Alaska

Alaska Pictures...

~Alaska~

Alaska is in like 4 days! I'm super excited to be going on this mission trip, but also to grow closer to my students & see how God can work through us! What a tremendous opportunity we have!

Last Day!

Today is our last official day of school. I just want to breathe a sigh of relief at all of it - I mean, we did it. We survived, and not only did we survive, but we're growing - by leaps, in fact. We have 15 registered for next school year; two completely new students (meaning, not coming to us by way of Veritas), and I fully expect to have at least a few more by the end of the summer.

It's amazing to me what one step out in faith can do in your life. I have learned so incredibly much, about me and about my level of faith. Its one thing to say sure, I believe in God... I have faith in Him... I know He will take care of me, but when the opportunity presents itself to actually take a leap of faith - do you do it? Most people don't. They're content. There's something to be said for that contentment. The security of knowing that you will have a paycheck, the ability to pay your bills, live, etc. Then again...

There is something so empowering about signing your own paycheck. Knowing that the decisions are on you. Knowing that you are the vessel to put into place the vision that God gave you. Pretty flippin awesome.

Year one, in the books.

North to Alaska

In about 20 days, I will be heading off to Alaska for a week-long mission trip with four of my students and two other adults. The last time I actively went on a mission trip was the three-month long internship with ACMNP in the Grand Canyon. I'm so, so, SO excited to be going to Alaska!

Please pray for our Alaska Mission Team as we prepare for the trip and the hearts of the people there.

I spent some time looking at my old journal entries from the past year last night & this past week. Its terribly ironic that a year ago today I was telling my students at Veritas that I wouldn't be coming back to teach them. And with my decision that was made yesterday; its just so cool how God's timing is. Its been a very interesting year, a learning year. I know that God has His hand on Trinity ~ and that He is going to continue to bless this school and its students. Based on what I saw this morning with the students praying with and for each other, He is already moving in a mighty way. I know that He is going to increase our territory because we have been faithful to His will. I know that He will bless me because I have been faithful to His will for my life, even if it costs me. I know that I made the right decision, because I have God's ultimate peace, and I also know that He will continue to take care of me because I am His child.

This week meant a lot of reflection for me, a lot of prayer and thinking. I had a decision to make, and honestly, I was torn, but after a lot of prayer, a lot of seeking counsel, I made my choice & I have peace about it. I think its interesting that... nevermind.

When you arrive at a fork in the road, what do you do?

Trust simply in God - listening, desperately for His call?

Or, continue down the road you think is the right one, the best one. What do you do with the fork?

Do you take the "road less traveled" - the harder journey, or is it easy street?

Robert Frost ~ The Road Not Taken

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,

And sorry I could not travel both

And be one traveler, long I stood

And looked down one as far as I could

To where it bent in the undergrowth.

Then took the other, as just as fair,

And having perhaps the better claim,

Because it was grassy and wanted wear;

Though as for that the passing there

Had worn them really about the same.

And both that morning equally lay

In leaves no step had trodden black.

Oh, I kept the first for another day!

Yet knowing how way leads on to way,

I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh

Somewhere ages and ages hence:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I --

I took the one less traveled by

And that has made all the difference.

I think about this poem a lot, especially when I am reflecting upon my life and the choices that I have made. I wonder what it would have been like - how different I would be. My dad says that my brother and I have a different drum beat that we walk to... that when the road is easy, we take the hard path... nothing that we do is simple or quick, but usually wrought with pot holes and detours.

I can certainly say my journey to teaching was that way, for sure. And I recognize that founding Trinity wasn't easy either; neither has this past year. It's impossible to say who or where I would be if I had chosen differently. I can think of 5 life-altering moments that changed the course of my life... (aside from accepting Christ, which goes without saying)

1) Staying at Brookstone when I almost failed out. If I had left, I would have not met Josh or Kenil, wouldn't have had the opportunity for their friendship otherwise, because our paths wouldn't have crossed.

2) Choosing Auburn over Alabama. I think this is self-explanatory... along with this decision came the choice to go from Elementary Education to Early Childhood, to Secondary and finally to English... along the way meeting some of my favorite people.

3) Applying for & not getting the 9th grade teaching job at Brookstone the summer after I graduated with my MEd, I interviewed for a position at Brookstone and, as the job had already been promised to another, returned to Veritas to start teaching English. If this fork had been different... Trinity wouldn't exist. My life would be different... I wouldn't know Kelsey, Jeffrey, Eliza, Christi, Ally, Kara, Stephen, Eric, Noah, Skyler, Ana, Brandon, Jacob or any of my former Veritas students - Miles, Susan, Katoree. Incidently, I would have known Jackson, Joel, Austin, Donald, WT etc, because I was their aide first.

4) Every relationship - and by relationship, I mean "boyfriend" - lead me to here.

5) Leaving Veritas at the end of last year to start the amusement park, or Trinity.

I think its so fascinating to look back at our decisions and recognize where we were and where we might have been. And, what's even more neat is to see how God used us in those situations.