9/11/11

As a writer, it is important to know when to say something and perhaps as important to know when to remain silent and get out of the way. So today, 9/11/11, I am simply going to get out of the way and let the Word express what I am thinking and feeling as I reflect on those tragic events which shook both of the nations that I call "home".

Psalm 62

For the director of music. For Jeduthun. A psalm of David.

¹ My soul finds rest in God alone;
my salvation comes from him.
² He alone is my rock and my salvation;
he is my fortress, I will never be shaken.

³ How long will you assault a man?
Would all of you throw him down—
this leaning wall, this tottering fence?
⁴ They fully intend to topple him
from his lofty place;
they take delight in lies.
With their mouths they bless,
but in their hearts they curse.
Selah

⁵ Find rest, O my soul, in God alone;
my hope comes from him.
⁶ He alone is my rock and my salvation;
he is my fortress, I will not be shaken.
⁷ My salvation and my honor depend on God^[a];
he is my mighty rock, my refuge.
⁸ Trust in him at all times, O people;
pour out your hearts to him,
for God is our refuge.
Selah

⁹ Lowborn men are but a breath,
the highborn are but a lie;
if weighed on a balance, they are nothing;
together they are only a breath.
¹⁰ Do not trust in extortion
or take pride in stolen goods;
though your riches increase,
do not set your heart on them.

¹¹ One thing God has spoken,
two things have I heard:
that you, O God, are strong,
¹² and that you, O Lord, are loving.
Surely you will reward each person
according to what he has done.

A Day at the Races...

…and what a day it was! The 2011 cross country season started off with a bang on a hot day at Tama Hills. Humid, with highs approaching 88˚F (31˚C), today felt like a return to mid-August—slightly warmer than the ideal climate for running.

Despite the sweltering heat, the CAJ teams started strong. Though we lost to St. Mary's and Seisen, there were a number of strong individual performances worth noting! The returning Middle School boys all matched or improved on their PRs from the previous season, and the newcomers had a strong first showing. Special mention goes to Kenji J, 7^th grade, who placed 30^th with a time of 15:22 on the 3.3K course, and Callum M, (also grade 7) who placed 55^th with a time of 16:39.

Though there are only two middle school girls running this year, the girls, both 6^th graders, had an outstanding showing this morning in their cross country debut. Ha Eun K. placed 17^th with an impressive time of 17:20 on the 3.3K course (a time that would put her in the middle of the pack at the high school varsity level!) and Angela L. placed 52^nd with a respectable time of 19:45.

The high school girls showed a high level of energy and promise, with three girls, Junior Ria K, Sophomore Misaki N, and Sophomore Runa S finishing 14th with a time of 15:41, 16th with a time of 15:51, and 19th with a time of 19:46, respectively, on the 3.3K course.

Compared to last year, the high school boys had the toughest act to follow, as the 2010 team (comprised of some very talented runners who have since graduated), won the Far East tournament. The make-up of the current team is almost completely different, with only several boys returning. Veteran runner Tsubasa K, Junior, led the team, placing 7^th with a time of 16:31 on the 4.4K course. Newcomer Ryan H, Junior, placed 13^th with a time of 17:27 in his cross-country debut, and newcomer Kye A, Sophomore, placed 17^th with a time of 17:55 in his debut.

I’m extremely appreciative of the positive attitudes and hard work displayed by the runners today, and I am eager to watch each of them set goals and improve over the course of the season. Otsukaresama and Godspeed!

Friday afternoon

Teaching is not an 8:00-4:00 job where you punch in, become a teacher, punch out, and stop being a teacher. If you're a teacher, you're always a teacher, even when you're not in your classroom.

Sidenote: One of my pet peeves is when teachers do adopt this punch-clock mentality. If teaching is nothing more than a paycheck... why teach?

Back to the topic at hand: Long story short, it took me an hour to leave school today. 60 minutes to walk from the plaza to the bike parking lot (a walk that would ordinarily take 20 seconds). It seemed like I would take a few steps and then get into another long conversation with either a student or a colleague. Oh, I'm not complaining--not in the least! This lengthy end to the school-day was one of the many highlights of this week.

I love these conversations--conversations about how classes are going, conversations about how life is going aside from class, conversations about goals for the coming year, conversations about career goals, conversations about theology, conversations about faith... this afternoon had 'em all.

All this to say, I appreciate my students and the people I work with. I'm grateful for the community and the fact that this school environment doesn't encourage punch-clock-itis. It's fun to hear what colleagues are doing in their classes and it is such an encouragement to hear students thinking deeply about the world and about faith. Definitely a good end to the school-week.

Running to God

This marks my 31st blog post since I returned to Japan (which has been less than 31 days). I love writing, and it has been tremendously energizing to me to start writing regularly again--I enjoy working with words, of course, but beyond that, writing helps me to process what's going on in my life more deeply than I could otherwise.

It has also, in a lot of ways, challenged me to be more serious about my own faith. Having grown up in a Christian home, and consistently Christian settings, I have a tendency to be spiritually lazy. Coattail syndrome, let's call it. The logic, however faulty, is as follows: I don't have to be Christian all the time because there are so many Christians around me who will pick up the slack.

Okay, so my thought process about this has never been that crass, but at any rate, the fact remains that I have struggled my whole life to truly make the faith of my parents, mentors and community my own. Earlier this year, in the wake of an earthquake, then another earthquake, and then some fairly major losses within the community, I realized just how empty I was. I also realized that I tend to seek my escape, my respite, in things other than God and just wind up more empty.

So, my challenge to myself for this school-year is to pursue God, and pursue Him with every ounce of energy that I have and every spare second that I can remember. If a man is thirsty, does he slake his thirst by eating 20 packets of senbei? Certainly one would hope not... but that's what I've been doing, that's what I'm inclined to do. It's so illogical, so destructive, especially in light of the fact that there's a Fountain more refreshing than any mountain spring and it has been offered to us in spite of who we are. So I now run to the fountain and drink, again and again.

Writing helps me to do that. It reminds me to think about how richly blessed I am, about how big and how good God is. It reminds me to praise Him and thank Him, even on days when I am feeling tattered and drained. It's not a perfect process. I'm easily distracted... call it spiritual ADD. If I get the least bit stressed, or if something doesn't go the way I wanted it to, I complain about how bad I have it. All of my talk about God's mercy and blessings evaporate from my mind and my lips. So, I seek to remind myself again and again of the Joy that I have in my life as one of His creatures, as one who has been redeemed by the blood of the Lamb. Seriously--to be loved that much? It's overwhelming when you really think about it. To forget this truth is inexcusable. To forget this truth is also distinctly human.

That's why a vast number of my recent writings have revolved around faith. I'm not trying to look super-righteous, or just trying to talk the talk, and I hope it doesn't come across that way. If the content of my head and my heart were to be projected onto a big screen, you would see just how imperfect I am. It's scary sometimes. I write about faith as a challenge to myself, as a means to praise God and as a way of constantly reorienting the compass of my heart to seek Him. If others read and are similarly challenged and encouraged, so much the better.

"Find rest, my soul, in God alone, amid the world's temptations! When evil seeks to take a hold, I'll cling to my salvation." Alleluia!

Two Weeks In

It's been quite a week--a good one, at that. Getting to start my day off with Tully's coffee almost every day this week, sitting out under the trees in the plaza--blissful! Classes are continuing to go well, pretty much across the board. Today, I had the opportunity to talk through rhetorical fallacies with my Humanities students as they worked on skits/videos in small groups, and had some fun bouncing examples off of them and hearing them come up with good examples, themselves.

In World History, I had the opportunity to hear a number of very solid storytellers from among the ranks of the freshmen class. As a teacher who has students do a lot of presentations, the ease, enthusiasm and confidence that I see in my students at this point in the year tells me that I can focus on teaching more advanced public speaking skills since the kids seems to have a solid foundation already. Very exciting!

Then, in 6th period English 11, I had my students read the poem "Sure, you can ask me a personal question" by Diane Burns (a wonderfully sarcastic piece written as a one-sided dialogue responding to common stereotypes about Native Americans). I then assigned my students to write their own one-sided dialogue addressing stereotypes that they commonly face, whether based on their ethnicity, gender or age. This lead to a series of great conversations with small groups about stereotypes and where they come from.

Cross country is going pretty well, too--definitely a different atmosphere than last year's team (a strong group of 8th grade leaders last year... this team is younger--primarily 6th and 7th graders). Still, I think that they will do well, and that the first race on Saturday will remind the kids of what they are working toward in practices. Middle schoolers are funny, man. Here's a snippet of dialogue from after practice on Tuesday:
"Coach, how old are you?"
"25"
"EHHH? You're so young!"
"I was 22 when I started working here, so compared to that, I'm not so young anymore!"
"Are you married?"
"Nope"

Turns out answering this question was a big mistake because what followed for the next 10 minutes solid was 6 different middle schooler's opinions on who I should go out with--I think they listed every single woman in the community.

"Look guys... I'm content being single for now. I'm pushing myself to seek God first in everything that I do. It's hard to explain, but I believe that I need to preoccupy myself in striving to develop my relationship with the Lord. Someday, and I'm not sure when, a woman who is just as preoccupied in pursuing God will bump into me, and without missing a beat, we'll just keep the journey going together!"

...At least, that's what I would've said, if I had been able to get in a word edge-wise. Not exaggerating, the middle schoolers' excited chatter about how they were going to play matchmaker didn't let up for even a second until I told them to get changed and go home. Fortunately, they'd forgotten all about their elaborate schemes by Thursday's practice. They are entertaining and good-hearted kids, and I appreciate them even when they try to play puppet-master on my life. I hope I can be an encouragement and positive influence for them... I tend to be at my most tired and uninspired right after school and digging deep is a must.

So yeah... that's my week. I'm ready for the weekend, but Fridays tend to infuse both teachers and students alike with energy we didn't know we had. Thank God for Fridays!

Oh, and I'm not sure who will read this, or if anybody will read this far into this post, but if you do... I'd appreciate prayer as I will be speaking in chapel next Wednesday and I'm currently mulling over what to talk about. Thanks.

Adulthood

When you're a child, it's easy to believe that the adults in your life have everything figured out; you think to yourself, "they know what they're doing" and then you curl up and fall asleep in the backseat.

Only as we grow older do we discover the truth: there was quite a lot that our parents improvised--simply made up as they went. We learn this when we reach our early to mid 20s and discover that there's no training seminar on how to be a grown-up. We may have a college diploma at our disposal: a piece of paper that proves that we're competent to work in one field or another (anything from teaching to journalism to working as a lab technician). Yet, that certificate is no guarantee of our competency to live as adults... it simply means that we knew how to succeed in the still-relatively-controlled environment of school.

Learning to be independent, learning to pay taxes, to rent and furnish an apartment, to eat healthy while cooking for oneself... these things take work. Throw in marriage and family, and that's a lot to juggle. For most of these tasks, we won't have someone looking over our shoulder, giving us constant guidance and feedback. Help is there when we ask for it, but ultimately, as adults we are expected to accomplish these tasks ourselves.

This was a revelation that struck me this past week one morning as I was setting up my classroom for the coming day. It dawned on me that I was the grown-up in the classroom and had been for a few years. When did that happen?! It really is a quiet transition that sneaks by without any fanfare. In some ways, childhood seems so recent. Certainly adolescence seems recent. I tell my students stories from my high school years that seem so fresh in my mind until I lead off with something like, "I started my freshmen year in fall of 2000, so this story happened 11 years ago." When I was a freshmen, 11 years was nearly an entire lifetime. When I was a freshmen, my current freshmen students were toddlers. And, here's something I literally just realized that affects my plans for class this week: Walking into class this coming Friday and asking my kids what they remember about 9/11 is probably not a fruitful idea. Hmm... change of plans.

So, I accept and embrace the fact that I'm a grown-up. Even though I feel a little frustrated, lost and clueless about what adulthood entails at times, I take solace in the fact that surely I am not the first to feel this way, nor will I be the last--and many others who felt this way turned out fine. For now, I need to learn how to be an adult... a scary prospect--a little sad (au revoir, childhood), but mostly exciting. Right now, at this very moment, being an adult means taking care of myself, recognizing that I'm tired and feeling under the weather, and going to bed. And so, I close my semi-stream-of-consciousness ramble on adulthood. Goodnight!

Firstfruits

Today, as I sit at "my" picnic table in the plaza during my 1st period prep, there's a distinct feeling of autumn in the air. The table is smattered with fallen yellow leaves--casualties of the on-again, off-again rainstorms of the past few days. The air is slightly cool, and there's just a hint of that fall crispness to it. Maybe it's just my imagination. Maybe it's just wishful thinking... I mean, after all, I know that it will warm up this afternoon, and it will be muggy during cross country practice. When that time comes, I won't be making any comparisons to fall. But right now? Things are perfect.

God is giving us a taste of what's to come, a reminder that the heat and humidity that make us sweat, make us feel gross will not last. Eventually, they will give way to a cooler climate--the season that is traditionally associated with the harvest. This taste of things to come was a concept familiar to the ancient Israelites as well. By God's command, the Israelites would hold a celebration just prior to the harvest known as "first-fruits" in which they would gather the produce that had already grown in their fields and gardens. It was not a full harvest--the vegetables, wheat and grain were still growing, still had weeks or perhaps months to go before ripeness. Yet, the Israelites would feast and celebrate on the earliest vegetables in expectation of that full harvest.

This is very much a reflection of where we are today, where the church is today--just like the heat and humidity, sin continues to oppress us and afflict us. Sometimes, it seems as if there's no exit, no end. However, we know that Christ has defeated the power of sin and death--the oppression can't last. Sin is dying--it's still dangerous. It's still flailing its limbs and causing more collateral damage than we care to see... but sin will crumble and fall for good when Christ returns. This is the harvest which we anticipate--the lovely, cool autumn season. We can see traces of this in the world today--consider the power of the Holy Spirit in the spread of the gospel! Consider the work of the church! Consider each time relationships are repaired between estranged friends and family, when broken marriages are restored! Consider the ways in which humans selflessly serve each other and reach out to the broken! No, it's not a full harvest--these are just traces. But, if these traces bring us so much joy, then how much more will we rejoice on the day of the harvest?

It's warmed up significantly since I started writing this post, and the bell will ring in two minutes--then I'll be off to class. When next I emerge outside, it will likely be quite hot and humid. I pray that I may not forget about the hope, the anticipation and the joy of the first-fruits of autumn.