Fragile!

Today we heard an epic sermon from Gods word on love. It was a good and sober look at the call on our lives to love one another deeply...with patience and kindness.....with forgiveness and perseverance. Total and completely. 

It was shocking and it was compelling at the same time.

Thank you Rae!

When all was good and done and we went home feeling, well full up and directed, the afternoon unfolded.

We shared a glorious day celebrating a birthday party of a darling little girl who we love and who is a treasure on many levels. We have known her since her birth and are so thrilled to watch and enjoy as she grows and thrives.

While at the party tea, a terrible accident dashed the fun. Our dear friends boy... her son.. was badly hurt. In the moment we were called to love and act.... and people did. Crisis and chaos are like that.

As we reflect and pray this evening, for healing and comfort and all our hopes for this precious child whom we love so dearly, we share our lives again with these treasure friends. Over the years these two families have been through it with us and now we are going through it with them. 

Love is like that. 

As I write I have been reminded of how uncertain this world is.

How out of control we are.

How fragile we are!

In our fragility we can either depend on our selves or we can turn to him who is in control and who is able to do order things and work them for our good.

And so we turn....... we pray for our friends who have always been there loving us and now we love them back!!

from a point of belonging I am vulnerable!

http://mindmetaphors.weebly.com/uploads/1/3/6/8/13689850/_212818.jpg

And so I write .....

From the TED talk by Brene' Brown on being vulnerable and on shame I come away with these few ideas, milling about my thinking.

On being vulnerable, she speaks of those who are able to explore and risk being vulnerable from a point of strength. Those who have a deep understanding that they are worthy of being loved and of belonging seem to find vulnerability easy and in being vulnerable find deep connection with others.

Those who operate from a more broken base in regard to belonging and worthy of love, find  being vulnerable illusive and so feel disconnected from fellow human beings. 

I simplify her argument and studies but in doing so find that the simple clarifies some of the questions I have had around people being disconnected, even in the setting of church, where we are all called to love one another very deeply from the heart and carry one anothers burdens.

I think some of us have not grasped the real belonging we have in Jesus and so with God the father. He has totally accepted us in Christ and we are secure in his love. We have belonging and he has made us worthy of his love. He loved us totally and fully at the cross. 

If we grasp this we can begin from a base of security to be vulnerable with one another,

and in so doing, we can be truly connected to one another. 

A barrier to this kind of vulnerability is trust and what Brown calls shame. To trust that the hearer will not quickly box and judge is a risk. The shame we call out to ourselves is often also a real block to us truly sharing with another - our struggles, trials, temptations, hurts and hopes. 

To never truly be vulnerable is to not truly connect as human beings. 

what would life look like if.....?

http://roadpastor.files.wordpress.com/2011/07/loving.jpg

This morning while contemplating life in the quiet of the roaring shower, I wondered to myself, " what would my life really look like if Jesus was totally and radically at the centre?"

A profound question I know but it has lingered with me all day.

What would our lives really look like if we put you first Lord?

How would our selfish decisions change?

What would our prioritites be for our day.... for the week..... for our year?

What would our longings be for ourselves and for our children?

How would be love and long to be loved?

The list of questions goes on and on.

What difference does knowing Jesus and being known and loved by him really make in my life?

or, do I just look like and behave like a good version of those around who are lost.

I long to know Jesus more and more than that I long for his purpose and his direction for my life to breath life into my so often selfish and heartless existence.

On Being Vulnerable

https://www.ted.com/talks/brene_brown_on_vulnerability

http://www.ted.com/talks/brene_brown_listening_to_shame#t-1210039

These two TED talks are both profound and encouraging. They speak to the topic of being vulnerable and shame. I recommend them knowing that the speaker speakes NOT from a Christian perspective but non the less her study is extrmemely helpful. As I interact with fellow life travellers and friends, I have come to see these two as profoundly influencial. Even and especially for us who profess Christ. Shame is such an interesting topic . There is right and wrong shame. I think she is talking about the wrong shame we expereience which distracts us fromt eh right shame we ought to hold.

When learning DOES NOT come easy

http://www.seoscribe.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/child-struggling-school.jpg

I am a teacher and have worked  with children for 20 years ,in various different cities , countries, schools, and ages of children.

I have my own 4 sons , 2 of which are ADHD. I tutor primary school children in maths , Afrikaans and Xhosa.  I have my own art studio for classes with children age 4-12 and adults.

Over these years I have come to have a deep empathy  and understand some of the barriers to learning children experience. I am not a remedial teacher but  I have gathered some tips that I would like to share.

1. Seek help early - If you are concerned about your child's learning, seek help - there are many professionals who can assist you in supporting your child

2. Schools should be equipped to help you find some help for your child , either in the school or by recommending someone outside of the school

3. leaving a potential problem to hopefully "sort itself out", in my experience, simply does not work.

4. If your child is getting help from a tutor or having extra lessons......

* be constant by keeping the weekly time slot booked

* Give it time - children often need time to consolidate information and concepts and that is what the extra work is providing.

* building confidence is a KEY - often, children have lost confidence in their ability. Extra help is a way to build back some foundational work so the child can feel that I can do this feeling

and so YOU play a big part in building confidence by what you say and or do not say

* keep up communication with you class teacher

* work at home - doing some times tables or  a game on decimals on the computer are two small ideas for home practice.

* keep it short and make it fun!!

*  Be Patient- realise that it is a process that takes as long as it takes. We can not rush a child through the stage of learning he or she is at. 

*  Have realistic expectations- extra help is not a miracle work and it might be that the extra help simply keeps the child learning steadily and not raises the mark up to an A

Tips for organsing thinking

One of the barriers to learning is what I like to call the brains filing system.

Children learn a whole lot of different concepts in a given subject. Subjects like science and history are easy to put into the filing system because each section is often taught as a whole and the concepts belonging to that section stay together.

However, in areas like maths, English and other languages, concepts are taught throughout the year and from year to year. These concepts build on one another and are scattered or not taught as a single unit.

Children often have a chaos in the brain in these subjects. In other words all the separate concepts are not clearly in the files in the brain. 

How to help?

1. help your child to clearly head all his or her work in the workbook 

2. use colour post it notes to classify sections of work that belong together - is use these in the text book too 

3. You might even like to get a separate file or folder and colour code all the work into sections . When your child is studying, he can then put all his "werkword" learning together into his file.

This process helps any child to organise his thinking and learning and then it helps him to retrieved the information more easily from he right file in the brain.

Forgive me

http://www.keepcalmandposters.com/posters/23982.png

Forgiveness.

A very big theme and a very real issue.

This term in  one of my fabulous bible studies, we are studying Tim Keller's book The Prodigal God. I am not sure if you have read this book but it is truly a profound and wonderful read. I decided to listen to some of the sermons Keller has preached that are linked to his book. The first was on the topic of forgiveness. 

The prodigal God is a book that grows out of the The prodigal Son story that Jesus told in the New Testament. 

A profound and wonderfully challenging story in the bible.

One of the themes of that flows out from this story is the theme of forgiveness. 

If you read the story in Luke 15, you will see a father who not only patiently waits for a son who has rejected and shamed him but more than that, he rushes to meet him when the son finally returns. This Father then forgives the son of the debt that the son holds. 

The thing is, what happens to the debt that is owed to the father. Where does it go. Is it brushed aside or simply forgotten?

Keller explains what happens by saying that the Father actually forgives his son by absorbing the debt himself.

This is powerful and has deep meaning for the Christan life. If I am to forgive those who have hurt me and or offended me, I am called to absorb the pain and the hurt - absorb the debt so I can set the person free from the debt they owe me. 

WOW!

How is this possible?

The spirit of the Living God within those of us who call ourselves Christians is able to accomplished this kind of real forgiveness.

This kind of forgiveness is open to me. God has absorbed the debt I owe him by bearing my sin on the cross. He has forgiven me the debt I owe him. 

He is truly glorious and beautiful. 

He has set me free.

I am able to set others free!!

The profound working of Ritalin

http://images.natureworldnews.com/data/images/full/2950/boy-running.jpg

Ritalin, The one word that causes such confusion and such disagreement. People have incredibly strong opinions about Ritalin. Ritalin is in fact the brand name for the drug metholphenidat. 

We are an ADHD family and we use Ritalin.

I have written a great deal about ADHD including the use of medication so this is not all I think nor is it all we have journeyed through together. 

This weekend we had one of those experiences that further underlined our very positive experience of the use of medication for helping ADHD.

Two of our 4 children have been diagnosed ADHD. Both take different dose of Ritalin LA. 

The LA Ritalin 10 is fairly new in SA and for some or other reason is out of supply at the moment. I switched our little guy to the short acting tab while we wait. Short acting Ritalin lasts for about 4 hours and so we need to give another dose at lunchtime. We have been forgetting:(. 

I had totally forgotten how angry; frustrated; blow-up, irrational and uncooperative this little chap was off Ritalin. Wow oh wow. We have been reminded.  He has not experienced those deep and overwhelming emotions for a very long time. These out of control one that are often part and parcel of ADHD.

And so we are again so grateful for the positive and helpful effects that medication has had for us and for this son. 

Our second part of the Ritalin affirmation came with our older son. He is 12 and at the moment has to prepare for an oral. His topic required research. He had been working on it for a long while and then asked me to read his work. 

The quality of his work was both way below his normal functioning and really , really short. It did not flow well and his ideas were all scattered. 

He told me he had written it off meds.

Take two was on meds and unfortunately we did not keep the first draft, but it is really interesting how these two written pieces were from the same child. It was honestly hard to believe.

For children who need help with meds, these meds are truly a life changer!