A Glimpse of Heaven

In a world full of so much turmoil how can we even begin to think we can accomplish the "Mission Possible" that I base this blog around? How can we expect to make a real difference in the way the world is when the good seems outweighed by the bad in so many regards? While this post is a heavily Bible-based one, I think these two principles apply to the world as a whole, even if you are reading this and are not of the Christian faith. So how can we capture a glimpse of heaven in a fallen earth? Here are two suggestions that I've really fixated on in my preparation for leaving my home to live in another culture.

Relationships

I'm finally in Peru now (which took longer than expected, as I will share in another post later)! I have said goodbye to so very many people in the last few weeks, and I'm thankful for that because it means that my lifelong support system is rock solid. This is exactly what my Lord had in mind when he established the church. I've got friends I've left behind in the states, but I was also welcomed by friends in Cusco! Read this... 

"So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit." ~ Ephesians 2:19-22

This is a family bound by the strongest cords there are - the blood of Christ. We grow together as a whole structure stabilized and held firm by Jesus, the cornerstone, the head. We are a body, working together toward one common goal. One part cannot continue without the other part of the body (I Corinthians 12:12-27). There is nothing that can tear apart these strong relationships, though as humans we tend to be self-destructive in our relationships due to petty problems, selfishness, and impatience. But when we submit to one another - with each party in the relationship putting themselves intentionally below the other in their minds - this fixes a lot of problems before they ever even come up in the first place (Ephesians 5:21 & 29-30). This goes along with the 2nd point if you want to scroll down and cheat.

No Christian can be an island on his own. Honestly, no person, whether a Christian or not, can be an island. Often, we want to handle things on our own and be independent for whatever reason - often pride. But we are told to "encourage one another and build one another up" in I Thessalonians 5:11. God knows there's a better way, and He wants the best for us. When King Nebuchadnezzar gave an order to kill the wise men in Babylon (which included Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego), Daniel did not try and handle the problem on his own, independently from his support system (or independently from God in heaven). Chapter 2:16-18 shows that they were a team: 

"So Daniel went in and asked the king to give him time, that he might tell the king the interpretation. Then Daniel went to his house, and made the decision known to Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, his companions, that they might seek mercies from the God of heaven concerning this secret, so that Daniel and his companions might not perish with the rest of the wise men of Babylon." 

Together they prayed and praised. Together they purposed in their hearts not to defile themselves with unclean food. Together they went into the fiery furnace and came out again.

This must be what heaven is like - having friends on either side of that journey from life on earth to life eternally in heaven just like I have precious friends both at home in the United States and in my new home in Cusco. After all, God told us that "everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or lands, for my name’s sake, will receive a hundredfold and will inherit eternal life." ~ Matthew 19:29 

Of course, it's only a glimmer, but I see a little bit of God, a glimpse of heaven in every one of you who have said kind words to me, helped me prepare, provided funds, or prayed for me. It means more than you can know, and it made leaving easier and harder at the same time! You've encouraged me and given me strength by letting God use you in this way - to touch my life. Thank you to all of you! I have really been reminded of this verse lately: 


"No one has seen God at any time. If we love one another, God abides in us, and His love has been perfected in us." Thank you for showing me God's perfect love through your lives. Take time today to nurture your relationships with others! They are important and worth it, even when there are struggles or problems to work through. 

Humility 


You can see straight through transparent materials, so they're obviously worthless...right? Windows, light bulbs, telescopes, contact lenses, magnifying glasses, lamination - the transparency doesn't really matter. Let's just replace them all with wood.


Now obviously, I'm being facetious. Why do we have transparent things? Well, to be able to see through them, of course!

 

Let's think about that light bulb for a minute. When you see a light bulb, you don’t look at the bulb itself. At first glance, you notice the light within instead. This would not be so if that light bulb were not transparent. Paint that same light bulb black and what do you notice first? You see only the bulb, the outer covering, which was never meant to be the center of the device’s attention! It's the same with us as people created in the image of God. When people see you, what do they notice first? Is it the bulb or the light shining within?

"For we do not preach ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord, and ourselves your bondservants for Jesus’ sake. For it is the God who commanded light to shine out of darkness, who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellence of the power may be of God and not of us." ~ II Corinthians 4:5-7

Let's go back to Daniel and his friends again. After they prayed for God to reveal the king's dream to Daniel and deliver them from death, Daniel immediately praised God, and the way he prayed to Him is truly inspiring!

"Blessed is the name of God forever and ever, for wisdom and might are His, and He changes the times and the seasons; He removes kings and raises up kings; He gives wisdom to the wise and knowledge to those who have understanding. He reveals deep and secret things; He knows what is in the darkness, and light dwells with Him. I thank you and praise You, O God of my fathers; You have given me wisdom and might, and have now made known to me what we asked of You, for You have made known to us the king's command."

He knows! He knows what's in the darkness, and he doesn't want that for us! Clearly, God is the source for everything good in the world! Picture yourself as a light bulb (I know, it’s strange). Picture every person on earth as a light bulb. God is the source of light, and we are the bulbs carrying that light around in the world so that others can see and come out of darkness. Some bulbs are turned off and have no light to give. Some bulbs are painted black though a light is within, hidden. Some bulbs are transparent and shining outwardly. In order for the world to be illuminated, your bulb must be transparent. If these bulbs were the only light on earth and we looked down on the planet from outer space, how much light would we see, and would you be contributing to it? Matthew 5:16 shows that any attention we draw to ourselves has only one purpose: 

“…that they may see your good works and glorify God in heaven.”

After Daniel reveals the dream and its meaning to King Nebuchadnezzar, he points straight upward to his God – “…but there is a God in heaven…” You see, the other wise men of Babylon were focusing on the wrong source for their light of revelation. 

Humility can be hard, but it's absolutely essential if our true purpose on earth - to glorify God - is to be realized. If people around the world are only glorifying themselves, there is no light, and the world remains in darkness. Remember - I do not matter. You do not matter. On our own we don't, that is. God matters, and he makes us matter because of Him. When we are transparent, we allow the Light within us to shine, and that brings a glimpse of heaven down to this fallen earth.

P.S. - Do you have an example to share of how these have played out in your own life?

I Can Communicate in a Foreign Language...and so can you!

Just give it about 4 months!

Ten months ago, I started studying Spanish. 
For 5 years in high school and college, I studied French.

And yet, I knew more Spanish after ONE month than I have ever known of French. And I even lived in French-speaking Belgium for a semester! So how? Why? WHAT?? I'm going to answer these questions for you today. But let me warn you - it isn't easy. It's not osmosis. It's not your university foundations class you took your freshman year that you could sleep through and still ace. (Sorry...)

Before I tell you about all my resources, there are a few key ingredients for you to plant, cultivate, pluck, and simmer a while before you can really move forward with learning a 2nd (or 3rd...or 4th...) language. 

1. MOTIVATION 

This is the key part of any language learning journey. You've got to really examine your reasoning for wanting to go through with this endeavor and keep that in the forefront of your mind or, I promise, you'll become a quitter much sooner than you'd hoped, and definitely much sooner than when you've reached fluency (which won't happen). I have often looked to this verse for motivation: 

"If I do not know the meaning of the language, I shall be a foreigner to him who speaks, and he who speaks will be a foreigner to me." ~ I Corinthians 14:11

Why do you want to know your target language? Usually, it's to be able to talk to people who speak that language and not your first language. This is a great way to broaden your view of and knowledge about the world around you. If you get frustrated and give up, these people will remain strangers to you all of your days! You can never truly get to know them. What a travesty! But imagine the day - oh yes! - when you will speak to them face to face and be understood! And when they will speak to you and get a thought-out response instead of blank stares! 

2. COMMITTMENT

This will come right along with your motivation. Don't be a quitter! Remember why you started this and if it's really important to you. When you're trying to learn the 500 forms of the verb "estar," don't despair! Okay, you can despair for a little while...I mean, it's just rough. But then get over it, give yourself a pep talk, and move on! It comes with time and practice, not all at once. That is why committing to your language learning long-term is so important. And when it comes to verb forms, memorizing all the forms at once won't do you much good anyway. You have to see them and use them in context and it will become more natural in time!  I'm sure you've heard the phrase, "If you don't use it, you lose it." If you study really hard for a week and then take 2 weeks off to get over the trauma, you're back at square one, buddy.

3. TIME AND CONSISTENCY

And rolling right off of that note, this whole language learning thing can't be "on again, off again" like your last bad relationship. In just the same way, it won't last! This is going to be a big time and effort eater, so be prepared for that at the onset. If you create a consistent time when you sit down to work on your target language, that will help a lot. Oh, I'm in the car going into town? Time to listen to my Spanish podcast! It's 9PM? Time to read one story out of my Spanish children's novel! 

Be consistent with your studies. Have a goal, and if it helps you to write it out or to mark off your study times on a calendar, then do that! You know yourself and your learning style and study habits better than anyone else does, so I can't tell you what will work for you to stick to it week after week and month after month. The most important thing is to surround yourself with the language and not do too much too soon. Take it one day at a time, one subject at a time. Avoid the "intensity trap" of studying 5 hours a day one week and then falling off the bandwagon completely the next week. I don't recommend either of those two paths. Start low and go slow.

4. IMPERFECTIONISM AND HUMILITY

This one may sound strange to you. You mean...you want me to be imperfect? To NOT be perfect? To not even strive for perfection?

Why YES, that's exactly what I'm saying. If you try to be perfect when you speak, read, or listen to your target language, your growth will be stunted because you'll never get real practice. You'll turn the radio back to English because, well, you weren't getting what the latin song was saying, and so what's the point? You'll revert back to where you're comfortable - your 1st language, your heart language. But to grow, we must be challenged beyond what we're currently able to do so that someday in the near future, we CAN understand that song!

You must be willing to make a fool of yourself, be uncomfortable, and be okay with that! Don't allow yourself to get discouraged when you don't know the right conjugation to use or you accidentally agree to go salsa dancing with someone tomorrow night...and then have to cancel later when you realize what you've done! It's all part of the learning, and you'll get some hilarious stories out of these language mishaps, too. Be nice to yourself.

RESOURCES: 

Many people have asked me what I've been doing to learn Spanish before I move off to Peru. Here is a list of the resources I have used that have been super helpful in my language learning. Lucky for you, I'm not interested in working my way through a textbook. That method might work for some people, but it's totally off my radar. I'm going for a more natural and conversational route.

• Duolingo app

This is a great anytime, anywhere resource that can test your knowledge. The lessons are arranged in categories and just take a few minutes each. You can set your goal to between 1 and 5 lessons a day, and it will remind you to do them on your phone. Sometimes there's matching, translating, listening exercises, etc. It's a helpful little FREE application.

• Coffee Break Spanish and Show Time Spanish podcasts (in that order - the second builds on the first)

These are completely FREE, and it's probably been my best resource! The episodes are about 15-20 minutes each, and it's designed for you to listen to the same one each day for a week and then move on to the next episode, though you certainly don't have to stick to that setup. You can also purchase extra resources from them if you'd like, but the podcasts alone have been sufficient for me. There are a teacher and a student on this podcast, so the student makes mistakes just like you will! You have a chance to speak and repeat back what you are learning, and your knowledge is tested at regular intervals. It's really a great system.

For android, you can get an app called "Learn Spanish" (the one with the orange circle, Spain flag, and headphones) to hear the podcasts without an Apple device, and there are several other Spanish podcasts on there, too. I listen to these in the car on the way to and from work quite often.

• Kids' movies and TV shows in Spanish (or your language of choice) 

I switched my Netflix language to Spanish. Some of my favorites to watch were Tarzan (all 3), The Emperor's New Groove, and All Hail King Julien (the show based from the Madagascar movies). You can watch with subtitles in English, then subtitles in Spanish, then no subtitles! See how you do! It helps if you've seen the movie before and kind of already know what's going on.

• Extra en Español 

This is a soap opera on Youtube that uses easy and slow Spanish, specifically made for learners. I've watched it through a few times just to track my improvement in understanding after a few more months of study. There's just one season of 14 episodes.

• Youtube language lessons and conversational videos

One of the best I've found is a channel called "Señor Jordan." It seems like he's got a video about any Spanish language topic/area you could want! And he's a great teacher. Here's an example:

• Write out Scriptures, quotes, or a journal entry in your target language

Typing is okay, but I really mean writing in the old-fashioned way - with a pen and paper. This will help you learn to spell things and feel with your own hand the setup of sentences in your grammatically correct target language. You can try journaling in your target language, which will help with the same things plus learning to express yourself in that language even if you don't have someone to speak out loud, too. Read your entry out loud back to yourself to help practice pronuncation and start to feel more natural hearing these sounds come from your very own mouth.

• Set your devices in your target language 

Phone, computer, GPS, radio, iPad, etc. - I put it all in Spanish! That way you kind of already know where everything is, and if not, you have to learn to get around! It's a sort of lazy, subconscious way to engrain things into your natural memory.

• Reading children's Bibles or other books in Spanish (or your target language)

Toward the beginning of my learning, I used this because it is simple and for very young children. It was really good for working on past tenses (which I hate). The pictures are cute, too:

When I started getting a little better at understanding, I moved on to this. It's for older children, so it is a bit more complex, simple but still challenging enough to learn a lot from and get used to the way sentences are set up and different conjugations. I also really loved that at the end of each story, there was a "conexión con Cristo," a connection to Christ section: 

I have a word document where I write out words I don't understand with their definition, a sample sentence, and a sentence I come up with using that word. Don't feel like you have to understand everything you're reading! Even if you're a little lost (or a lot lost), you're getting used to grammar and sentence structure in your target language and seeing words written down that you may have only heard before. I also sometimes like to read the stories out loud to work on pronunciation. It's now become less and less strange to hear myself speaking Spanish.

It is also helpful to pick up flyers, brochures, and advertisements in Spanish to practice with whenever you come across them. I have a guidebook to Petra from when I was in Jordan in October that I found in Spanish, along with maps and brochures. I also have copies of Divergent and Frankenstein en Español, but I'm not to that point in my language skills yet, so those are some to look forward to as I improve.

• Listen to music in Spanish as often as possible - pop is good, and cafe type music is good, especially Julieta Venegas; check out Spotify for their several playlists in the "Latin" section of the Browse Bar (I especially like the "Cafe Con Leche" and "Latin Pop Hits" playlists)

• Find someone to talk to!

To make language learning work, you actually have to use it in real situations and say the words out loud. Often we get stuck on listening and reading but don't get to speak our target language as much. Make a friend online that lives in a country that speaks your target language. Convince a friend to learn with you and practice together. If there's a group in your area that speaks your target language, get involved with them.

• SpanishDict app and spanishdict.com

This has been the most accurate translator I've found. It also gives example sentences and more of a dictionary definition instead of only a translation. There's a table for ever verb with every possible conjugation! They also have an online program called Fluencia that you can purchase for a monthly fee (which I did not do) if you're interested in that sort of thing. The app and website are both great!

• Take a trip to a country that speaks your target language 

Of course, this isn't always possible due to finances and other constraints. If you can make this work, wait until you've been studying at least a few months. This will help you gauge how your studies are truly going if you MUST use it to get around! If you're better than you thought, it will be very encouraging! If you are behind where you'd hoped you would be, it will be motivation to increase the effort you're putting into the language! But the best part - you'll get to practice in a real situation and hear/see the language everywhere around you, plus you'll have a fun traveling experience, too!

Do you have other suggestions of good resources for language learning or any words of encouragement for your fellow learners? Any questions? Share them in the comments below!

Disclaimer: I have no claim on any photos or videos posted and no personal or business ties with any products endorsed. I am not being reimbursed for any of my recommendations but simply think they are all wonderful by my own judgment.

Trying Out Something New

Well, a lot has happened in the past three weeks! The children's English Bible program and adult English Bible studies are definitely in full swing! Since I have written last, there has been a mother and daughter (Marla and Mrs. Gina) come to work with us for two weeks and a recently graduated elementary school teacher (Courtney) come and work for one week! It was nice to have extra hands and new faces, especially getting ready for the children's program to start this past week. 

The week after Mr. Walenty's funeral, Courtney, Holly, Annabelle, and I worked and worked on getting materials ready for the children's program. This program brings in people from all over the community of the Gdansk-Sopot-Gdynia Tri-city area. We started by organizing material that they already have in the storage room. There are a lot of good things there to use when teaching children! There hasn't been a children's program here in a few years, so the materials and supplies were dusty, out of order, dried up, broken, etc. We spent the first week getting everything in the right place down in the basement, throwing away and replacing unusuable supplies, and cleaning the area to get ready for kids to come. Everything downstairs is now spick, span, and easy to find! It was a lot of work, but it paid off!

That weekend and the next week was spent getting everything together specifically for this summer's program! Thankfully, a friend of mine from Freed-Hardeman arrived last week and will be here for three weeks! Unfortunately, Holly went back to the States on Tuesday. It was such a blessing to work with her for five weeks! This is the schedule that Annabelle and Mrs. Molly came up with: 

Week 1 - Jesus Calls the Children and the Apostles
Matthew 19:13-14, Mark 10:13-16, Luke 18:15-17 and Matthew 4:18-22, 10:1-4, Mark 1:16-20, 2:13-17, Luke 5:1-11 and 27-32, 6:12-16 and John 1:35-51
Main Idea: Jesus Loves Me

Other Theme: Family and Relationships

Other Topics: Geography, Roman Rule, and Jobs of the Apostles 

Week 2 - Jesus Heals Ten Men with Leprosy (and only one comes back to thank him)

Luke 17:11-19

Main Idea: I Say Thank You 

Secondary Theme: Body Parts 

Other Topics: Temple and Priests, Leprosy and Illness

Week 3  - Jesus Feeds the 5000

Matthew 14:13-21, Mark 6:30-44, Luke 9:10-17, John 6:1-15

Main Idea: Jesus Takes Care of Me

Secondary Theme: Foods

Other Topics: Foods in Jesus' Time

Week 4 - Jesus Calms the Storm

Matthew 8: 23-27, Mark 4:35-41, Luke 8:22-25

Main Idea: I Ask God for Help When I am Afraid

Secondary Theme: Clothing for Weather

Other Topics: Sea Routes and Transportation in Jesus' Time

Week 5 - The Good Samaritan

Luke 10:25-37

Main Idea: I Help Others

Secondary Theme: Health

Other Topics: Land Travel and Transportation in Jesus' Time

In order to prepare for this program, we researched, organized, and brainstormed crafts, puzzles, activities, advertisements, pictures, coloring pages, videos, flashcards, games, and so much more! We printed things, colored materials, laminated, ran errands, decorated the building, bought paper and other craft supplies, and studied the text on our own. I never knew so much work went into teaching children! I've boiled this down to a short paragraph, but it really filled up our entire week! In the States we do a one-day or one-week VBS in the summers, and that takes a lot of work. This is like VBS every day for five weeks!

The program lasts an hour and a half Monday-Friday each week. We go over the same lesson each day (maybe in a different way, using different materials, or a different part of the story). The children who come may be there only one day of the week or every single day, so it is hard to know who will come! The children can be from age 5 to age 11, which is the critical period of childhood for learning. The brain processes language differently during this time than at older ages, which is why adults have a much harder time learning things, such as language, than children do. Each week, our goal is for the child to leave knowing at least one very important lesson, such as that Jesus loves them, that they can ask God for help, to say thank you, to help other people, or that God will take care of them. Those are the over-arching themes of each week.

On a more personal note, I am in the process of learning a new, and very important, skill - how to effectively and comfortably teach children. I haven't had a lot of experience teachings kids nor do I have children of my own. I haven't had any real training on how children learn, but I am learning so much from doing this here in Sopot! Annabelle is so wonderful at it, and I am learning just from observing her! Being involved with the children's program is a bit out of my comfort zone, but that is a good thing. Moving outside of one's comfort zone leads to broader horizons and spiritual growth. This is a skill that will be SO useful for the rest of my life, so I am very glad to have this opportunity to be involved in it!

For this first week of the children's program, there have been only a few students. It is the last week of school here, so most people were very busy. Next week, we are expecting to have many more children coming through our doors! This week we taught about Jesus calling his apostles and Jesus bringing little children to himself. We start off each day with circle time, where we use simple English phrases and tell the story for the day. We sing, go through flash cards, and play games. When we are done there, we help the children do a craft related to the lesson, and we may sing some more, put together a puzzle, and tell the story again! The children are so precious! 

During the first week of this program, we lost four of our workers, so we were a little short-handed! While Annabelle and Amanda focused on the children, Mrs. Molly and I focused on  the adult English lessons. We took Holly's, Marla's, and Mrs. Gina's students on, so we were very busy! I had several lessons a day to prepare for, but I absolutely loved it! I got to talk with so many people, in depth, about wonderful Bible stories and principles. It has been so good to have lessons with the same students over and over again. I always look forward to seeing them and getting to know them more when I know they have lessons scheduled! It creates a nice variety to have lessons with adults in the morning and afternoon hours and then to be with the kids in the evening.

Last Sunday before Holly left, one of the members of the congregation here, invited us over to her flat for dinner, and then we went for a walk together around Sopot. It was so lovely! We also had a couple of free days in the past few weeks, and we visited a gingerbread museum in Torun, Poland and Westerplatte in Gdansk, where World War II began. After being in the apartment with only me and Amanda for a few days after Holly's departure, we got three new workers from the States, Mr. Tony, Mrs. Treva, and Ms. Janet! I am loving my time here in Poland, and I am learning so so much more than I ever thought I could! I have been so blessed by the experience I have had here so far, at my halfway point through the summer. I definitely made the right choice when I decided to come here this year!

The Next Leg of the Journey

This week has been another one filled with learning experiences and productivity! The funeral for Mr. Walenty Dawidow was on Wednesday, so Holly and I were able to put our helping hands to good use for the first half of this week. There was a lot of work to be done before, during, and after the funeral. In the United States, funeral homes take care of almost everything in the planning of a funeral but, in Poland, the family has to do all of that. Annabelle, Mrs. Molly, and Mr. Mike had so many tasks to complete this week in just a few short days! They bought flowers to decorate the auditorium where the funeral was held. They put together a very nice room with tables and chairs decorated for a meal for the family. They bought and cooked food for over 40 members of the family and friends that came to the funeral. They organized everything with the gravesite. They had to get a lot of paperwork done. They ran here and there all over town for a few days. Mr. Mike prepared appropriate words to speak at his father’s funeral. Before and after the funeral, everything had to be cleaned and put away.

…and all in the midst of such tremendous grief and heartache.

Holly and I were able to vacuum and clean the auditorium, help set up the fellowship hall for the meal, bake a pound cake for the family, help put together the many food dishes needed for the meal, serve food and beverages to the family, wash and dry the many dishes, clean up after the funeral, and many other things. I say this not at all to boast, but to show you, my supporters, that the money you graciously contributed to get me to Poland is, indeed, going to good use. Not all good work is Bible study; some is lightening the load for those who are hurting and showing the love of Christ to others through their observation of the way we live. Mrs. Molly even commented to us that she suspected that God had sent us here to help them during this time of need. I am so glad we were here and able to help in a very tangible way.

Even if it may, on the surface, seem like this situation was an interruption of our work here, which was supposed to be teaching English Bible lessons, I do not consider it an interruption. We were not idle but, rather, trying to be the hands and feet of Christ. We were learning lessons about mission work and about relating to people all along the way as well as building up relationships.

It was an absolute pleasure to work along next to my Polish brothers and sisters in Christ during these few days. Everyone in the congregation here is very ready to help whenever it is needed. They are selfless and loving. After spending these past couple of weeks here, and especially the first part of this week, I can now say that I actually know several members of the congregation. I can address them by name, and some of them even speak English! I had some wonderful conversations with people here and have begun to form relationships with the lovely Christians and others here in Sopot. I am beginning to learn a few Polish words here and there just from seeing them over and over again on signs or hearing people say them a lot. I have learned how to pronounce different sounds of words so I can now try to sing along with the hymns during church. I can recognize the members of the church on Sundays now, and they always greet me with a warm handshake or a hug and a smile! My cup overflows.

On Thursday, Holly and I were finally able to begin teaching lessons! I had four lessons on Thursday and one on Friday morning. They generally last about an hour each. My lessons covered different parts of Adam and Eve, Abraham, Moses, and John the Baptist this week. Each student is at a different point in the 6-book series, so there is a huge variety of topics for which to prepare. Throughout the day, I discussed Adam and Eve being banished from the garden, Abraham being promised he would become a great and chosen nation, Moses receiving the Ten Commandments at Mount Sinai, and John the Baptist preparing the way for the Lord and being beheaded. The texts selected for each lesson really do spawn a lot of questions and discussions from both the student and the teacher. The Dawidows have put a LOT of hard work into preparing these books and related materials, and it has really paid off. There are binders for each lesson with prepared worksheets, maps, memory verses, visual aids, quizzes, and unit tests. By the time a student completes a lesson, he will know the text and the principles from the text like the back of his hand. It was really interesting for me to watch people read certain excerpts of the Bible for the very first time that I have been hearing about since before I could talk. It is an amazing thing to see understanding and amazement light up across a person’s face! 

The Word is so able to speak for itself and to work its way into the hearts of people! What a blessing!