Long Obedience In The Same Direction

A Long Obedience In The Same Direction

Today is our 35th wedding anniversary and our marriage is strong. At first our union was so fragile that many friends and family members advised us not to get married at all. Many predicted that we would not even celebrate our first wedding anniversary. Chris and I faced so many barriers: cultural barriers, language barriers, and racial barriers. I look back on our marriage, and I see God’s hand all over us. Without God in our marriage I know that I would not have seen today, a wonderful day when I am happily packing to go to New York to see my first grandchild.

The road to this point has not been smooth. I encountered big boulders crashing down on me that almost killed me. Big rocks blocked the road; gravel made the journey tiresome and difficult. Sometimes, I wanted to give up, and take the easy road out, but God was with me. He carried me when I was exhausted and lifted me up when big burdens fell on my shoulders. With his help, I was able to run the marathon, which requires a long obedience in the same direction.

Chris and I have been going to Africa for nine years, to the same place to the same people, year after year. One Rwandan pastor shared publicly this summer, “Many missionaries come and help, but they don’t come back. There are only two groups come back again and again to us. They are Foremans and Rick Warren”. I took this as a complement because we are running a race that requires a long obedience in the same direction. When God called me to go to Africa, I answered that call. The first few years were exciting. I appreciated meeting new people, learning new languages, and experiencing a new culture. However, establishing an on-going mission requires more than excitement. It requires commitment and perseverance – just like a marriage. God calls us to be faithful in all we do. Faithful means that our actions are worthy, dependable, and enduring.

Women's retreat

I had a great time at Mt. Hermon last weekend. Some brave women walked on a rope (30 feet high from the ground) and ate bugs (edible, chocolate covered) in order to take points to win. I was not one of those brave ones. I took lots of pictures for their walks. There were 15 small groups, and we challenged each other with different activities, counting lamp posts in the camp ground, or counting the number of bleachers. My team didn't win for the easy tasks, but we won rope walks and bug eating activities. At the end, we were all winners.

This year's theme was "The Amazing Race: God's Way". I had a time to reflect my life, I can say how grateful I am for His mercy and blessings for my life. I also got to meet ladies from a Nigerian church in Oakland, when they sang, I missed my Rwandan friends so much. Here is a slide show from the weekend. I put a music to spice up the slide show, it is little loud.

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What a great time to be a teacher

It is so good to work with roomful of bright students. I read their learning blog, and learn so much from their learning. Here is what Alex shared with us, and I am sharing with you. We are living in an exciting time-- Look at what we are going to use soon. I don't have to squint my eyes to find keys on my phone. Here is a talk about MIT media lab work: http://www.ted.com/talks/pattie_maes_demos_the_sixth_sense.html




Also, Alex found this great site for us:

"NEWSFLASH: My favorite blog, information aesthetics, just posted about Sixth Sense. Here's a four-minute video. Imagine the implications! This is soooo cool, and it's very much what Dr. Wagner was discussing in class about Web 3.o (3D).
http://www.kwfdn.org/map/map.aspx"

This can happen to your grandmother

I don't have digital TV conversion problem since I don't own a TV. But most of our church people (there are more than half of our congregation members are over 70) have to convert their TV. I didn't even think about asking how they are managing this conversion problem.

I got this wonderfully funny video from Dr. Ellen Wagner's site. I have to ask her if the lady is her mother whom she talked about in our class. I thought this Youtube video is so funny. But it is not so funny when it is a reality that our seniors have to deal with. As we use more technology tools to connect with each other, we need to think about accessibility issues.

Video story

Since I asked my students to create a less than one minute story using a web 2.0 tool, I should do it too. I asked them to create a video story to highlight the points which were made by my friend, Curt, who came as an online guest speaker from IU. I confess, I didn't do "WE ALL CAN LEARN" thing. Here is my story about my grandson.

I will be going to Brooklyn in a few weeks, during my spring break, I can't wait to squeeze this bundle of joy. Till then I squeeze pixels of Lorenzo.

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