the heart of the matter

I was going through an old blog post from my other site and decided to re-post it with no edits:

May 26, 2009

When I was in the Pre-K/Kindergarden class, all the kids have “Prayer Journals”. We give them 10 minutes of “Soaking” time to pray and listen to what God has to say to them. Then we ask them to write down what God is saying to them in their journals. Only 3/12 kids wrote things down in their journals. The one that caught my attention was a little girl, age 5. She said “God told me that, I am His favorite daughter.” I think it’s amazing that kids at such a young age are able to understand these kind of things. Then later that day during the night session this same girl was feeling super tired and wanted me to carry her. As I sat in a chair and just held her in my arms I really embraced the moment. Through this little thought that this girl shared in the daytime, it showed me the reason why I was here at this retreat, helping out in the daycare. At the same time I was fearful for a second. In my arms I was holding a child that I was suppose to help, to teach, and to just simply share God’s love by loving her. Being a helper for the children is such an important job because we are the one’s that are starting to build the foundation for the kids of the future generation. 

So I started this post a few days ago or maybe one day ago, I forgot but I kind of forgot what else I was going to write..but in a nutshell, I went in with no expectations and came out with many great experiences. Through this past weekend it reminded me that children, I feel are such an important aspect to life and church and stuff. Being so young, they haven’t created all the filters that we have as college students, adults, etc. The faith of a child is just like all out, nothing holds them back. Sometimes I wish I could be a kid forever, instead of growing up and creating all these filters that often cause me to doubt, and all that stuff. Anyway, and one last thing, after being with these children, I’m pretty sure I’m sticking with my major; Child Development. I seriously love children. The only thing that kind of scares me is about how much of an impact teachers or day care figures have on these kids. They watch our every action and look up to us. We have such an important part in their lives and to think that we have a helping hand in raising up the next generation is like…BIG.!? Haha..anyway…yea.

As I have finished my undergrad at CSULB under Child Development and Family Studies this past Fall 2011 semester, I still have this upcoming Spring semester before I “officially” graduate with my BA. (I think that’s what it’s called.) So I decided to start taking four pre requisite classes that go towards CSULB’s teaching credential program that I can take before I even get into the program. (Not even sure if I’ll get in..since I’ve been lagging ..like majjjj on these exams I need to pass to even apply.) First of all because I didn’t want to just start applying for jobs since I plan to walk in May and didn’t want any complications with that, so being a student and taking classes seemed ideal. And I didn’t want to “waste” a semester just taking a bunch of fun classes..though it was very tempting. The decision to take these pre req classes has been tough- I’ve been in school for technically about 18 1/2 years? and I feel pretty over it.  After going to a meeting about CSULB’s teaching credential program I was very…hm..disheartened ..ish? Like it just sounded like too much work..and in my current state of mind..I don’t want to deal with more school and field work etc. But after stumbling upon this old post..I have a little more motivation to obtain the teaching credential. We’ll see how that goes.

“But in friendship, we think we have chosen our peers. In reality, a few years’ difference in the dates of our births, a few more miles between certain houses, the choice of one university instead of another, posting to different regiments, the accident of a topic being raised or not raised at a first meeting—any of these chances might have kept us apart. But, for a Christian, there are, strictly speaking, no chances. A secret Master of the Ceremonies has been at work. Christ, who said to the disciples “Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you,” can truly say to every group of Christian friends “You have not chosen one another but I have chosen you for one another.” -C.S. Lewis