Classroom This Year

It's Good to be Back!

It's so good to back this year.  One month ago I was welcomed by this lovely sign, these lovely flowers, and my lovely roommate.  It was so good to come back to the familiar - to my same apartment, to the same roommate I had my first year, and back to my classroom and students.  It's been a slow start to the year for a couple reasons, but it's been nice to ease back into school and to feel really ready.  

We were delayed by one week because of the coup, but that has had no effect on us (in fact, I had completely forgotten about it until writing this!).  We had the first two days of school and then a weekend.  After that we had four days of school and then a workday where we had to go to immigration to get our visas and work permits renewed.  The following week we were supposed to have school but we had so many cases of Hand, Foot, and Mouth disease that the kindergarten and elementary schools had to be shut down from Monday to Wednesday.  We had school Thursday and Friday and that leads me to today.  So after being here a month I have really only taught about 8 full days.  Kind of crazy!  

But it's been a great first month.  It is so nice to come back to teaching having had two years of experience.  It makes everything so much easier - from deciding what projects to do, to knowing where to get the materials, and to knowing how to handle my classroom and the students that I have.  I have also found that I have a lot more confidence in what I am doing and that has helped in so many ways.   It's been great to see my students again and reconnect with them, and so fun to have them for a third year!  I love already knowing my students and having a relationship with them.  

It's amazing to think back to two years ago when I was arriving in Thailand for the first time.  I was so afraid, so homesick and scared and lonely.  I had absolutely no idea how to manage a classroom or come up with all my own curriculum.  And now I come back for a third year, confident in teaching, having good friends, knowing a couple hundred students, speaking a bit of Thai, knowing my way around, and flourishing where I have been planted.  God is so good! 

Card 2014-2015

Prayer Letter 2014-2015

I am now back in Thailand for my third year as the art teacher at Global English School.  GES is a private Christian school for local Thai children who come to learn English.   It is a wonderful community and I feel blessed to be a part of the ministry that takes place here.

This year I feel called to be very intentional in prayer and to be deeply rooted in the Bible -- to remain close to Christ.  “Remain in me, as I also remain in you.  No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine.  Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.  I am the vine; you are the branches.  If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing” (John 15:4-5).  As much as I want to bear fruit, I know that it will not happen in my own strength, but only as I remain in Christ.  Please pray with me that I would be dedicated to reading the Bible and to prayer, so that I may gain strength, wisdom and power from Him, that I might intercede on behalf of those I interact with, and that Christ may work through me, so that every person I encounter may be pointed toward Him.  It is my prayer that I would be so close to God that his heart becomes my heart, and that I would move according to his Spirit, as I intercede and listen in prayer.

Please pray for my relationships and interactions with my students.  As the art teacher I get to teach Grade 1 through Grade 12.  Because of this I have the same students every year and get to build on relationships from the past two years.  Pray those relationships would continue to grow and bear fruit.

Please pray for the Christian teachers and administration at GES.  Pray that we would be unified, be strong in our faith, and be clear witnesses to Christ’s love and grace.  Please join us in earnestly praying that God would use us in the lives of our students and their parents and that every word, action, prayer, and lesson would bring glory to God and tell our students of his love and forgiveness.

Please pray for the students, parents, Thai staff, and neighbors, who are almost all Buddhist.  Pray that they would see and hear and experience the love of God and come to know God as their Savior and friend.

Finally, please pray for the country of Thailand as it is in a state of political unrest.  Please pray for wisdom for the leaders of Thailand and safety for all.  Pray that whatever happens would be used to expand the kingdom of God.

Thank you for your prayers and support over the past two years as I have been in Thailand.  It means so much to me to have so many friends and family encouraging and praying for me while I am here.  It is truly only God who can change the hearts and lives of the people of Thailand.  Your prayers are essential to this ministry and I thank you in advance for them.

Love,

Bekah Steele

Sing to the Lord, bless his name; tell of his salvation from day to day. Declare his glory

among the nations, his marvelous works among all the peoples!  Psalm 96:2-3

Thanksgiving

Today is Thanksgiving, but it doesn’t really feel like Thanksgiving at all.  Hot, humid, and a normal school day just like every other Thursday – 4 classes, chapel, after school duty and Bible study.  I am not gathering with my family around a table full of food.  But that’s not what it’s really about, is it?  It’s never been about the food or the football or the friends and family.  In fact, maybe those things have become the face of the holiday more than the real meaning.  Of course we are thankful for those things – but how much time during Thanksgiving do we actually spend giving thanks?  A day set aside to give thanks to God for all of his wonderful gifts, so many of which we take for granted.  Our abundance can sometimes lead to a poverty of gratitude; kind of reverse of what it should be, huh?  The more we have the less grateful we are and the less we have the more we treasure each small gift.  In our wealth we become entitled to things, or we just always have them so we don’t even think about the fact that it’s a gift.

I’ve always found it a good practice to list my gifts, list my thanks. Each small or big thing I think of is written down and given thanks for (this idea came from One Thousand Gifts by Ann Voskamp)… the sunrise, birds chirping, hot coffee, hugs from students, etc.  It really does make you stop and think about all the gifts in your life, so many of which you look over without a second glance.  But this is a time to pause and give thanks to God for all things, big and small, that he has graciously given us.

The topic in Bible study this week is selfishness… that is where we tend to live, isn’t it?  We look to ourselves and our needs and our wants and we strive to fulfill those longings.  Our eyes are fixed on the empty places of our hearts and we strive and grasp for things to fulfill it.  If we just get this next new thing, or make this new friend, or eat that last cookie, all will be well.  But we achieve that goal and ache continues.  Have you ever noticed when you’re giving thanks that the ache stops?  That the hole feels full?  That when we take our eyes off ourselves and fix them on God and his goodness and love that we are doing what we were meant to do?  Because that is what thanksgiving is really about – glorifying God, which is what we humans were made to do from the very beginning.  Instead of trying to lift ourselves up and fill the empty hole, we lift God up and he makes us whole.

I’ve always loved the quote by John Piper, “God is most glorified when we are most satisfied in him.”  Thanksgiving – a reminder to live satisfied in God.  A time to remember God and his goodness and his lavished love on our lives.  A time to stop striving and remember the gifts, list the thanks, and in doing so lift up God in our hearts. 

Have you ever read Psalm 107?  Here is a little summary of parts of it…

Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good;
    

his love endures forever….

[The Lord rescues people from wandering in a desert]

Let them give thanks to the Lord for his unfailing love
    

and his wonderful deeds for mankind,

for he satisfies the thirsty
    

and fills the hungry with good things….

[The Lord rescues rebellious people from their ways]

Let them give thanks to the Lord for his unfailing love
   

 and his wonderful deeds for mankind. 

Let them sacrifice thank offerings
    

and tell of his works with songs of joy….

[The Lord lifts the afflicted and increases families]

The upright see and rejoice,
    

but all the wicked shut their mouths.

Let the one who is wise heed these things
    

and ponder the loving deeds of the Lord.

I pray that you would see the gifts of God and rejoice, and spend time today pondering the loving deeds

 of the Lord in your life.

A normal day... life in the art room :)

Works in Progress...

Really enjoying these works in progress...

(we are attempting impressionistic landscapes :)

Finished products to come!