Am I A Missionary?

Am I a missionary? Yes, I am. But so are you. Say whaaaat? At least I think so and I hope so. The term missionary is such a weird term. What exactly is a missionary? I was talking to some friends the other day and we were talking about the term “missionary.” When I come back to the States, I want to continue to be a missionary. A missionary, in my opinion, is anyone that is actively sharing the Word of Christ.

I think that being a teacher makes it very easy to be a “missionary.” I encounter students every day that do not know the Lord. The interesting thing about my students is that they are surrounded by poverty everywhere they turn, and many of them are apathetic to that. A lot of the students do not realize how well off they are and how big of a problem the poverty is.

It is super ironic that I started blogging about this earlier because today at Bible study we talked about money. We read in James 5 where it talks about the wealthy. I keep thinking about my life in the States. What do I want my life to look like when I get back? I live SO cheaply here. I don’t worry about cable, I don’t spend much money on food, and other things that are “necessities” in the States have no value here. I really love the simplicity of it all, but I know that once I get back to America, things will change drastically. I would like to say that I’m going to try to maintain the same type of lifestyle that I live in Haiti once I get to America, but I know myself. Friends want to eat out. Friends want to go see movies. Friends want to do things other than sit in the apartment and watch DVD’s that we’ve seen a million times.

I need to be praying more. For my lifestyle, for my students, for my friends. I want all of us to realize that money is something that is here today, and gone tomorrow. Success does not equal happiness. It is my mission to be a missionary at all times. Whether I am living among the poor, the rich or the in between, I need to be sharing Christ will everyone, all the time. I need to love the unlovable. I need to be with the poor. I need to show my students that there is more to life than being rich.

Some days being a missionary is hard. But isn’t that the same way for all believers? I never want to be content and comfortable, because I want to be taken out of my comfort zone and given opportunities to share Christ at every opening.

I feel like I just needed to share all of that. I challenge all of us to be missionaries all the time.

In other news, today is Melissa Hope’s first birthday! I cannot believe that she is one year old today! Although she still looks like a 6 month old, she is growing like a weed. Jenny, the lady adopting Melissa, flew down to be with Melissa on this special day. It truly broke my heart that I could not be there celebrating with her, but Jenny is so gracious and Skyped with me this evening so I could see her on her very special day.





This Friday, we have another basketball game. This is our third one of the “season.” We are currently undefeated. Here are some pictures from our last game versus our rival, Union School.

Some of my awesome sophomore girls


Another sophomore student of mine shooting free throws

Team huddle on a time-out

Final score! Go Eagles!

Also on Friday, I am meeting up with these lovely ladies for our discipleship time. Our time together has been really good, but I really feel like they could open up a lot more. They are such incredible girls, and I know that God is going to do amazing things through these girls. It is so wonderful to get out of “teacher-mode” and hang out with these girls on a more “friend” basis. They are all relatively closed off when we join in small group, but I’m really hoping they come out of their shells. Two of the girls have really opened up to me. One girl seems to be somewhat angry with God. She doesn’t understand why the earthquake happened and why Haiti is the way it is. She believes that God is punishing the country and sometimes the answers are so hard to find. I feel like she is having a major transformation in her heart, and I’m really excited to see where that leads.

My discipleship group: Maika, Taressa, Lorena, Paige, Celine, Alexandra, Claudia, Myrlene

My sophomore girl's class. Somehow this is the only class I got a picture of.

This blog is a lot heavier than I originally thought, so I’m going to end on a light note that makes me very happy. Vols won! So glad my boys got it together and finally pulled out a win!

Until next time,
Kristina

My first day as a teacher! Well, kinda :)

I started my job at Quisqueya Christian School today. What an awesome opportunity the Lord has provided me! I was already semi-familiar with most of the high school teachers because I had met them at the open house for Dustin and Ashton’s classes. All the teachers are so friendly and really welcomed me in today and made me feel like a part of the team!

My day started out with Mr. Dakoter. He is the elementary school principal. He took me on a quick tour of all of the facilities and introduced me to a bunch of different teachers that were not busy at that time. I also sat in on one of the classes that I will be teaching. Mr. Hersey, the director of the school currently teaches 10th and 11th grade English, and those are the two classes that I will be teaching for him. In 11th grade English, the students are just finishing up reading Huckleberry Finn. If you know me at all, you know how much I love reading the classic books, so when I found out this was what they were reading, I was very excited! The class is very energetic and has a number of different interests. I’m excited to get to know them better and really start digging into the material. I will be just an observer for this week and then slowly ease my way into teaching.

I ate lunch with a bunch of the teachers. They were all so kind, and they all knew that I was going to be teaching there because of an e-mail that was sent out to the staff. The other high school English teacher was super inviting and really took me under her wing and let me know that she would help in any way shape or form. It’s really great to know that the teachers are so close here. It is a small family, and I’m excited to be a part of it.

After lunch, I read for about an hour because I had a break, then went and say in on the other English teacher’s class, just to get a feel for how she teaches. Her class is going through Antigone, which I have not read, but I really learned a lot from her teaching style.

And that was my first day of school! Pretty low-key, but also very fun. My awkwardness definitely came out today, but I quickly put it away and became a normal human again, haha!

But I got a double-dose of teaching today!

Every Tuesday, the Roberts teach an English as a second language class at the First Baptist Church of Penier. I had taught it once before, but really found the curriculum they had to be mundane and not helpful. So today, I decided to make up my own curriculum, with the help of an ESL book that was given to us. I had about 10 students in my intermediate class and we went over the verb “to be” and how to use am, is and are. It was a great class, and I really enjoyed it this week because I knew what I was teaching and how to teach them effectively. The students really enjoyed it as well. They were asking me to bring worksheets for them every week so they could learn better.

I know that God is doing BIG things in Haiti. One of my projects while on staff at Quisqueya is to start a mentoring program for the girls of the school. Mentoring is so close to my heart. Many of you know that I mentor girls back home in Nashville, so the opportunity to continue that here is such a blessing. I really want the students to feel God’s love and really understand what it means to live a Christ-centered life. I know that the Lord is in this school and He will guide me through this awesome time!

Well, that is all for now. I have another full day of learning and growing tomorrow! Thank you for all your thoughts and prayers! God is working!