Trials and Blessings

I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world!

John 16:33

This verse has become one of my absolute favorites and one that I have to remind myself of often.  Like last weekend...several of us decided to take a trip up to Starkville and enjoy some SEC football.  We had a great time cheering on the bulldogs and just being together.  

Hail State! It was Molly, Angie, and Jenna's first college football game!

We stopped on the way home to get gas and some coffee (it's about a 2.5 hour drive) when Josh noticed that my car was smoking and leaking coolant all over the place.  After figuring out what happened and deciding to leave my car in Louisville, MS, these were the thoughts running through my head:
1. Praise the Lord that I was able to call my Dad at 12:30 am and him be able to tell me what I needed to do with my limited knowledge about cars.
2. Praise the Lord we were in a town (more or less) and not the side of the road in the middle of nowhere.
3. Thank you Jesus for friends who are patient, caring, and sacrificial
4. Thank you Jesus that we were in two cars and again, friends that are willing to be slightly uncomfortable (and illegal)

Long story short, we went back on Sunday, got my car and were able to drive it home (thanks to some wise advice from our family mechanic in Georgia) and I got a brand new radiator on Monday.  Yes, it was a setback.  Yes, I got slightly frustrated when it was all going on because it was simply an inconvenience.  Yes, I was stressed because I also had several assignments to finish Sunday but instead had to deal with this car issue.  But then I remember the words of Jesus: "you will have tribulation.  But take heart; I have overcome the world!"  Nothing is bigger than Jesus.  

In children's church these past two weeks, we have been teaching about Joseph.  Joseph was definitely someone who knew about setbacks and tribulations.  However, he continued to have a good attitude and tried to see each trial as an opportunity to allow God to work and be glorified.  I need to ask the Spirit for that attitude and perspective every day.  

So whether it is car troubles, financial issues, tensions in a relationship, hardships at work, sickness, or any other tribulation, take heart! We serve the God of peace and He has overcome the world!

Teaching in Year Two

Now that we have officially been in school for a month now, I'm finally taking some time to update you all on how it has been!  It has been SO different from last year; and definitely in a positive way!  I am the ESL teacher for the entire district which means I serve grades PreK through 12!  Thankfully, I only have 1 PreK student and 2 high schoolers but I have 37 students in between!  Making my schedule was not the easiest to say the least.  I do small group pull-out by grade level, except for a few of the upper elementary/middle grades which I group together.  I have been getting my exercise because I go pick up my students which means walking all over the school sometimes to find them.  I really enjoy the flexibility and although not having much guidance makes it really hard sometimes (as far as planning and knowing what all I need to do), it also allows me to do my own thing and the way I want to.  Lesson planning for so many different age groups and levels is definitely the hardest part.  There is also just a lot that they need to know (Kindergarten mostly since most don't really know any English) so it has been hard prioritizing concepts and words I want to teach them.

My kids are all pretty awesome.  I love my Kindergarten and first grade groups the most.  They are a lot of fun and you can really see them learning things from one day to the next.  There is just so much you can do with them and they love songs and games.  Most of my students in 2nd grade and up are fluent speakers and listeners, they just need extra support in reading and writing.  One of my high schoolers came to the United States during the middle of last year so he is still a beginner.  I spend about 3 hours a week up at the high school working with him.

If you read one of my previous posts, I think I shared how nervous I was about working with the families in this new position.  Even though I still sometimes get a knot in my stomach when I get a phone call from a parent or get called to the office to help translate, once I start talking with them, it goes away.  My Spanish still needs a lot of work and I have been using it a lot and learning through that, but I know that God is giving me every single word I need and helping me understand what they are saying.  Some of my Kindergartners though...not so much...their little kid voices make it really hard to get what they are saying.  So that is when I just nod my head and say, "cool!", or "oh no!".  All the parents are really understanding and know that my Spanish is still in the works, so we are definitely making it work!

So yeah, that is how my year has started and although I am still at Hazlehurst and sometimes I am shocked by the things that happen, or don't happen, I am really and truly enjoying what I do on a daily basis (definitely not what I would have said last year).  On a completely different note, my roommate, Angie, will be getting married in late December, so more changes are coming our way!  I am very thankful that one of the other Kindergarten teachers, Rachel, moved in with us back in May so I will not be all alone when Angie moves out after the wedding.  Please be in prayer for us as these changes are happening and also as we are thinking about what happens after this school year.  It seems crazy to be thinking about it in September but our commitment to Teach for America ends in May and we are trying to figure out what is next.  I am currently praying over staying in Hazlehurst for a third year and several international opportunities.  Pray for wisdom, discernment, and peace in walking in God's will for me and all my TFA friends here in Hazlehurst.

Oh, and go Vikings!! If you haven't seen the flash mob from Viking Venture this year, you need to!
WE ALL ROW!

Back to Mississippi

 "Update blog" has been on my to-do list for almost two weeks now.  Praise the Lord that I kept putting it off until now.  The reason I say "praise the Lord", is because had I written a post last week, you all would have seen a very different side of Alyssa.  Last week, especially the beginning of the week, was the hardest couple of days I have ever experienced in my life.  The devil was eating me alive with negative and depressing thoughts.  I was so overwhelmed with starting school again in a position I had very little knowledge about that I considered quitting multiple times.  I was absolutely terrified of the unknown and felt very alone trying to figure out what I needed to do as the ESL teacher.

Relentless prayer and a precious little girl helped get me out of that pit of depression.

I was at Dirt Cheap when I noticed a little Hispanic girl with her mom.  I had met several of the families I would be working with back in May but did not remember specific faces or names.  As soon as this little girl saw me, her face lit up and she turned to her mom and said in Spanish, "Mom! She is going to be my teacher!"  The Lord used the simple words of this little to bring peace, hope, and confidence that I am exactly where God wants me.  I am clinging to the promise that, as Mark Batterson puts it, the Lord does not call the qualified, he qualifies the called.

"...may He equip you with all you need for doing His will..."
Hebrews 13:21 (NLT)

I am currently doing the 40 Day Prayer Challenge that accompanies the book, The Circle Maker by Mark Batterson and every day the Lord reveals more to me about His love, mercy, and perfect plan.  He is teaching me so much about prayer and that He always answers prayer, just not always the way or on the timeline we want him to.  It is so hard to accept the fact that sometimes God's answer is "no" or "not yet".  But trusting the Almighty means knowing that His plan is far greater than anything I can even imagine!

The Holy Spirit filled me with such peace, diligence, and guidance at the end of last week and throughout this first week of school.  There are still a lot of things I am unsure about about teaching ESL and there is a lot that still kind of scares me but I am not going to allow those feelings to determine my attitude or my joy in Christ.

Once school gets into more of a routine and things settle down some, I will definitely update you all on what life is like for me as an ESL teacher.  Please pray for continued guidance, confidence and joy in Christ, and glory only to the Father!

Another part of my heart

If you read my previous posts about Cambodia, you might be under the impression that we worked tirelessly every single day! :) No worries...we had lots of time to just enjoy one another's company and experience Cambodia!  With the nature of the work we were doing, the ministry makes sure to leave a lot of time for debriefing, resting, and random fun when making the schedule for their teams.

Just a normal tuk-tuk ride! 

Erik playing around on one of the staff member's motos.  It had been raining, so they just brought it inside the center!

Morgan, Erik, Katie, and I enjoying our 50 cent coffee from the corner stand! Made with sweetened condensed milk, coffee, and ice! I usually had at least two a day!

Morgan and Kelsey acting as boy caterpillars one day during Kids Club.

Our fearless leader, Drew, being goofy with his niece.  She is one of two Cambodian girls that Ally, the founder of Hard Places, has adopted.

Kelsey having some fun at Dream Land!

We shared a lot of laughs with the staff over lunch and dinner and also got to know some of the interns pretty well.  We had a lot of dance parties that involved us teaching the Khmer staff various dances like the Wobble (their personal favorite), the Electric Slide, the Cha-Cha Slide, the Cupid Shuffle and the Macarena; and they also taught us a traditional Khmer dance.

Full-time HPC staff, Derek, with 17-year-old intern, Ben.  Their pretend father-son relationship was very amusing!

Ben, Josh, and Drew.  Josh and his wife, Gretchen, are interning for three months with HPC.

Dance therapy as some of the Khmer staff called it...they loved doing the Wobble!

One night we ate at Chuck Norris Dim Sum.  They served different kinds of dumplings...and lots of Chuck Norris jokes.

Dinner at Jars of Clay on our last night in Cambodia.  Love these people so much!

Definitely one of my favorite dinners!

One of the first nights, we took a walk down by the River Front, played on the exercise equipment, and tried some of the local delicacies!

This little boy was killing it on the elliptical!

I tried grasshopper, cricket, and frog.  Frog was by far my favorite so I ate five or six of them.

Other reactions to the bugs!

As I mentioned in my first post, we played an American vs. Cambodian game of soccer.  They had been practicing so they won, but we had a blast!

One of the most recent ministries that HPC has started is a touring business.  They helped four guys who were working in male brothels in Phnom Penh get out of the sex industry by teaching them English and training them as tour guides.  So now, a year later, they are starting to give tours on their own to various tourists who come to Phnom Penh for various reasons.  We got to go on a tour, hear more about the country, get to know the tour guides, and see some of the places around Phnom Penh we had not visited yet.

Kelsey, Katie, Morgan, and I on our tour.  It is the year of the snake so they have a huge snake out in front of Wat Phnom (the main Buddhist temple).

Unfortunately, this monkey already belonged to a lady at the Wat. :(

My roommate, Katie, and I playing on the "sacred grass" in front of the royal palace.

My week in Cambodia was full of challenges, brokenness, and spiritual warfare.  But it was also full of hope, laughter, singing, dancing, worship, and smiles.  I feel so blessed to have been part of such an incredible group of people serving alongside such incredible followers of Christ.  The trip really taught me to seek out opportunities to share that same kind of joy and hope in the States and I know God has me right where He wants me.  But I also look forward to the day I can return to Cambodia, where I have left another part of my heart.

All the kids, staff, and team members at Dream Land!

One of my favorite pictures from the trip...It just makes me laugh!

In my weakness, He is made strong

2 Corinthians 12:9 (NLT) 

"Each time he said, 'My grace is all you need. My power works best in weakness.' So now I am glad to boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ can work through me." 

This verse kicked me in the butt while I was in Cambodia.  Although I was really enjoying my time there, I was pretty discouraged the first couple of days.  I was astounded by the work of HPC and their staff but I felt very incapable of doing much of anything; primarily because I did not speak Khmer.  I think I was used to going to Mexico and knowing enough Spanish to be able to talk to the kids and laugh and play with them.  

I shared my frustration with some of my team and Deborah reminded me of 2 Corinthians 12:9.  God is able to use us the most when we cannot rely on ourselves.  I do that so often! I look for ways to work out of my strengths, gifts, and talents as I should (1 Peter 4:10) but I forget about how God can use our weaknesses for His glory IF we allow Him to.  

I just started praying, "God, I'm at a point of desperation and need your guidance.  Work through me and in me so that these children will know that they are loved not only by me but by You."  I know I am going to be praying that prayer many times over the next year as I transition into the ESL teacher at Hazlehurst.  I will be working with a totally new group of students (PreK through 12th grade) and their families as well.  I know that every day, I will talk to parents that I may or may not understand.  But, I know that through those situations, God is the ONLY one who can receive the glory!  

Cambodia overview

Chum reap sour! "Hello" in Khmer was one of the few phrases I picked up during my time in Cambodia.  I have been back in the States for almost a week now although it doesn't seem like that much time because of the jetlag.   Thank you to all of you who prayed for me and my team! Please continue to pray for the country of Cambodia and the incredible staff at the Hard Places Community.  As you will hopefully begin to understand, there are many challenges they face every day but we must cling to what scripture tells us in Psalm 10:17-18:
"Lord, you know the hopes of the helpless.  Surely you will hear their cries and comfort them.  You will bring justice to the orphans and the oppressed, so mere people can no longer terrify them."

I wanted to give you a brief overview of what my trip looked like and I will post some other stories or things I learned over the next several days.

After 30 or so hours of traveling, we arrived in Phnom Penh late Friday night.  On Saturday, we headed out fairly early to visit the Choeung Ek Genocidal Center, also known as the Killing Fields.  In case you are not familiar with the history of Cambodia, the Khmer Rouge took over the Cambodian government in 1975.  They were led by Pol Pot and believed in a completely agrarian society void of any outside, especially Western, influences.  Their goal was to be a completely self-sustaining nation and any one who posed a threat or even seemed to pose a threat was viciously murdered using whatever tools they could find.  All of the cities were evacuated and everyone was sent to work at various camps throughout the countryside where they learned to suppress their emotions and individualism or else risk their lives.  Over 2 million people died during the four years of the Khmer Rouge regime.  The memorial center we visited is the site of several of the almost 300 mass gravesites around the country where bodies were deposited.  Our visit to the Killing Fields was very difficult but it was necessary to help us understand the people of Cambodia.

                     Mass grave of 400 victims

Killing Tree against which executioners beat children (before throwing them into the mass grave site found next to the tree where 100 naked women and children were found).

The sharp edges of this palm tree were often used to cut the throats of  victims.

This is a memorial stupa and from far away it kind of just looks like a normal building or perhaps part of a museum.

The inside of the stupa, however, holds over 9,000 skulls that were found in the Killing Fields.

On Sunday, we had the privilege of worshiping at New Life Fellowship Church which has a large congregation made up of both Khmer members and foreigners.  New Life has church plants in various provinces in Cambodia and truly believes in serving and spreading the love of Christ throughout the Buddhist country.  Many of the Hard Places Community staff members attend and are heavily involved at New Life and most of them came to Christ after participating in the free English classes the church offers. 

Since I mentioned the staff, I will go ahead and tell you a little about them.  Hard Places has almost 30 people on full time staff with 80% of them being Khmer.  God truly amazed me by the work that they do day in and day out.  They are so passionate as they work with kids who have such heartbreaking stories and they seek the Lord’s calling in everything that they do.  We had the opportunity to get to know several of them on a pretty personal level and it was incredible to hear how the Lord brought them to Hard Places and to watch them being used in magnificent ways for God’s glory.  Most of them are between the ages of 18 and 22 and all have excellent English skills that they continue to work on through night classes.  

Chhoengka and Borey worked with us on the River Front every day.  They truly have a heart for these kids!

Panha (20) and Veasna (21) are the head counselor and social worker (respectively) for Hard Places and do a phenomenal job.  The little girl is the director's adopted Cambodian daughter.

By Monday we were fairly accustomed to the 12 hour time difference and were not as terrified riding in a tuk-tuk or crossing the street amidst the crazy Cambodian drivers.  Our daily schedule for the week looked pretty similar each day.  In the morning, we were working at the Boys Center that Hard Places started two years ago.  There are between 60 and 80 boys between the ages of two and seventeen that come to the center on any given day and they all live within walking distance of the center.  The center provides a safe place for them to play, learn English, and hear about Jesus.  Their day is structured around rotations to English class, computer, playroom, and discipleship.  Our team assisted the Hard Places staff and led discipleship each day.  Two of our team members are dancers and so they choreographed a song and taught the boys one day during discipleship.  They loved it! By building trusting relationships, the boys feel more comfortable telling the staff if someone has abused or exploited them.  The staff has numerous trained counselors and social workers that can talk to both the boys and their families to help fix the problem or find the perpetrator and report him to the authorities.  The government is very corrupt in Cambodia but Hard Places has developed a good relationship with them and they are starting to see more changes and increased support. 

Tuk-tuks and motos (basically a mo-ped)

are the most common forms of  transportation. 

Only the wealthy people have cars.

In the afternoon, our team split into two groups and half would go to Wat Phnom, the main Buddhist temple in Phnom Penh, and the other half would go to the River Front.  I was on the River Front team and we would walk along the Mekong River, a large tourist area, and jump rope, kick a ball, work on puzzles, or play with play-dough with a group of 10 to 15 kids at a time.  Some of these kids lived on the streets but most were just out selling bracelets, books, or birdseed to tourists.  After we had a group of kids, we would sit down and do a little skit.  Our theme for the week was love so we had two caterpillars acting out love between friends, love between family, and love between a boy and a girl.  The butterfly, or God, gave them different scripture every day to help them understand that kind of love.  They laughed and laughed during the skits and on the last day, the kids even got to do some acting!  After the skit, we would do a craft that went along with the story.  Several of them brought their crafts back each day to show them off to other kids!  Each Kids Club we did lasted about 20 to 30 minutes and then we would walk a little further down the River Front and gather a new group of kids (and usually several from the last group that had walked with us down the River Front).  We ranged from 30 to 40 kids total each day between the three times we did Kids Club and the group that went to Wat Phnom had about the same number.  They did a more elaborate Kids Club with games and songs at the Wat because they stayed in the same place the entire time.

Our last Kids Club each day was here on the sidewalk in front of the Royal Palace.  We usually had a lot of adults watching at this location too.

 Along the RiverFront.  The Royal Palace would be facing the river from across the road, directly left of this picture.

My roommate, Katie, and I in front of Wat Phnom, the main Buddhist Temple in Phnom Penh.

The Pavilion at Wat Phnom where the other group held Kids Club each afternoon.

The River Front is a dangerous area for the kids because they are expected to bring money home and are easily tricked by men who offer them a large amount of money (usually like $5) to go with them.  The number of creepy, older white men wandering the River Front and hanging out at the restaurants and bars along the River Front is astounding.  It was so easy to be judgmental, give the stink eye, and wish each of them dead; but we were convicted by the unconditional love of Jesus and our mission to love our enemies.  It is also common for the families to exploit and sell their children because they are so desperate for money.  The Hard Places staff again works to build trusting relationships with the kids at the River Front to find out if they have been exploited and who is committing the crime to help get the child away from the situation or take action against the perpetrators through the police. 

On Thursday, we were able to watch and participate in the boys’ center’s monthly soccer tournament.  They even put together an American versus Cambodian staff game! Then on Saturday we took 138 kids (from the center, Wat Phnom Kids’ Club, and River Front Kids’ Club) to Dreamland, which is like a small amusement park.  All of us had a blast!  We spent some time at the market Saturday afternoon before we had to be at the airport to start our long trek back to America. 

Dreamland!

Because of the child protection policy, I am not going to post any pictures of the children.  
I will be glad to show them to you in person or via email though!

Some of the boys playing soccer during the tournament on Thursday.

This trip was probably one of the best experiences of my entire life and I am in awe of all that the Lord is doing currently and is going to do in Cambodia.  The staff at the boys’ center has a very daunting task ahead of them, as Hard Places is the only organization working in that specific high-trafficked area of Phnom Penh.  They are also planning to open a girls’ center in the next couple of months once they find the space and the funding is complete.  Please continue to pray for the Hard Places Community, the children, other organizations in Cambodia, and the nation as a whole.  I believe that one day every person in Cambodia is going to be jumping around and inviting the Holy Spirit to fill the atmosphere like the congregation of New Life does every Sunday morning.  If you want more information about Hard Places, please check out their website here.

Thank you again for your prayers and for partnering with me in doing the Lord’s work in Cambodia!!  More posts to come!