A belated Christmas greeting, electronically of course

Hey, hey, ho, ho!

I had a hard time starting this letter with a greeting that was purely related to Christmas since I missed getting my letter out on time. Nevertheless it is with great joy that I send you and yours a belated Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! The end of December snuck up on me quicker than I expected and here I am sitting down at the beginning of January to quickly review the happenings of 2008.

I found myself in the middle of my first year of teaching last January—I could hardly believe that I had survived one half a year and I was already looking forward to the start of summer vacation in MayJ As many of you who have teachers in your lives know, the first year is always the hardest and this mantra definitely held true for me. The most difficult challenges came in April and May as I struggled to work through some issues with multiple parents over philosophical differences related to the way I ran my FFA program. I have never been so challenged nor felt so attacked as I did then but in retrospect God knew what he was doing. At the time I felt very unprepared to deal with the issue but going through that time allowed me to truly develop and refine many of my teaching philosophies related to both instruction and my intra-curricular FFA program.

I completed my first year by taking a team of four students to the National Land Judging contest in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma where we spent four days practicing and competing in evaluating various soil properties. I was very proud of my team for their effort and hope to take another team next year. (Side note: I am a soil geek at heart and was absolutely overjoyed to share some of my limited knowledge from college with my students.)

As always, my summer flew by packed with FFA leadership camps and conferences for my students as well as attending multiple professional development workshops. Among the most impactful was the National Agriscience Ambassador Academy held in Chestertown, Maryland last July. This week long workshop truly changed my approach to teaching both agriculture and science concepts and I was also able to meet some of the neatest Ag teachers from around the nation. Ag teachers are a unique breed and I am proud to count myself as one of them, especially after that week.

I entered my second year of teaching in August much refreshed and reenergized. I didn’t believe all those veteran teachers who told me that each year gets easier, but they were right. I feel more comfortable with the concepts I am teaching and am more prepared to be the authoritarian figure with my students. I am eager to start the spring semester continually trying new activities and approaches in presenting material. I know I will continue to be challenged as I teach but am truly grateful to be at the school I am. Before I started teaching I knew that I would enjoy teaching, but I never expected to love it as much as I do nor enjoy my students as much as I do. I am so blessed and content.

I anticipate 2009 will be another great year filled with the richness and abundance of God’s blessing. I look forward to the next time our paths cross and I pray that your family is healthy and happy.


Love Always,
Katy

Tolerance

Note: Today's post is kind of a "soap box" for me, if you will. Just some thoughts...random mostly. But definitely from the heart.

Tolerance is defined as a fair, objective, and permissive attitude toward opinions and practices that differ from one's own. I often think of this word when trying to reconcile differences between my spiritual perspective and the actions of others. Experience has shown me that most people expect Christians to tolerate anyone who is different. I am not opposed to that, in fact I would encourage it. For example, I love homosexuals. I don't agree with the lifestyle they've chosen because it is defined as sin in the bible. While I don't condone their actions, I sincerely accept and love them as people.

This tolerance is rarely, if never, reciprocated towards Christians. Instead, they are ridiculed and persecuted for being close minded. We're the only people who are not allowed to say "no, that's wrong, I don't agree with that." That is probably an extreme view but it's accurate based on my experiences.

I absolutely hate the fact that people (to be more specific, critics of the Christian faith) are always worried about people being offended. They don't want nativity scenes displayed around town. Christmas trees in department stores might even viewed as offensive if someone doesn't celebrate Christmas. On the other side of the coin though, I don't take offense if I see a menorah. I'm not offended when I drive past a muslim place of worship. Again, going back to that point from before, I may not agree with someone's beliefs but I am not going to force them through legislation to remove or hide all signs of their faith.

Christians are held to a different standard. We must tolerate everyone else, yet no one will consider tolerating us. I know I'm making extreme generalizations here, but honestly I wouldn't expect anything different. As Christians we are to expect persecution if we identify with Christ. But it's because of our identity in Christ that we can take joy in both the persecution that comes with it as well as the blessings.

I pray you take joy this holiday season in being intolerable. Relish what we have in common with Christ. Expect persecution and ridicule but remain confident that God will bless you as you perservere. Blessings to you on the Eve of Christmas! What joy we have because of the life that was given us in Christ Jesus.

Sharing God's greatness

I saw a sunset last night that I couldn't begin to describe. Awesome. Majestic. Pure. Colors so rich they were almost unreal. Alive. I was trying to take a picture of it when I saw someone walking by so I made some passing remark about how beautiful it was. I thought I knew this person but I didn't. That exchange made me smile though because it was nice to share that moment with a total stranger. It was almost like sharing a secret moment with God with an individual who I might never see again. It was thrilling and so easy to share that. I never said anything about God but He felt so evident that I didn't really need to. Why couldn't always be that easy to share God? I think it's because I often feel like I have to do the work to share the greatness of God. I should know better. God's greatness is everywhere and I will never do it justice sharing it on my own. I pray I might feel more compelled to share God's greatness with strangers and close friends, knowing full well that God is the one who is really at work in that conversation or deed.

"...but you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for His own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who called you out of darkness into this marvelous light..."

A Ranch Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving!! I am so thankful for the abundance from God's hand--family, friends, a great job and the ability to work. Enjoy your holiday and all its traditions!

(This article was originally published in 1983 in Arizona Highways.)

Nine times out of 10 Thanksgivings in northern Arizona will come nosing ahead of a storm like an old lead cow going to water.

A solid front of gray will move across the high plains driven by a northwest wind whipping and slashing at the drags. It will be a full-blown storm front, shivering with snow and sleet, a storm that does what it sets out to do - puts an end to autumn. Every year is a gamble to see how long the cattle can put on weight before that first storm hits and the feed loses its strength. Fifty years ago, northern Arizona ranchers rounded up cattle in October and sold them around the middle of November. Some still do.

When fall roundup is over and the cattle are shipped, there's more work to be done. Holes in the fences and watergaps are fixed, the shoes are jerked off the horses. Mother cows go off to their favorite canyons and cedar breaks to wait out the winter. The saddle horses, turned out on the open range, will have to make their own living until they're needed again unless they decide to come in for a handout. Then, if a person listens, the coyotes will tell him a storm is on the way. A strain of urgency, a high-pitched ululation breaks with dawn. Thanksgiving Day is near. In the old days a cowboy often let Thanksgiving get by him, as the work didn't stop for holidays. Even faithful members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints had little time for celebration. On Thursday, Nov. 29, 1894, Lucy Hannah White Flake wrote in her journal: "This is thanksgiving day [sic]. The wind is blowing. There was no school this afternoon so we washed. The men folks are all working on the reservoy."

Later on, when the country developed and roads improved, ranch neighbors often came together to celebrate Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving dinner on an Arizona ranch is likely to have scents and seasonings never dreamt of by the Pilgrims, but cattle people have just as much to be thankful for, maybe more. A ranch family is thankful if they all made it through branding and fall roundup and lived to tell about it. They are thankful for the rain that filled their dirt tanks and made winter feed. They are thankful for the calves and steer yearlings that paid the bills. They are thankful, too, for friends and neighbors who helped with the work. Most of all, they thank God for partnering with them another year.

Women raised on ranches are likely to serve recipes they inherited from mothers and grandmothers. With every bite of cornbread stuffing, carrot pudding, homemade noodles or mincemeat pie, memories ebb and flow - back to the smell of cedar wood firing up a cookstove on a frosty morning. Doing chores before school. Bacon, coffee, sourdough biscuits. The whang of a windmill pumping water into a steel storage tank. The ring of spurs and clomp of boots on a wooden porch. Cold mornings and fresh horses.

Memories waft from the kitchen. The summer garden greens up again with each bite of bottled peas or green beans. The orchard comes to life in peach preserves spread thick on homemade yeast rolls. It may be slim pickings part of the year, but at Thanksgiving there's plenty for all. Somehow, the ones who made it possible are always there at Thanksgiving time.

And if a winter storm is biting at the heels of dark clouds, listen. You can almost hear the pounding of a herd of range cattle and the far off cries of men bringing in the roundup. Coming home. Coming home.

Close to the land

I am on a continual quest to find quotes that accurately paint a picture of the way of life that cowboy's live. I was reading Range magazine this weekend and stumbled upon some great quotes describing just this. I hope that in sharing them, you may be reminded about the way of life that is slowly being lost as farms and ranches are encroached upon by urbanites.

"Those outside of rural America need to see what is in this book. They'll be astounded to find that those who are close to the land have a startling sense of where they belong in the universe. They love their lives, accept the inherent struggles, and are surprisingly at peace for those who confront so many daily challenges. Perhaps it is because they know what it is to grow things, have worked to understand and to accept the forces of nature."

On election day

The following excerpt was taken from Beth Moore's blog from Living Proof Ministries. I think it nicely summarizes what our attitudes should be/can be during today's election and what is to come.

Blessings!
KG

A few things I'm so thankful for on this election day, regardless of the outcome:

*We live in a democracy where we have the right to a vote and a voice. We have the God-given responsibility to use both wisely and in the way that best reflects what God conveys through Scripture.

*God "works out everything in conformity with the purpose of His will" and "according to the plan." Ephesians 1:11

*Not only does God work out everything in conformity with His will, He has promised to work out everything for the GOOD of those who love Him and are called according to His purpose.

*God sets up kings and deposes them and gives wisdom to the wise and knowledge to the discerning. Daniel 2:21

*We, the beautifully diverse family of God, are never - not at any time - powerless. Nor are we ever victims of a system. Believing prayer takes us through doors we'll never be invited to enter and into judges chambers we'll never grace. Take a look back at Genesis 18 once again with astonishment over the dialogue between God and His servant and friend, Abraham. Rejoice that God is ever mindful of a faithful remnant. The Judge of the Earth will always do right.

*Even if persecution should await believers in Christ or harrowing circumstances hound us, God will use hardship to bring unity and purity to a people who need it desperately. The best of circumstances do not always produce the best in the Bride of Christ.

*The living God is firmly established upon His Throne and there at His holy feet we can always find grace and mercy in our time of need.

*No matter what happens today, we are GOD'S elect. He has elected us to show His heart and to walk in His ways in the culture that surrounds us. We are called to walk in the challenging balance of grace and truth.

May we be filled with Christ's Spirit today and our mouths given to praise and to believing, receiving prayer. God IS faithful and He has us firmly in His hand. We will not fear. We will not doubt. We will not hate.

"Let the beloved of the Lord rest secure in Him, for He shields him all day long, and the one the Lord loves rests between His shoulders." Deuteronomy 33:12

Don't Lose Heart

Have you ever made the mistake of thinking that becoming a Christian meant that you got to join the Red Carpet club? If you haven’t, I’m sure you know of someone who accepted Christ thinking that life afterwards was designed to be easy and care free. Wrong! Becoming a Christian may actually mean that the pressures and problems of our lives are intensified and amplified. Our guest pastor (Scott Morgan) at church last week spoke on this misconception using scripture from 2 Corinthians 4:7-12 where Paul encourages the Corinthians to “keep on, keeping on” despite discouragement or persecution in their walk as Christians. I wanted to share my notes from the sermon as well as my personal thoughts on how this relates to me and some of my recent struggles.

“7 But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. 8 We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed but not in despair; 9 persecuted, but no abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed. 10 We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body. 11 For we who are alive are always being given to death for Jesus’ sake, so that his life may be revealed in our mortal body. 12 So then, death is at work in us, but life is at work in you.”

Looking back at verse seven, Paul speaks about a treasure held in jars of clay. Verses one through six indicate that this treasure is the gospel; as believers, we are the jars of clay. Why would God place something that is invaluable in something of so little value? Living out of our weaknesses illustrates God’s power in our lives. We shouldn’t think that God is incapable of using our weakness and frailty to adorn the halls of heaven—this very concept is illustrated in the following story.

Every day a servant placed a pole across his shoulders that carried two clay buckets. He walked to a stream that was several miles away, filled up the buckets and then painstakingly returned to his master’s home. The bucket on the left was without imperfection and always returned a full measure of water; the bucket on the right however was cracked and by the time the servant returned, this bucket was only half full every time. One day the cracked bucket cried out, feeling sorry about his deficiency; he didn’t understand why the servant continued to use the cracked bucket since it was incapable of completing the very task which it had been designed for. The servant gently asked if the bucket had ever taken notice of the path on the right side and the left as they returned from the stream. The very next day, the cracked bucket noticed that there was a path of beautiful wildflowers growing, all the way from the stream to the master’s house on the right side of the path; whereas the left side was without. The servant explained that he had known all along that the bucket had a crack, but he chose to sow flower seeds in its path cultivating beauty out of something that appeared to be purposeless and wasteful. The servant explained that the master’s table is adorned with the beautiful flowers all year long that grow because of the water that drips out of the cracked bucket. WE are the cracked bucket my friends—we see our weaknesses as something that are purposeless, and designed to simply frustrate us or trip us up. How dare we limit the power and purpose of God in our lives though. God is able to use our cracked and broken bodies to bring goodness to those around us. He has a purpose and a plan, and is far more capable than we’ll ever know of bringing goodness and beauty out of our “deficiencies.” Take heart my dear friends, for God is at work in our frailty.

Have you noticed the hope and endurance in Paul’s voice when you read verses eight through nine? He speaks of challenging times for the Corinthians where it seems they are attacked from every side; however they are never completely destroyed or ruined. God is going to allow challenging times in our lives. But it is in these challenging times that we have a huge opportunity to communicate that we are tied to the eternal anchor in heaven—God is not going to put us in a situation that is greater than us. He knows our limits and he will pull us through. The message that we communicate in these trails though should speak of the hope and endurance we know we have through Jesus Christ. Don’t lose heart in challenging times; be confident that God is at work in our experiences.

In verses 10 through 11, Paul speaks of Jesus’ death and life, but you will notice that His death always precedes His life. If we are to identify with Jesus, we have to embrace the dying of Christ in our lives by dying to ourselves each day (Luke 9:23). This is an active element in our lives, something that we have to consciously choose. This process of dying to ourselves and allowing Christ to be displayed in our lives is called sanctification; after accepting Christ, sanctification is the journey that we go through where God makes us more like Christ. This journey is life long and there will be many seasons of “death.”

If you haven’t had a dying season, you can expect it. When I speak of a dying season, I speak of a time where God puts you in a position that causes us to die to ourselves—we are forced to abandon hope that we have placed in things and rely on God’s strength and character. As we die to ourselves though, we can identify with the death that Jesus Christ chose, therefore allowing us to also identify with Him in life. As human beings our natural tendency isn’t to gravitate towards challenging situations that refine our spiritual character. Instead we choose the smoother, easier path that often times wouldn’t be rough enough to take calluses off our hands. God loves us enough though to place us in these situations to refine and purify us.

This point here struck me in the very core of my being as I listened to this sermon last week. If you read my most recent blog or you have spoken with me about my first year of teaching you know a little bit about the struggles that I went through last year. Last year felt like one of the longest periods of my life—it seemed to drag on and on and on. There was no end in sight, and it seemed that near the end things couldn’t get any worse. I kept telling myself that there was a purpose in all the adversity that I kept facing however it was like being blind and trying to trust the voice you hear guiding you through an adventure course. I knew the voice was there, however I lost confidence in the purpose of the adventure course. It was in the challenges of last year though that God was working to make me more like His son. I will readily and enthusiastically admit that I would have never placed myself in any of those situations last year just so that my spiritual character could be refined and so that individuals around me could see the wisdom and grace of God displayed in my life. I’ll admit it—I’m shallow and lazy, and I would prefer that life were easy. However, because of God’s love and purpose for me, he stuck me straight into the fire. I am thankful for this though because I learned sooo much and I am far more confident and aware of God’s purpose for my life and career as a teacher. I think the only thing that can help us endure the pain of our dying seasons is knowing that God will complete his perfect work in us until the day of His return (Philippians 1:6). Take heart in your season of dying—there’s nothing fun about it but you can be confident that God is at work in your sanctification.

Finally, you can have heart knowing God is at work in your influence. In verse 12, Paul says that while death is at work in us (our dying season), life is at work in you. We may be going through a death season, but this death will produce life in you. Your reaction in your death season will speak volumes about what and who you have hope and endurance in. Don’t under estimate the power and ability of God to use you in the lives of friends, family and complete strangers around you. May they be encouraged by your patient endurance. May they be strengthened by the hope that you display in the eternal God. Remember—someone is always watching. Make sure they glean God’s character from your life.

In closing, take heart in your journey as Christians. We have a faithful and all powerful provider who has the perfect plan for our lives. Don’t box him in. Don’t underestimate him. Simply be encouraged by what you read in God’s word, knowing that God wants to refine you, make you better and use you for the glory of His kingdom. It may be hard and uncomfortable but God will never abandon you. Trust in him. Have hope and endurance.