Autumn Days and Benches
I love autumn. I love how the weather is warm in the daytime and cool in the nighttime. I love that my lawn grows more slowly so I can mow less often. I love that apples and pumpkins come in season and the foods that are made from them. I love the smell of something baking in the oven and sound of soft things tumbling in the clothes dryer since those two appliances warm my home as they work. I love adding another blanket on my bed and moving my sweaters to a higher, more accessible drawer in my bureau. I love the golds and rusts of the changing leaves and the crickets serenading me to sleep. Yes, I love autumn.
We are well into the first quarter here at GGCA. I counted fourteen and a half school days until grades close, the half day a remnant from when Harvest Night was planned to be on a Friday; it is on Saturday now, October 27. We have begun meeting with parents about academic concerns now that progress reports are out. Athletes are on academic probation if their grades are too low and working hard to bring them so that they can be eligible to practice and play in the playoffs and the state tournament. Elementary students are making pilgrimages to local farms to learn about farm life and find pumpkins. The juniors took the PSAT yesterday and the sophomores take the PLAN next Wednesday. Every season brings its own annual events.
I leave Sunday to attend a seminar in Dallas sponsored by Summit Ministries. I was invited to attend this Teach for Eternity seminar along with many other Christian school principals at no cost to me but airfare - Summit is putting me up in a Great Wolf Lodge a mile from the school where the seminar takes place and feeding me too. The sessions begin Sunday afternoon at 5:30 and end Tuesday at noon. Summit's mission is to train Christians in apologetics and worldview analysis. This seminar targets how Christian schools can teach children apologetics and biblical worldview from elementary through high school, so I was curious about what other schools are doing and looking for ways that GGCA could improve. Pray that I get there and back safely and that I learn something beneficial to our students. What will autumn in Dallas be like, I wonder?
I like the new addition to our campus, the six benches made and donated by 2012 graduate Jordan Myers, our favorite Boy Scout. I think they make the sidewalk look a bit friendlier. A bench is a place to rest and wait. I get two pictures in my mind when I think of benches: One is of Forrest Gump sitting on a bench offering to share his chocolates with a woman waiting for a bus; the other is the illustration showing a child sitting on Jesus' lap from my childhood Bible opposite the page where Jesus says, "Suffer the little children to come to me." Jesus isn't sitting on a bench in that picture, but He is the bench for that little child. I like to imagine that as a child of God I have Jesus as my bench, and I can rest in and wait on Him. I don't need a piece of chocolate, although that's nice, but I need the sweetness of His presence supporting me.
Enough already. I have a school to help run. I hope that you find time to rest and wait on God in this glorious season.
We are well into the first quarter here at GGCA. I counted fourteen and a half school days until grades close, the half day a remnant from when Harvest Night was planned to be on a Friday; it is on Saturday now, October 27. We have begun meeting with parents about academic concerns now that progress reports are out. Athletes are on academic probation if their grades are too low and working hard to bring them so that they can be eligible to practice and play in the playoffs and the state tournament. Elementary students are making pilgrimages to local farms to learn about farm life and find pumpkins. The juniors took the PSAT yesterday and the sophomores take the PLAN next Wednesday. Every season brings its own annual events.
I leave Sunday to attend a seminar in Dallas sponsored by Summit Ministries. I was invited to attend this Teach for Eternity seminar along with many other Christian school principals at no cost to me but airfare - Summit is putting me up in a Great Wolf Lodge a mile from the school where the seminar takes place and feeding me too. The sessions begin Sunday afternoon at 5:30 and end Tuesday at noon. Summit's mission is to train Christians in apologetics and worldview analysis. This seminar targets how Christian schools can teach children apologetics and biblical worldview from elementary through high school, so I was curious about what other schools are doing and looking for ways that GGCA could improve. Pray that I get there and back safely and that I learn something beneficial to our students. What will autumn in Dallas be like, I wonder?
I like the new addition to our campus, the six benches made and donated by 2012 graduate Jordan Myers, our favorite Boy Scout. I think they make the sidewalk look a bit friendlier. A bench is a place to rest and wait. I get two pictures in my mind when I think of benches: One is of Forrest Gump sitting on a bench offering to share his chocolates with a woman waiting for a bus; the other is the illustration showing a child sitting on Jesus' lap from my childhood Bible opposite the page where Jesus says, "Suffer the little children to come to me." Jesus isn't sitting on a bench in that picture, but He is the bench for that little child. I like to imagine that as a child of God I have Jesus as my bench, and I can rest in and wait on Him. I don't need a piece of chocolate, although that's nice, but I need the sweetness of His presence supporting me.
Enough already. I have a school to help run. I hope that you find time to rest and wait on God in this glorious season.
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