to go save his girl. (This is where the illustration stops being useful because the Joker lied and mixed up the addresses so....she dies. sorry if you haven't seen it).
The Point: I realized that Batman helped me see that this is what the Lord has been trying to tell me for a very, very long time. That HE will fight for me. He will fight those things that are evil. He'll protect me. The Lord isn't a passive bystander...He's the fiercest fighter that there is. Batman is pretty consistent....but the Lord is constant, never-changing. He would drop everything and forget all else to rescue me from whatever situation I was in.

Ridiculous that I discovered this from Batman? Yes. Applicable? Absolutely.

I feel like this revelation came at a perfect time, and that if I had to pick a theme for my last few weeks, it'd definitely be some kind of battle/warrior/fighting theme. Fighting battles against temptation, lies, all those things that satan likes to throw at you. Fighting off fear and anxiety of starting a new job. Fighting worry about not being able to pay for things. And then that revelation came along and I was like YEAH. I have Someone FIGHTING for me.
Then, things went really well for a bit and I kind of reached this "high point." It was awesome. I'm reminded of a Steven Curtis Chapman song where he says "Faith flowed like a river free and deep, and grace was not so hard to be believed..." and then the next day, I woke up and felt completely empty...and the song continues..."but that was yesterday...and what was close enough to touch now seems a world away." Couldn't have said it better myself. So I got frustrated and thought "well what was all that for then!?" Didn't expect to get an answer so quick.
The devotion for that day in my "Streams in the Desert" book (which is amazing) was about how the Lord will put you in a "desert" of spiritual sorts sometimes after what you might call a spiritual "high". But it said that He doesn't do it because He's casting you out, or doesn't think you're doing it right...it's because He sees you as fit to withstand the test of faith. The quote said "After blessings comes the battle...yet it is a period that always ends in certain triumph for those who have committed the keeping of their souls to God." Mind.blowing. All that revelation WAS for something: that I would know that in this new "battle" the Lord would still be fighting for me, even if I couldn't FEEL it like I did the day before.
I wanted to share this random, random yet extremely significant thing with the world just because I'm sure that others have gone through something similar. Maybe it can be an encouragement of sorts.

So today's devotion in my book mentioned airplanes and flying.....and, well, THAT is just a different story altogether.