September 11

Went back to Skid Row the past two weeks...I'd forgotten that my heart lives on those broken streets...

Both of the past two weeks I've ended up in long and intense conversations with Muslims. It hurts to look into eyes that gaze back with intelligence and lucidity and then realize that they are just as entrapped as those who look at me through eyes clouded with drugs and alcohol. It hurts to listen to them butt heads with my beloved brothers and sisters who are ministering with me, to hear them respond to my "I'll be praying for you" with an "I'll be praying for you as well." To know that all I can do is pray. Nothing I say will convince them that Jesus is the only way to God.

But isn't that how it always is? It's only that I feel that my words have an actual impact on the other people I minister to, when in reality those conversations are just as much a product of God's grace. How many times to I have to keep coming back to the reality that I am nothing? So, so often I begin to think that I can make an impact on people through my own merit, when it is always, only, all of God.

I am so lost when dealing with Islam. I was really encouraged in my Postmodernism class today when Prof Suzuki somewhat addressed this issue...in academic terms, but still it helped me see why I have such huge roadblocks to conversation when dealing with Muslims. He said, "The Muslims do not subscribe to our narrative and play the completely wrong game against us." There's such a disconnect between us and them that we're not even on the same playing field, let alone playing by the same rules.

This makes God's grace so much more amazing. He reaches down and miraculously transforms everything about a person so they come to saving faith in Him. Isn't that incredible?

...deeper into the glories...

It's been a long time...

I'm back at school...

Back in the mindset where I've forgotten what to do if I have a moment of free time...

It was crazy to walk through WOW Week once again and remember that just one year ago I was one of those "little freshmen"...to remember how lost and timid I felt...to think of all God has done in my life in that one short year. In so many ways I think that I'm a completely different person than I was back then. God has been so good...I am daily amazed by His faithfulness to me. I don't deserve it at all. I fall every day...yet every time He accepts me back into His arms. I am in awe at His faithful mercy.

One of the coolest things about being back is being around all of these people who inspire me with their passion. I love coming away from conversations deeper in love with Jesus and more excited about the work of the Gospel. And there are so many people here who I only know a little, but I can't even see their faces without being reminded of how awesome God is. Then there are those who daily call me to a closer walk...Christian community is such a joy...it hurts to let them see all my faults, but it's so very sweet at the same time. What a marvelous grace!

Love love,
Jillian Rose

to reveal all of You that i can...

The last few weeks have been exhausting and amazing...

I can't even begin to find words to sum everything up...

I spent the weekend of the Fourth in the company of some of the most amazing people in the world...between football and lightening bugs and Pad Thai and homemade peach icecream and crazy pool games and trips to coffee shops we managed to slip in some planning for our camp in Tennessee. The night of the Fourth found me in a church office, copying and stapling booklets for the camp. I heard the explosions outside...remembered past celebrations...and laughed. If someone had told me one year ago that I would be doing random secretarial work in Tulsa, Oklahoma when the next Fourth of July rolled around, I probably would have laughed at them. And yet I didn't mind one bit.

I think that's one of the biggest things God is teaching me in ministry this summer...that I don't matter. Not that the work I do doesn't matter, but that this thing I call "me" doesn't matter. My rights and personality and wishes and preferences and desires must all be laid aside for the sake of Him Who gave His entire life for me. I must keep killing myself. Moment by moment. I didn't realize how very much my life is totally me-centered, even in the little things. I want my life to be a sacrifice, willlingly and lovingly laid down for the sake of this great Treasure.

Hmm...where was I? Oh yes, Tennessee. The day after the Fourth found me playing football in the freeway median somewhere between Memphis and Nashville...as an accident stopped traffic for miles. We ran youth camp for Theta Baptist Church...that week was such evidence of my infernal weakness and God's majestic grace. It was such a joy to see God change kids...and to know that it was only Him who could have ever done such work.

I stopped writing this for a while to recollect my thoughts. They are no more collected...but I'm now fighting tears. God is incredible. I don't have words at all to describe the experince of Him. I just pray and live that people might see in my life the change that the gospel has made.

Project 61 ended today. I am exhausted and encouraged and discouraged and mostly more in love with God. Ah...why is it that I have to be at a place of utter devestation to realize my neediness. I know with my mind that I need Him all the time, but it's so rare that I know it with my heart, that He is all my desire, that His words provide all my sustenance, that prayer flows as naturally as breathing just because I am so aware of my need.

The kids, well, they're the reason I'm here. This wouldn't be a good post if I didn't tell you about Montana, the sweet bad boy type who stole my heart with one impish smile and has now moved away. Or Keaundre who stole Nate's wallet today and lied about it. We were shocked...he was one of the last kids we suspected of such a thing. Or the girl whose name I can't even pronounce, let alone spell, but who is so starved for love that she can't even accept it or recognize it.

So much more to say...

God is beautiful.

my calloused feet and too tender knees

I love the line that I used as the title of this entry. I don't pray enough. You know that verse about praying without ceasing? I don't have any idea what it would mean to pray for even 10 minutes without ceasing...my mind wanders so often and I am distracted from my task at hand. I hate that in me...I hate the battle that happens in my mind every time I attempt a prolonged time of prayer. It seems weird to ask for prayers that I might be able to pray, but that is what I am doing. My knees are far too tender.

I meant to write a bunch of things that have inspired and/or convicted me, but alas I left my journal in the intern office...hopefully those rascally boys don't get to it...

Seriously though, I love all the people I am working with. It's awesome to see God use each of them...it's awesome to learn with them and pray with them and sit on a porch at midnight and talk about how great God is...and to laugh! We laugh all the time...these are some of the coolest crazy people in the world...I'm certain I'm the crazier for the twelve-hour-plus days we've spent with each other. And I'm okay with that.

I will leave you with some words from the great poet Pablo Neruda...I managed to get Allison hooked on him tonight so I thought it fitting...

...stand up,
you, stand up,
but stand up with me
and let us go off together
to fight face to face
against the devil's webs,
against the system that distributes hunger,
against organized misery...

...there's nothing else i need anymore...

Snapshots of my life as of late:

God is everything. I am only a barefoot nineteen-year-old girl standing in front of a class of children whose pasts are filled with more hurt than I can imagine. I am inadequate. I am more than inadequate. I am nothing.

My heart has been stolen...irrevokably. I love these kids with a passion I can't describe...and I break for them with a pain I can't describe.

God's plans are bigger than mine.

I'm more content than I've ever been. I'm more exhausted than I've ever been. And it's a good feeling to be exhausted working for the kingdom.

Sin is sneaky. Yeah. Really sneaky. It attacks when I'm not looking, lies in ways I forget to look for, and is bent on ruining my witness. Oh God, guard me in the shelter of Your wings!

I want today, tomorrow to be a time for dancing and laughing and embracing, but I can't demand my times. My times are in His hands. And that's where they're the safest.

"Let us know; let us press on to know the LORD;

His going out is sure as the dawn;

He will come to us as the showers,

as the spring rains that water the earth." Hosea 6:3

Amen! Come quickly Lord Jesus!

Much love...from the depths of my heart...

Jillian Rose

For the Bellinghamsters

Today was the first official day of interning. It was, as my new roommate (another) Allison would put it, amazing. We've got a lot going on this summer, but the coolest part about it is that it's not just busy work. Everything we're doing is merely letting our light shine so that others see and glorify God. As Pastor Joe said this morning, the awesome thing about light is it's purpose is not to display itself, it's to show something else.

So the main reason for this post is cause I need y'all to pray. A lot. Our tutoring program starts tomorrow and it will be awesome but I'm not ready. Mentally or emotionally. miriam threw me off the deep end (for which I love her dearly) and then drew a picture of me drowning. Well, it looked so awful (me drowning) that I decided I must swim. So pray that I do. Thanks!

Oh! And fireflies (or lightening bugs, if you chose to call them that prosaic name) are amazing.

Much love...

Today...

...I went to the zoo with my family. At the zoo they have a reproduction of some buildings in a typical African village.

We have so much.

...A Burning Fire...

1 Corinthians 9:16--For if I preach the gospel, that gives me no ground for boasting. For necessity is laid upon me. Woe to me if I do not preach the gospel!

Jeremiah 20:9--If I say, "I will not mention him, or speak any more in his name, there is in my heart as it were a burning fire shut up in my bones, and I am weary holding it in, and I cannot."

Does it ever hurt you that "Christians" can live lives in this lost world and NOT preach the gospel? That they can tell their children to not befriend unbelievers as they might be polluted by worldliness? That they can be partakers in the greatest gift ever bestowed and then promote trivial things like sports teams and new recipes and the latest and greatest invention when they do have opportunities to talk to unbelievers?

People, this world WILL NOT LAST! Why do we talk to unbelievers like it will? Why doesn't it physically hurt us, like a fire inside our bones, when we dance around the Truth and talk meaninglessly about the weather and coffee and clothes and all of the million things that seem to matter now and have no bearing on eternity? Why do we find it so easy to talk about anything but the gospel? Why do we talk about people who do share the gospel as if they've done something worth boasting about? People, that's our job! The only reason we are still on this earth is to share the gospel. That's it! That is the meaning of your life; that is the will of God for you. Woe to us if we DO NOT preach the gospel!

We've got it--the pearl of greatest price. What are you doing about it?

"back in pink"

The title is thanks to Jake...a mixture of AC/DC and what he believes is an excessively spirited dorm life...he has this strange dislike for Waldock...probably because he's not man enough to wear pink...but that's me. Back. In pink.

It's been nice to be home. Nice--and weird. You see your own selfishness so much more in conjunction with family. And you see your discontent when you watch other people's dreams come true (dreams you've prayed about for years and years) and realize that the fulfillment of yours is still far in the distance. You know though, I'm seeing more and more that the only thing I've ever wanted is Jesus...I just didn't always know it.

I forgot how much I missed people till I got home. I was at a late night softball game, laughing at the antics of one of my friends, and realized that I hadn't known that I missed that, or even that I missed that friend. Being gone for so long gave me a greater appreciation for the little things. Like a well timed hug, or a home-cooked meal, or the antics of a large family around the dinner table, or driving on a sunny afternoon listening to country music with my little sister, or doing dishes. Little stuff that makes up life.

Still though, I'm excited about what's ahead. Excited and scared. I have this tendency to want to do whatever I think is hardest, what I recoil from...and after my initial "Yes," I begin realizing that I may have gotten myself in way over my head. But that's good for me, because not being able to do it on my own puts me where I should have been in the first place: completely relying on God.

I have more that I'm thinking about and wanting to write...but another thing that I forgot about is that one internet connection for seven people means your time online is both rationed and pestered. So now I must hand the mouse over to the singing 13 year old who's been bugging me...pretty much since I got on. :-) Jake's blog should be updated fairly shortly.

Thoughts on Teaching and English and Being Me

...another Advanced Comp paper that also could serve as a blog post...

From kindergarten through tenth grade, I was home schooled. I never set foot inside a public school classroom, never even saw the inside of a classroom expect what I saw in movies and television shows. I entered community college my junior year, eager to learn, with no idea about what I wanted to do with my life. All I knew is that I was good at working with kids, and that there were avenues opening for me in special education. And I loved to learn.

My first quarter at Whatcom Community College, I took beginning composition. My teacher was a feminist (the first real one I’d ever encountered) and a liberal who was not shy about sharing her disbelief in any sort of organized religion. My first essay was an in-class essay about the controversial Eminem song, “Lose Yourself.” I took the opportunity to write about a biblical view of family, which I was currently studying with my mom, and held my breath as I turned the essay in to her. She gave me an A. The next topic, yet another controversial issue, yet another deviant paper. And another A. I got bolder and began speaking up in class. I found others who had similar beliefs but had been reluctant to express them for lack of support. And my teacher and I became good friends. In fact, a year and a half later she wrote multiple glowing recommendations of this once-timid ex-homeschooler who found her voice in English 101.

I sometimes think about what might have happened if I had not been in that teacher’s class that quarter. Would I have chosen English as my future field? In one of my talks with her, we discussed why she chose teaching English. She was bright and could have gone into many fields. But she chose this one because of the flexibility it offered.

Two quarters later, after taking an English lit class that exposed me to literature I never knew existed and made me fall in love with poetry, I took the next course in the composition series. This time my teacher was an even more politically liberal environmentalist who loved Joyce James and Kate Chopin and Quincy Troupe. And, to my surprise, he loved my papers where I would contradict him or reinterpret things from a biblical viewpoint. Another solid A. And my desire to teach English grew stronger. Sam Roper, my teacher for English 102, told the class one day, “I chose to teach English because I can really teach about anything, I can say almost anything, and I get to hear you guys talk about it as well.”

This appealed to me, as I felt like I wanted to teach, but I also wanted freedom to improvise. I wanted to talk about important things, to explore things about the world that are truly worth exploring, to make people think. So I chose. I decided that I would be an English major. People were pressuring me to teach somehow, I knew I loved studying English, and I hoped it would provide me the opportunity to teach what I love and what I see as important.

But the further I get into this whole thing, the more complicated teaching seems to me. It’s not just talking about what you love and getting students involved in talking about it too, it’s the daily in-and-out of grading papers and coming up with lesson plans and figuring out what to do about students who just really don’t care. That’s the part that bothers me the most: how will I deal with students who aren’t interested in learning at all? I’ve always been a self-motivated learner, seeking out things which interest me, writing for the pure pleasure of organizing my thoughts on paper, reading for the pure pleasure of finding new things and meeting new friends. I don’t understand people who don’t care about learning. I really don’t understand people who don’t care about grades. As much as I try not to, I find that I am obsessive about my grades. I even go to the point of seeing my grades as a reflection of myself as a person, an attitude that I know is not healthy or right. But I still strive for the best grade I can get. The grade-less classroom appealed to me briefly, but I don’t think that I could operate like that. I don’t think I could handle not having a grade to strive toward. Because as eager as I am to learn, I get worn out. Midway through the semester, I find my grades dropping, and I force myself to go to class and to turn in assignments because otherwise I’ll fail the class and lose my scholarship and drop out of school and end up in a trailer park working two fast food jobs. Yes, some days I have to actually picture myself in a McDonalds uniform just to get myself to class.

But not all classes. Some classes I would love to just sit in on if there were no grade pressures. If I didn’t have to take general education classes in order to graduate, I’d do things like take Isaiah with Dr. Boyd just because it’s amazing book taught by a brilliant man and I would learn so much. I go to classes and learn about the Bible and about foreign languages and about other cultures and about music and about history and about literature and about theories, and I’d love it. But I wouldn’t turn things in to the teachers. I’d write to sort my thoughts out, to remember things I thought were beautiful, and to tell others what I’d been learning. But I wouldn’t have this sort of education. I wouldn’t sit through my fourth speech class ever just because my other three didn’t transfer. I wouldn’t try to listen to a boring teacher read almost verbatim from the book I read the night before about things I already have studied. I wouldn’t go to a math class and do unit multipliers and interest formulas and other things I did in middle school. Yes, middle school. Because I’ve always been liked at math, and I’ve always enjoyed balancing my education by having a mixture of things I’m studying at once. Math homework had been a welcome break from reading, and reading has been a relief from studying politics, which has been a diversion from solving equations. If I didn’t have to graduate but could still go to college, I would be better rounded than I am.

But I am abnormal in this way. So many other students don’t have this sort of enjoyment of diversity in learning. If there were no requirements, too many people would leave college having not learned anything. They would focus on one specific thing, they wouldn’t try to think through and synthesize their learning, and they would just waste their years as a student goofing off.

So as a teacher, I want to be able to give students flexibility in learning, to let them explore what they enjoy, but I also want them to actually learn. I’m not into making students do mindless busy work, but I also want them to learn. This is what I see as my biggest struggle when I start teaching. How do I give kids a love for learning through fun and interesting assignments, rather than make them hate it because of an overload of work that is entirely meaningless to them? How do I get them to be students who don’t turn things in merely because of the grade, but because they are actually interested in or even passionate about what they’re doing? I don’t know how, because I don’t even know how to get myself to do this. I want to get back to when I first fell in love with English, back to my junior year when I discovered writing to persuade people, or back to my freshman year when I began learning about the whole realm of great literature available, or even back to my grade school days when I passionately declared to my mother, “Oh, I just love diagramming sentences!” I want to be able to get people to one of those places. I want them to fall in love with books and authors and writing and the joy of connecting two ideas. I want to teach what I’m passionate about in order to make others passionate as well. But, mostly, I want to point people to be more like Jesus through all of this. That is why I’m here.