I made it to BFA!

For those of you who aren't on Facebook and didn't get a chance to see this video already, I want to extend my thanks for all your prayers and support. I am so thankful to be here!

Gamma Gamma Garni

I arrived in Kandern two weeks ago today and just got home internet this afternoon. What a strange feeling to be dropped in a foreign country without immediate access to the news and updates from my friends, particularly those back in the states. Several generous new friends opened their doors for me and my housemates to come over and use their wifi, but it was always weighed against the realization we had to hike back up our hill after checking our email... Sometimes it just wasn't worth the walk; I read instead.

I've always loved reading and choose to spend a lot of my time reading, but in the last two weeks, I finished six books in all the free time I had without the internet. While I definitely had moments of longing to message or Skype friends back home, the last two weeks gave me a chance to really be present where I am in every moment. I want to preserve that liberating feeling of not being tied to a device (other than my e-reader).

There have been hours for me to hang out in my fabulous reading nook and recharge through reading, and I've had opportunity to spend time getting to know my amazing housemates.

You may not have a chance to meet them all face to face, but I promise you, these are some of the most amazing women I've ever met. It's going to be quite an experience living with seven busy teachers; so far we've had plenty of laughter as we figure out living habits and how to share one kitchen (well, plus a mini kitchen on the garden floor). Were you to walk into our home on a lazy afternoon, you might find Sandra and Christine on the garden floor in our second living room laughing loudly at something hysterical one or the other has said. Or they could be up on the main floor in our spacious living room with Hanna or Julie (our temporary tenant). In fact, the three of them might be on "Hanna duty" making sure our one true extrovert is never by herself for too long. Ahna would already have been on a run through the Kandern hiking trails with our neighbor Jessie, but she might be joining in the fun as well. Johanna and Dayla will be around, possibly practicing violin or viola upstairs in their rooms. Were you to venture up to that top floor, you'd likely find me tucked in the reading nook where a couple housemates abandoned comfy chairs for me to plop into with a book. Well, I'd likely be there if I wasn't downstairs enjoying quality time with the Garni girls.

Between the seven year long residents of the Garni, we teach in five departments, cover all three campuses of BFA (actually, Christine covers all three by herself), and are brought together by one passion of serving TCKs here in Germany.

We're halfway through our new teacher orientation, and all of us are getting a little antsy for school to start. I've already registered at the Rathaus as a resident of Kandern, opened my German bank account (almost set up the online banking part), met with the English department head, saw my classroom, and set up my desk. All I need now is some students to fill my classroom! Okay, I still have a long way to go - especially considering I just found out this afternoon that I'll be teaching one section of Spiritual Formation. I've got to set up the desks in the classroom (they're all stacked in the back), I've got to submit my lesson plans for English 9, I've got to meet the Bible department head, and I've got to figure out what the curriculum for Spiritual Formation is.

But on the students note, I have had the blessing of meeting three of my freshman girls already. It was so much fun to get to put a couple faces to the previously nameless void of my English class. The first student I met is the daughter of my BFA "host" who's helped me transition to living here in Kandern. I had dinner with their family my first week here, and heard about how she's grown up in Germany as her parents serve on the leadership for GEM.

The second student I met is new to BFA this year. Her parents are going to be dorm parents at the school, and they've just moved from Thailand. She came along to our picnic on the Rhine this afternoon. While walking home from orientation after a full day today, a returning BFA teacher stopped to introduce me to some students; one of them happened to be yet another freshman. She's just come here with her parents from Ireland and will be the last of seven kids in her family to attend BFA.

And now that you've read through another action filled post, I'll reward you with some photos of my recent adventures.

Outside my bedroom window looks a lot like home.

I told you the living room was amazing - we can see the whole town!

My host took me and some of the Garni girls to Kaysersberg the first weekend I was here.

It was an amazing view from the top of the tower - and I inspected the stones on my way down after I enjoyed the view as per Tolkien's advice.

Walking through this French town felt a little like going through Disneyland; it was surreal to think I was actually in France.

I'm so glad to know I can get Pop-Tarts at the local grocery store if I'm willing to pay $8.68 US dollars.

This is my first ice cream cone in years! The ice cream store owner's wife has food allergies; he gets me.

Johanna invited me to sleep out on her balcony one night.

This is what I woke up to in the morning. Can you see the sun lighting up the trees rimming the town?

This is my very own desk - complete with Wyatt's smiling face and a Tina doodle to remind me of home.

And now, as thankful as I am for internet, I'll be heading to bed soon, ready for another full day of orientation tomorrow.

A Long Way from Longbottom

There's a fantastic coffeeshop in Hillsboro called Longbottom Coffee. It's my favorite coffeeshop not just because it's name comes from a Tolkien novel, and not just because they make amazing coffee, but also because they have an amazing view of Hillsboro from their small store seating area. I love sitting on the comfy couch with my giant mocha looking out on the green hills of my small town (or behind me at the employees lounging around seen through the window from the store to the warehouse).
Longbottom is a fantastic place to relax and take in the beauty of creation; it's the best place I know of in Hillsboro.

My new living room is even better. The past two mornings my body has decided to get me wake me up around 4:30am because surely that's no time for sleeping soundly. Unable to fall asleep, I've grabbed a Trader Joe's instant coffee pack and made my way down the marble staircase from my top floor bedroom to the kitchen on the floor below to boil some water for my coffee. I took the coffee into the spacious living room with large windows overlooking the town and watched as the sunlight reached over the hills in the east to lighten up the brightly painted houses in the valley.
For now you'll just have to take my word for it on how beautiful the view really is because I haven't had the sense of mind to actually take a picture of it to post. I haven't really taken any pictures yet, and I do apologize, but, in my defense, it's been a whirlwind of a week getting here.

After my farewell open house on Friday night, I spent my last Saturday in the states the same way I spent every Saturday from when I was four through when I was twenty - I went to breakfast with my dad. I thought I was composed enough to make it through church on Sunday, but all my plans of not crying fell out the window when I parked. I started tearing up in the parking lot realizing that seven years ago Westport didn't exist, but I was part of the team that helped launch it. Now we have a building - I didn't have to get there two hours early to set up my Port classroom, and I didn't have to stay late to pack everything back into the Grover's car. Instead I showed up early to catch a few more friends before they left from the first service and stayed late to give one last hug to one of the few people who's stuck around as long as me. (He's also the person who made me cry most that day - thanks a lot, Jamie.)
I went to lunch with a group of my students, and enjoyed the time laughing with those kids one more time. Next, I hunted down Jen and Dave who had to bolt from service without seeing me and spent time with them before running home for a final LAD meeting where Amanda and Desiree helped me weed out a few of my books from my three stuff suitcases. Okay, so it was like a banker's box full that they got me to take out.
I left from there to go to my final FUEL event and watched my kiddos play kickball before Sarah met me to go to dinner. She let me choose the place, and I got to have my last dinner in the states at Juan Colorado. Even though she was doubtful of the dessert that was deep frozen ice cream rolled in cornflakes and dunked in a fryer, she ended up loving the fried ice cream as much as I do.
Once we got back to my house, Sarah opened my three suitcases and confidently told me that we could get it down to two - underweight. The next four hours were a painful process of eliminating books, clothes, and a few heavy items - I left every mug behind.
And we're not even to the travelling yet. Ready? Let's go!
Monday morning at 7 am, my parents, Sarah, and I loaded the two full suitcases, carry on, and my backpack into the car with the empty suitcase just in case anything unforeseen happened at the airport. We drove to Tacoma where we had lunch and coffee with Cat before getting to the SeaTac airport at 3pm. Eight hours into my trip, we finally made it to the airport! Sarah walked up to the kiosk to check me in, and the employee weighed by checked bags which each had half a kilo to spare before asking me if I had a carryon. I told her my small duffel was my carryon and my backpack was my laptop case. She politely informed me that was not okay and I would have to remove my laptop from the backpack and leave it behind. She also said my duffel weighed too much to take on the plane. Sarah calmly pulled heavy items out of the duffel to put in the checked bags, and I frantically took my laptop out of the backpack and started stuffing clothes and food from the other bag into it to replace the weight.
I made it through security fine, and didn't even panic when my 10.5 hour flight to Frankfurt started boarding half an hour late, eating up a third of my layover. I calmly walked aboard my first international flight to discover all the nice flight attendants speaking German. I realized I was already outside my comfort zone, but I made my way to my aisle seat to discover an older woman occupying it. I told her I thought she was in my seat to which she rudely responded, "No. Find another seat. They have already moved me twice. Go away." Panicked, I showed my seat number to a flight attendant who waved me to the middle section. "Sit in that row," she said nonchalantly, "Just sit in the middle one." So much for my nice aisle seat.
I wrenched my knee getting in to the seat, but once able to buckle the belt, I didn't stand up again until we landed in Frankfurt. As we began our descent, the flight attendant announced that due to our delay several passengers had already been rebooked on new flights and those going to another list of connections would have to rush to make their connecting flight. Naturally, the connection to Basel was one that I had to rush to.
After nearly 11 hours seated, I found my knee did not respond well to weight of any kind put on it, but I ignored the pain and powered through to a massive security line. I walked to an employee and held out my ticket asking, "Will I be able to make my flight?" He looked at the ticket and confirmed I was travelling alone before letting me cut to the front of the line. Flustered, I pulled my laptop out of the case, placed my carryon after it on the conveyor belt and walked through when the waved me forward without a chance to empty my pockets. Of course I set off the alarm and I'm sure the employees thought I was the dumbest person to go through the line that hour (I'm assuming they get several people a day flustered because they're about to miss their flights... I'm hoping at least). After being released from security once they confirmed the metal bookmark in my backpack was not a knife (thanks, Jen), I hurried on to the long line at customs. I made small talk with the couple who flew in from LA and were about to miss their connection to Prague. I prayed that the line would move faster. I fidgeted as the stern faced employees checked passports and tickets. I finally made it to the counter and discovered there was no need for worry. With just a quick look at my photo and my face, the kind German customs man put the first stamp in my passport. I didn't have to answer any questions or be delayed any more. He directed me how to get to my gate, and I booked it through the massive duty free store to make it panting to my gate.
The kind woman asked me politely if I was going to Basel. I said yes. She asked me if I was from Helsinki. I panicked. "No, I'm from Seattle," I said as soon as I remembered that's where I flew from, not Portland. The other flight attendant said that I was from Seattle at the same time, so I felt a little better. She scanned my ticket and let me through the gate. I followed a doorway to a hallway to a tunnel and started to panic again - where was my plane? It was leaving in less than half an hour, and I was lost in a tunnel!
I came to a bus in front of a man with a yellow vest. "Basel?" I asked. He nodded, and I got on the empty bus save one American business man. "Are you going to Basel?" I asked. "Yes." "Are we flying?" "Yes." "Okay. Good." I sat down and caught my breath. "Are we going to make it?" He looked at his watch and told me we'd be fine. We sat there for another ten minutes as a few more people loaded the bus.
Finally, the driver boarded, and we left the tunnel and entered the tarmac. Big, fat raindrops bombarded the bus, and the driver swore as he was assaulted by wind and rain when he opened the door. (I laughed inside when the one naughty German word I know was the first one I heard in Germany.) I plowed through the sheets of rain up the stairs into the plane and found my seat near the back of the tiny jet. I plopped into my seat and checked the time - 4:12. The flight was scheduled to depart at 4:15, and I'd made it. I breathed a huge sigh of relief. Once my sigh was out, the pilot announced that the entire Frankfurt airport was closed indefinitely due to the thunderstorm. We sat there in the pressurized cabin for an hour before actually beginning our half hour flight to Basel.
Once I exited the plane, I knew I needed to get my bags and leave out the French exit - NOT THE SWISS - where my ride would pick me up. I followed the signs with pictures of bags that everyone else seemed to be following and was assaulted by a red hallway with a white cross that boldly told me WELCOME TO SWITZERLAND. I turned around and looked for any other hallway that might welcome me to France, but, seeing no other way out, followed everyone else to baggage claim. I discovered once we got to the baggage carousels that there were exits from there leading to France or Switzerland. I picked up my two suitcases and walked towards the French doors expecting them to lead me to another line where I'd have to answer questions about the contents of my bags. Instead, I stepped in the green lane with nothing to declare, and walked through the doors to France were Dani immediately stepped out and said, "Laura?" I was so relieved, exhausted, and smelly, that I weakly smiled my reply confirming she was my ride.

Now do you feel a little more okay with me forgetting to take pictures? Thanks. I do hope to share some soon, but it may take me a few days before my body knows when to wake up and when to pull my camera out to document the beauty around me.

Farewell, Portlandia

I love Portland. I always have; I always will. I'm pretty sure I'll love Kandern as well, but before I get there I have a few goodbyes to make. This past week has been full of farewells as I spend time making visits to people and places I love that I won't see for quite a while.

Last Sunday I started the week with a downtown adventure with two friends. I hopped on the MAX to visit Saturday Market, Stumptown, and Powells one more time.

I have Hillsboro to Gresham at my fingertips.
(Though who would go as far as Gresham?)

Enjoying my elephant ear at Saturday Market.

I'll miss the delicious Stumptown drinks.

I had such a hard time not buying more books!

After my Sunday adventure, I had a week filled with spending time with people I love. I had the chance to sit down and have lunch or coffee with several different good friends who I don't often see, and I got to spend a couple nights having dinner with Westport families who I will dearly miss. It's hard to pick a highlight from such an amazing week, but it wasn't over with just that. 

The two women most influential in forcing me to be open to the idea of teaching overseas kidnapped me for a night to spend some time away in Seaside before I launch on the adventure they jumpstarted. I got to spend two days with the most amazing women on the planet, and I got to ride a shark. It was awesome.

I am incredibly blessed, and I don't want to forget that for a minute. This last week, actually, most of this summer, has reminded me of how spoiled I am to be surrounded by such loving people who care about me as a person. Talking with friends at the Westport picnic today reminded me that I won't have that network of support so close to me when I move to Germany. As I say farewell to Portland and the friends here, I know that I'll still be in touch with them over the internet, but I'll need to develop new relationships with people who can go out to coffee with me, nerd out in giant bookstores, and laugh with me when I fall off mechanical sharks. 

That adventure will begin in just a week now. I'm at 90% of my monthly support, and I just need $200 a month more to reach 100%. My departure date is August 5th, and I can't wait to get to Kandern and share with you the next steps on my journey in Germany - the ones where I finally arrive!

Family Legacy

I love attending memorial services for family members on the Hewett side of my family; I'm dead serious.

Hear me out.

In my experience, the memorial service for a Hewett is a celebration of a life well lived in service for the Kingdom as well as a gathering of amazing people who are excited about great work God is doing across the world. My uncle's memorial service today was no exception.

I got to listen to stories for nearly an hour of how much Uncle Vance loved to help other people. One of the ways he helped people was through the second hand store he founded to support the families he met on the field in Peru. I even learned that his years of service in Peru have had such a lasting impact that he's been honored by the government. I didn't get to spend a lot of time with my uncle when I was growing up, but I remember him inviting me to come with him on a trip to Peru when I was in junior high. Serving people in Peru was a huge part of his life.

Not only did I get to hear about the work my uncle started which is being continued by his family, but I got to see my great aunt who has spent years of her life serving in Uganda with Africa Village Ministries. Aunt Marie is one of the most inspirational people in my life. God has given her a job to do on this earth, and she will not rest until it is completed. She is so full of love and passion, and I hope that I am just like her when I reach my 70s.

My great aunt, my uncle, and I make three generations of missionaries in the Hewett family, but we're not done there. After the memorial service today, I had the joy of listening to my cousin's fifteen year old daughter, Ruth, share about her recent mission trip to the Philippines. She found out her grandpa passed away while she was on the trip and just arrived back in the states two days ago. Even though she wasn't able to come back and tell her grandpa about all that she did on her trip, she was still brimming with excitement about the deaf children she had fallen in love with and eagerly shared about to me.

As I sit in the middle of this generational legacy of missionaries, I think about the one relative that ties us all together and his love for missions. My grandpa Frank (Marie's brother, Vance's father, and Ruth's great-grandpa) wanted to go on the mission field, but MAF rejected him as missionary while accepting his friends Nate and Marj. Praise the Lord! Instead of being on the field with Nate, my grandpa faithfully financially supported him. In fact, I found this handwritten thank you note Nate sent my grandpa while serving in Ecuador. 

I'm blessed to be going to Germany, but I need a team of people faithfully praying for me and supporting me financially. I'm hoping to move in three weeks, but I still need to raise a little over 40% of my monthly support. With just five people stepping up to say, "I can give $100 a month;" five who say, "I can give $50 a month;" and ten who say, "I can give $25 a month" I would reach my monthly goal. 

While I'm on full disclosure here, the thank you notes I send you are not as likely to become as valuable as this one. The odds of my life becoming a movie or a book are very slim; the odds of my story being as remotely famous as Nate Saint's are even smaller. Full disclosure again - I'm not in it for the fame and glory. Earlier this week I got to spend some time with two of the Gaston English teachers that I worked with last year, and I was reminded how much I love education. I get excited about changing students lives through learning, and I want you to be a part of that as I teach the students at Black Forest Academy. You can be part of this legacy.

Which Wardrobe?

Most people know that I'm very proud of the fact that I'm an official tour guide for Aslan's How - which is my fancy way of saying Dr. G let me help give tours of his amazing house. I got to do the coolest part of the tour where you actually walk through the wardrobe. I got giddy every time. It's so much fun to take people through the house and point out all the fun Narnia items and talk about one of my favorite authors.

I've loved Lewis since I was in first grade when my dad read The Chronicles of Narnia to me (but you already knew that if you read my previous Narnia related blog post). I loved Lewis so much that when I was in high school, Wheaton College was my top choice for school for one simple reason - they are home to the largest collection of works by and about Lewis in the world. Ultimately, I decided that I should probably look at the educational offerings of colleges as well and ended up at a different school.

For the first time ever, I actually got to see this amazing collection when I visited the Marion E. Wade Center on Wheaton's campus. I had some free time and got a couple girls to come along with me to the small museum that honors Lewis and six other great writers. In their one room museum they have a fancy wardrobe (that is not nearly as nice or easily entered as the one at Dr. G's) along with Tolkien's old writing desk. Naturally these were exciting things, but the wardrobe didn't lead anywhere. To the left, however, there was a door that led me into a whole new world.

I entered the reading room, and with overwhelming joy and excitement completed the form to be allowed to take journals off the shelf to read what others had written about Lewis and leaf through extensive photo copies of his personal correspondence. The girl at the desk in the reading room was also a big fan of Lewis and she showed me where all the different journals and dissertations were. I spent the next hour and a half reading abstracts from dissertations of people who thought critically about the works I hold so dear. I even found a great paper comparing Gollum and Grendel based on Tolkien's criticism of Beowulf. There were literary critics looking at Lewis's representation of Cupid and Psyche and theologians examining his soteriology. I could have spent days reading the amazing criticism, but I moved on to skimming the scans of Boxen, the stories about talking animals which Lewis wrote with his brother as a kid. The sweet girl who showed me around had to come up to me after what only felt like a moment to tell me that I had to go because they were closing for the evening.

As I walked back out of the door, it felt like my bittersweet return to Britain from Narnia. For a brief moment, I was in a place where people were excited to engage critically with the ideas of a brilliant writer, and I could listen to what they had to say by reading their dissertations. I crave those conversations, and it was so refreshing to be alone with those texts that had a plethora of interesting ideas. I realized, though, that while I may not ever get to go back to read those dissertations, I'll get to go to a place that looks a lot more like Narnia in just a couple weeks. And Lewis related or not, I'll be able to have amazing conversations with people who are excited about the same things I am.

At dinner tonight, I had a great conversation about literary theory with a girl going to teach in Bolivia. We shared books we loved and talked about the great texts that had made us cry because they were written so well. Not only that, but before I even went to the Wade Center this afternoon, I got to talk about Toni Morrison's character development with another new English teacher at BFA. I am so excited about these people who I am going to be working with in the fall.

[Transition to significantly less nerdy content.]

Some of you may have spent the last few paragraphs wondering why I'm even on Wheaton's campus. Even more of you likely will never make it this far in the blog post because you gave up on me after the first two paragraphs of excessive literary content. For those who stayed strong to get to this events based update, I sincerely thank you. I recognize that I can get carried away with my English nerd excitement, and I genuinely try to reign it in often. In fact, after my last post I joked with a friend about making all of my posts allusions to a work of literature; while this post does, in fact, have a high literary content, I promise not to make every post connected to a book.

Back to the question: Why am I at Wheaton? Well, this week is the TeachBeyond orientation for all new candidates going overseas in the fall. I'm here to learn all about cultural transitions and TCKs and insurance. Oh my! It's been so amazing to meet people going to schools all around the globe, and especially to spend time getting to know some of the people I'll be working with at BFA. I may have seemed excited about going to Germany before, but my excitement as more than doubled after meeting these people and hearing parts of their stories.

I'll be back in Portland on Saturday, and I'll be just a month away from my goal move date. I'm still only at 45% of my funds, so please be praying that the rest of my monthly support will come in quickly.

I Volunteer as Tribute!

Bear with me, I'll bring this one around, but read through the story first:

In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord, high and exalted, seated on a throne; and the train of his robe filled the temple. Above him were seraphim, each with six wings: With two wings they covered their faces, with two they covered their feet, and with two they were flying. And they were calling to one another:

“Holy, holy, holy is the Lord Almighty;

    the whole earth is full of his glory.”

 At the sound of their voices the doorposts and thresholds shook and the temple was filled with smoke.

“Woe to me!” I cried. “I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the Lord Almighty.”

Then one of the seraphim flew to me with a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with tongs from the altar. With it he touched my mouth and said, “See, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away and your sin atoned for.”

Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?”

And I said, “Here am I. Send me!”

He said, “Go and tell this people:

“‘Be ever hearing, but never understanding;

    be ever seeing, but never perceiving.’

Make the heart of this people calloused;

    make their ears dull

    and close their eyes.

Otherwise they might see with their eyes,

    hear with their ears,

    understand with their hearts,

and turn and be healed.”

Then I said, “For how long, Lord?”

And he answered:

“Until the cities lie ruined

    and without inhabitant,

until the houses are left deserted

    and the fields ruined and ravaged,

until the Lord has sent everyone far away

    and the land is utterly forsaken.

And though a tenth remains in the land,

    it will again be laid waste.

But as the terebinth and oak

    leave stumps when they are cut down,

    so the holy seed will be the stump in the land."

(Isaiah 6 NIV)

Clearly my call was much less dramatic - although it did involve a dramatic teenager saying some hurtful things that forced me to reevaluate my effectiveness as a youth leader. However, as fascinating as that story is, it's not what prompted me to title this post with an allusion to The Hunger Games. Instead, I'm drawn to the connotation of the word "tribute" and how it's connected to Isaiah's call. Tribute is literally the thing given as an offering to someone. (Offering's a weird word too; it's a gift given to someone way more important than you.) When Katniss volunteers as tribute, she is the offering. She stands up to say that her life will be given completely and fully to the Capitol. When Isaiah says he's volunteering, he's giving his whole life as an offering to the Lord (just as Paul commands in Romans).

Let's look a little deeper in to Katniss's decision though: when she stands up to take Primrose's place, she becomes the gift from the whole district to the Capitol. Katniss made the decision, but the whole community sent her. She shouts the memorable line of her own accord, but it's the district that takes credit for her when she shows up in the games. She's the girl from District 12.

Here's where I come in (thanks for your patience). I am standing up and volunteering my life as tribute; it's the gift. However, I'm not going on my own - I'm being sent by the church. The leadership and members of Westport are sending me with excitement as I move forward to serve in Germany, but they are not the only ones. I had the honor of being sent out by the Embassy in Denver this Sunday, and I can't begin to describe the joy I felt to have Cheri and Jacquie wrap their arms around me as Brandon prayed over me.

(I'm going to deviate from The Hunger Games for a minute, but I'll bring it back.) This family I have at the Embassy is amazing. These people spent time with me for a week last summer, and the whole Westport team bonded with everyone we met way deeper than a summer camp pen pals way. These people are my family. I came home and told everyone about how blessed I was by the experience of serving alongside these people in Denver (I also raved about the love of my life, Elijah, who is the cutest one-year-old on the planet). You may be able to imagine how excited I was when my parents agreed to visit the Embassy with me a couple weeks ago while they were in Colorado at the same time as I was. (Well, in order to appreciate my excitement, you should know I'm quite fond of my parents, and I really do enjoy sharing the important things in my life with them.)

Talking to my mom tonight, she told me how much she enjoyed meeting my Embassy family. She also told me how real and genuine she felt her interactions with them were in the brief amount of time she spent with them. There was no need for fake pleasantries when my families met. I love that that's the way the body of Christ works because I feel as close to my Embassy family as I do to my Westport family, and my mom and dad are part of that as well.

Because of that deep family connection, when I stood up and shouted, "I volunteer as tribute!" to God (or whatever version of "Here I am, send me!" I actually articulated) Westport and the Embassy stood with me to send me out. And before my metaphor breaks down because I'm not being sent to a televised battle of children killing each other, I'll finish with this thought: Katniss didn't volunteer for the fame or the glory; she just stepped up to do what was right for her to do.

I'm not planning to start a political revolution (though I'm not opposed to sparking a spiritual revival - I'll expect you to call me the Girl on Fire if I do), but I am doing something I find pretty scary because it's what I'm supposed to do. Katniss was protecting her sister; I'm obeying the Lord by volunteering for a position that he has equipped me to do (apparently not everyone is excited by grammar - it's my mission to intervene in the lives of freshmen at BFA to demonstrate how fun complex sentence structures can be). I am still amazed at how well the Lord has equipped me for this position, but it shouldn't surprise me when I see how perfectly he prepared Isaiah for his mission. Before Isaiah even volunteered, the Lord gave him clean lips to speak his message, and before I stepped up to teach overseas, the Lord gave me passion for students and understanding of grammar.