Boston

Maybe your best thing won’t draw a paycheck, but it is still where you shine and glow and come to life and bless the world. May I legitimize your gifts please? Just because you don’t get a paystub doesn’t mean you should shrink back or play small or give it all up. Do your thing. Play your note. We are all watching, learning, moved. You are making the world kinder, more beautiful, wiser, funnier, richer, better. Give your gifts the same attention and space and devotion like you would if it paid. (Or paid well. Some of us do our best, most meaningful work for peanuts. Do not be shamed out of your race for a bigger paycheck. I did not make a living as a writer for YEARS. My neighbor once when I told her I was a Christian author: “Oh! Is there a market for that?” Me: “I have no idea.”)

Run your race.

Maybe you need to invest in your gifts. Take a class. Go to a conference. Sign up for a seminar. Start that small business. Put that website up. Build in some space. Say yes to that thing. Work with a mentor. Stop minimizing what you are good at and throw yourself into it instead with no apologies. Do you know who is going to do this for you? NO ONE. You are it. Don’t bury that talent, because at the end of the day, the only thing your fear netted you was one buried talent in a shallow grave.

How many of us are trotting out that tired cliché – “I’m waiting for God to open a door” – and He is all I love you, but get going, Precious Snowflake, because most of the time chasing the dream I put in your heart looks surprisingly like hard work. Don’t just stand there, bust a move. (God often sounds like Young MC.) You are good at something for a reason. God designed you this way; this is on purpose. It isn’t fake or a fluke or small. This is the mind and heart and hands and voice you’ve been given: USE IT.

http://jenhatmaker.com/blog/2014/03/24/run-your-race

Goodbye, Wayne!

A dear part of our church left for Hong Kong today. To commemorate Wayne's time here, I made him a Sunday school "yearbook" / going away card. Each of the Sunday school kids drew a small self portrait, and then I compiled them with some simple text and my own drawing of Wayne. The result is pretty cute!

Front and back cover (later folded like a card)

Inside, with names first names alphabetically listed.

Christmas caroling

In Chinese (above) and Gujarati (below)

Reluctant Recruitment

"Do you want to go to Shake Shack?"
"Can we work on festival prep?"

My poor friends make a lot of sacrifices around festival season!

Brianne's Goodbye Party

Sneaking photos as we pray...because otherwise all of these beautiful people are rushing around, chasing kids, preparing food, moving out of state... Sigh.

Congratulations, Jorge!

Super proud of my friend, neighbor, and coworker, Jorge! One of the most hard-working and humble men I know. He tells me all the time he's a laborer, not a thinker, but he wanted to know more about ministry and put himself through school to do so!

Flexibility is key

Sunday school was held on the floor of the church office today, after a surprise party commandeered our regular space and used up all the tables and chairs!

2EFC Crew at Joy's baby shower!

Anyone who knows me well knows that I am not at all invested in the idea of "settling down" in a traditional sense. I don't want children; I'm not interested in marriage. My friend Joy, however, is the exact opposite. As long as I've known her, she's been dreaming of the day she'd start a family. That desire, of course, is God-given and good, but it's also led to a lot of pain and disappointment when the results she's wanted haven't materialized in the time span she expected. We've spent many hours rehashing old relationships and crying over crumbled futures, and in the process we've both learned a lot about patience.

Joy's expecting her first child in May, and while the circumstances are not desirable or ideal, she has a church family supporting her and countless mothers, sisters, and brothers in Christ standing beside her ready to welcome her soon-to-be son.

Noah's Ark

So this is what happens at 3 in the morning when Jimmy and I find our lesson plan five minutes short...

Summer, essentially.

Emily's bridal shower

My first New York roommate is getting married! Congratulations, Emily!

Wrapped Up in Books

Three thrilling books from my love Pete and his love Powells! Life Together by Dietrich Bonhoeffer; Jesus' Son by Denis Johnson; My Dog Does My Homework by poets like Shel Silverstein. Oh boy, what excitement! To find out more about my book obsessions, follow me on Goodreads.

SAY Yes soccer

When one of our students brought a new soccer ball to afterschool on Wednesday, all the kids begged to play. Chris obligingly set up a game, only to discover that not a single one of the nine kids present knew how to play. We went from the mad scramble of free-range soccer to a very organized chalk circle system where we practiced kicking and passing both to teammates and into the goal. No matter how we played, helping the kids navigate this sport for the first time proved incredibly entertaining!

The End.

Technically our LOST finale party isn't until tomorrow night, but Brianne invited me and Luke over to watch it tonight if we wanted. We did want, and maybe Luke went, but I ended up sorting shelves in the Sunday school closet instead. While the rest of the world is in shock and awe (I hope) over the show's revelations, the most exciting discovery of my night was finding a package of shrinky-dink left over from last summer. I can deal with that. Just so long as my face looks like this when I finally see the finale.


EDIT 5/24: Nope. My LOST finale face was, overall, much closer to this.

Except, you know, with the TV instead of a dress.

Maybe I would have been happier with the dress.

Observing Brooklyn "Evangelistism" Day with 8 other local Chinese churches by doing park & street outreach...

Must be the colors and the kids

Within the last hour, I’ve been struck by the uniqueness of my current situation here; the blessing of it; how much I’m going to miss it. It started as I leaned against the kitchen doorframe, pizza crust in hand, leisurely watching the boisterous game of Monkey in the Middle taking place before me. “Ms Rachel, come play!” called one of the kids. I laughed and shook my head, indicating the unfinished pizza. But for the first time, I realized how much I’m going to miss having a job that lets me play Monkey in the Middle every day with twelve elementary school kids and three of my best friends.

The game didn’t end until the second-to-last kid left. Then Rodrigo, one of our newer first graders, continued to lob the Bulbasaur plushie back and forth with Mr Chris. “I’m the only kid here!” he exclaimed enthusiastically. “I’m so lucky today!” He kept saying that: as he and Chris played catch; as he helped us clean up; as we huddled around the couches for a game of Break the Ice. “I’m here so late today! I’m so lucky, right, Ms Rachels?” Every time he said it, I remembered how my clothes were still soaked from walking a total mile to and from school with two trips of kids. I remembered how one of my arms was so much wetter than the other, because it's the one that had been holding the hand of a child instead of an umbrella. I kept watching Rodrigo's toothless grin. “So are we,” I always answered.

Eventually his dad came, and I trailed Chris with a Christian magazine from the mail, making fun of certain titles and expressing interest in others. Dion was there, too, singing softly to himself near the piano when he wasn’t with us. Outside, the mechanical whir of a water machine reminded us of teasing Jorge, cleaning in the rain. I pulled open the fridge door and prepared dinner for me and Luke: vegetarian baked zita, made just for me and Lindsay at the youth group fundraiser last Friday. All of us left were laughing. It’d been a long, wet, dark day outside, and we were sarcastic but pretty happy. Pretty content. And I realized how wonderful all of that is.

PS I've now referenced this beautiful song twice in two weeks, so if anyone's interested, here's a video with lyrics listed.

Walkaway Renee

I am very concerned about my life.

Very concerned.

Very concerned.

Yellow hair, you are a funny bear.

I'm back to blond.

I ACTUALLY SAW JEFF MANGUM PERFORM

And The Clean, and Yo La Tengo again, and Claudia Gonson of The Magnetic Fields, and Sharon Von Etten, and Portastatic, and Dimmer, and Kyp Malone, and Coasting, and a couple comedians, and the Kilgour brothers all over the place, and and and...

Oh man. I am not at all ashamed to say I was openly weeping.

So much love.

BrooklynVegan has an excellent summary of the whole night, plus a collection of bootlegged Mangum videos, here.