One of those weeks

Not a good one.

Yesterday I had one of those days where I felt like nothing I said came out the right way. As in open mouth, insert foot. Bible study is not a good place for this to happen. I apologised to someone I realised I may have said the wrong thing to, but there may be others whom I may have inadvertently offended. Sorry.

Today, I discovered a student who was in my tutorial sessions last semester has complained about the way her assignment was marked and has demanded a re-mark. Well, actually, she signed an affidavit so her mother could complain on her behalf. I think that says it all, really. But it still hurts. I wonder if I could have handled her situation differently (probably not), or whether it would have made no difference either way.

The subject I am tutoring this semester (which starts next week) appears challenging. To give you some context, my area of specialty at work is paediatrics, in particular young children with delayed development. This subject involves practical lab sessions where I will be teaching the students how to assist adults with strokes or other physical impairments to transfer and move around in bed, how to prescribe wheelchairs and pressure cushions, and how to use equipment to assist with dressing and eating. Part of the assessment is viva based, so I assess their ability to do some of these things in a practical scenario-based session. Think "blind leading the blind" and you have a pretty good summation of how I'm feeling about that right now.

Chris has offered to set up some equipment at his workplace so I can practise beforehand, and hopefully not look too stupid when the sessions come around. I am filling the shoes of someone who had vast experience with all this stuff. I am not in the same league.

The kids' school was seeking people to take billets from a high school band that is visiting the primary schools in our area next week. They are only billeted in pairs and we only have one sofa bed so I didn't say yes to start with. But when nobody offered to help and they got really desperate, I thought I should stick my hand up to take somebody. So now we have two male trumpet players staying at our house for two nights next week. They're aged 18 and 16. Good in that I'm thinking they've toured before and should be relatively responsible. But they probably eat a lot. And we'll all have to be on our best behaviour for those two days, which means the days after that might not be pretty.

Sorry. That's all pretty grumbly. But that's life here this week. I'd better get praying for patience, calm, and the ability to quickly get up to speed on how to position an adult stroke patient in a bed and chair.

One to one Bible reading

I caught up with my wonderful friend this morning to read our Bibles together. We decided we'd choose something simple to kick off with, so we've started with Psalms. We read Psalm 2 today.

We followed a question framework from the above book (you can get a copy of it here). And had a great time reading and praying together. Well, we prayed at the beginning and forgot to pray at the end. Something to remember for next time we meet up.

It's so good to make time to read the Bible properly. Lately I've been trying to be more disciplined with having personal Bible reading time. I'm trying to do this in the mornings when I'm not tired and before the day has a chance to run off the rails as it so often does by the time evening rush hour rolls around. I'm also encouraging Rosie to sit up next to me on the bed and read her Beginner's Bible while I'm reading mine. It's pretty cute. Often when she sees me sitting there reading (even if I'm not reading my Bible), she'll say "Quiet time now?" and toddle off to get her Bible as well. It doesn't always work and I often get interruptions while she's there, but hopefully she's getting the idea that putting aside time to read the Bible is an important thing to do.

But reading the Bible with someone else is amazing. I was privileged to share another person's point of view and ideas about a passage. And to pray with someone (other than my husband) one to one. And I was reminded again of God's goodness to us.

"Blessed are all who take refuge in him" (Psalm 2:12).

Zechariah

Chris and I are reading this in our Bible reading time at the moment. We're three chapters into it now.

I have to confess I haven't read much of the minor prophets. Other than Jonah at Sunday School, they weren't big in the church I grew up in.

I'm loving it. It's great how all those visions point towards Jesus.

Today at Bible study....

...we finished Christianity Explored. I missed a couple of sessions that were pretty important in the overall framework of the studies...like Sin and the Cross, for example. So today's wrapping-up session was very helpful.

And the best thing that happened was that we had a lady at our table who became a Christian today after we'd finished the course. I was sitting at the other end of the table and a couple of the other ladies sitting beside her prayed with her and she accepted Christ.

So exciting. Will be praying for Karen as she comes to know Jesus even better in the future.

Revelation

For my Bible reading this month, I'm working through the readings in Revelation from this month's Briefing.

Revelation has generally been a book I've avoided. I thought it was all a bit too hard. All those references to beasts and visions. If I'm completely honest, I'm still finding it hard going this time. But the introduction to the series of readings had two very insightful reflections that are helping me to stick with the program:

1. There are lots of Old Testament allusions in Revelation.

2. It is a retelling of the story of Jesus and his Gospel in a more colourful way.

Funnily enough, when Aidan is reading his Bible we often find him looking at Revelation. I think it's because he's obsessed with Beast Quest and similar types of books, so he enjoys reading about dragons and beasts. Perhaps that's my issue...I would prefer to poke my eyeballs with a stick rather than read about that kind of stuff so possibly my difficulties are because I'm struggling to relate to the subject matter?

But I think we need to be challenged to read parts of the Bible that we find difficult. It's in the Bible for a reason so it's important that we understand it.