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Monthly Archives: July 2009

"How's it Goin'?"

28 Jul

Well, I’ve been asked by several of my near and dear blog readers how our home school practicing has been going…so here’s assuming that those of you in far off places are wondering the same thing. :-)

I’d say…it’s going.  Going well?  Mmmm…I wouldn’t say that.  “Satisfactory” would be a good assessment, I think; as per my expectations…and it helps that I didn’t have very high expectations.  (Hee hee)  For the past week we’ve been working on establishing a semi-rigid schedule and laying down some ground rules as to what we can expect from each other.  I’m really glad that we’ve set aside some time to work through these things now.

Here’s our schedule:

9:00 – 10:00  Language Arts with Mum at home
10:00 – 10:25  Recess
10:25  Head over to the College Ad. Building
10:30 – 11:20  Math with Dad in the Ad. Building
11:20 – 1:00  Prayer Room time/Lunch in College Cafeteria/Recess/Pick up Noah from Preschool 3 days a week with Dad
1:00 – 1:30 More Language Arts with Mum at Home
1:30 – 1:50  Recess
1:50 – 3:00  Science/Music/Art or catch up on whatever

History Lessons will take place 3 or 4 nights a week after Supper with Dad (The history is really fun and interesting. It reads like a story. Dave, the boys and I love it!)

So there you have it.  Our schedule in all it’s glory.  We’ve more or less stuck to it for this past week and it seems to be working.  One thing that is going to make this whole homeschooling thing fun for the boys is the fact that we live on a college campus and Dad’s flexible schedule.  It will be nice for them to have a change in scenery everyday to do their math lessons.  And how cool is it that they get to eat lunch with college students?  Even cooler is that fact that these college student love Jesus and my kids.  (Oh, and on Tuesdays they will get to participate in the Prayer and Fasting time that Dave mentioned in the previous post.)

Logistics and rules and all that kind of stuff aside though, I know I’m going to love – already love – interacting with my older kids every day on an intellectual level.  And as I’ve actually sat down and worked with them in various subjects I feel my confidence growing.  “I can do this!” I often think to myself with surprise.  For me, it’s totally debunked the myth that learning should take place in a formal setting with a highly educated person at the helm.

I also can’t help but remember all of the times that I’ve been able to volunteer in Elijah and Zeke’s classrooms… and how little one-on-one instruction really happens.  I’ve heard that a very small percentage of a school day in a public school is actually spent learning, and I totally believe it.  I’ve seen it.

Another thing, of course, is that students need to deal with distractions consistently in a classroom setting…something that just might happen here in our home school once in a while.  …Okay, who am I kidding?  Distractions will be happening here consistently too.  But, here’s the thing:  that’s Okay!

 
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Posted by on July 28, 2009 in School

 

A Taste of the Age to Come

24 Jul

I love living and working around the students at Bethany College of Missions. They provoke me to live wholly for God. The Bethany campus fasts together on Tuesdays and we gather at noon to worship and pray together and I get to lead worship for it! This last week one of the mentors, Rachele Ward, and others went to promote Bethany at a local music fest and awesome stuff happened. I’ll let her tell you the story. I pass this on to encourage you to love God with everything and step out even in uncertainty!

It all started after setting up the BCOM booth at Desperation in Colorado Springs. Amy went into the bathroom and heard a junior high girl saying, “It really hurts, I think I’m going to have to go back to the hotel.” Seeing her in obvious agony Amy went up to the girl and asked if she could pray for healing, the girl agreed and her friends shyly joined in. As Amy was walking away she asked how she was feeling. The girl’s stunned reply was, “It actually feels a lot better!” Encouraged by this experience Amy mentioned this in her Facebook status. I saw this the next day as the Lord was challenging me

Several people, including myself, all promoted Bethany College of Missions at Sonshine Fest.  Saturday morning I felt the Lord heavily speaking to me, “Rachele you are here to bring my Kingdom not to promote BCOM.”  We are to bring the Lord’s Kingdom wherever we are… sometimes I forget this.  He was really stirring in me.  I went to the other two girls and I began to tell them what the Lord was speaking.  One person mentioned the scripture in Hebrews 6 that says, “Therefore, let us leave the elementary teachings about Christ and go on to maturity, not laying again the foundation of repentance from acts that lead to death, and of faith in God, instruction about baptisms, the laying on of hands, the resurrection of the dead and the eternal judgment.”  The Lord began wrecking our hearts.  They classify raising people from the dead as elementary teachings?!  That is crazy!  We also talked about the verse, “the same Spirit that raised Christ from the dead lives in us.”  That is crazy to think about.

I went back to my tent and left the girls and the promotion booth.  I told the Lord that if He wanted me to step out and lay hands on people and pray for random people I would but I needed Him to back me up otherwise I have nothing to work with.  As I waited on Him and I still felt like He was saying He wanted to break in at Sonshine. I also felt we needed to bring a Kingdom perspective – but how?

I went back to our booth and a few more students were there and I told them what the Lord had been stirring in our hearts.  One got excited and said he was going to make signs.  He made one that said “NEED PRAYER?” and another that said “NEED HEALING?”  We prayed and asked the Lord to bring only who He wanted.  From the time we began until four hours later people didn’t stop coming.  We began laying hands on people and praying for their requests.  At one point one of the girls asked this guy if we could ask the Lord for a word or prophecy for him.  In my head I was like, “Do not sign me up to prophesy.”  But the Lord quickly reminded me that He is the Shepherd and I can hear His voice.  From that time on we prayed for people but we also all listened to see if the Lord wanted to speak to us about the people.  This is how the Lord allowed us to bring a Kingdom perspective.  We began calling them forth into who the Lord created them to be.  We spoke truth over them and prophesied.  People began to come up for healing and they were being healed!  The first time we prayed we would ask how they felt and they said better so we prayed again until they were healed!  I am not sure why the Lord waited 2-3 times but He did.  A guy’s back was healed, a shoulder, ankles, depression, schizophrenia, sickness.  We prayed for a lady who was addicted to narcotics and was beginning the withdrawal process.  Some of the girls prayed over her and later she came back and said the Lord was healing her but she was being attacked by the enemy.  She was shaking and stuttering.  I believe she was manifesting (a demon).  We prayed over her until she stopped shaking.

People were running to get their friends and brought them back for the Lord to heal them.  It was beautiful.  One guy came up and said that He wished he knew what he was doing.  He wished he could do what we were doing.  I told him we didn’t know what we were doing either.  I told him the process of the Lord speaking this morning.  I asked him if he felt weak and then told him to jump on board.  He was able to lay hands on people with us and see the Lord heal.  It is amazing how the Lord delights in our weakness.  How in our weakness He just asks for obedience. Simply beautiful!

The vendor next to us was running her booth by herself all weekend.  If she wanted to go to the bathroom, she had to lock up all of her stuff.  So we went and got her food sometimes to make it easier on her.  Saturday night her husband showed up and I introduced myself.  He said that he knew a little about us.  I thought that was an odd statement for someone you just met.  He said when he got here his wife leaned over, pointed to us and whispered, “Those people are the real deal, honey.”  I started crying.  The Lord really spoke to my heart through that.  I felt the Lord’s heart for the end time church.  I thought about that scripture that says they will know us by our love.  I always wondered what that would look like.  I feel like I got a glimpse. That love is going to come through obedience in our weakness.  We are going to love the Father and people are going to see the overflow of our hearts.  Not in just hugs and joyfulness but in obedience in laying hands on people.  It was beautiful.  The Lord is beautiful.

Be encouraged! Living on this campus is a blast and I am excited to see what else God does in and through us. This is just a taste of the age to come. These students and mentors are “the real deal, honey”!

 
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Posted by on July 24, 2009 in head to heart

 

Some Summer Photos

21 Jul

Wow…the summer is flying by!  Summer vacation has been really perfect so far, I have to say.  Even the weather has been amazing…in a pregnant lady’s opinion.  Cool and breezy, for the most part.  I love it.

Pictures, I think, are the way to go for now, since I would have no idea where to start to tell you of all the fun we’ve been having as a family.  Every day is an adventure!

Zeke’s new toothless grin.

Elijah is all of a sudden Mr. Athletic this summer.  This totally took me by surprise.  Up until this summer, he was usually the kid sitting under a tree with a pen and paper writing comics while the other kids ran around. 

Best Friends.

Noah’s in the rebellious, “I’m only doing funny faces for the camera” stage. 

Phoebe feels she has to try out just about every slide she sees.  Her keen eyes see one every time we take a trip in our car.  “I see a slide, Mummy!  I see a slide”  So we’ve been to many different parks this summer.  I refuse to return to the one where Noah broke his wrist though.  :-)

Monkeys. 

We’re doing some practice homeschooling for the next few weeks, in an effort to both get a head start and establish a schedule before our September baby comes.  It seems crazy that I’ve picked this fall to start homeschooling when our new baby’s arrival coincides exactly with the beginning of school.  Ironically, though, I’ve never felt more ready to do this.  I feel like I’ve been given an extra measure of faith and I’m asking the Lord for an extra measure of His Grace to be present in our home as we venture out into this craziness.

I plan on sharing more of my thoughts and how we’ve scheduled out a homeschooling day in an upcoming post…soon…hopefully.  (As we work out our schedule for this fall, I’m thinking I’ll need to schedule blogging or else it just won’t happen!)

 
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Posted by on July 21, 2009 in general

 
 
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