grace-filled beginnings

new look for a new beginning...i love the birds!  to be perfectly honest, i've never really liked birds, but in the last month or so have had several strange encounters with them, and therefore am beginning to feel an affinity- especially toward small chickadees that seem to be able to say so much, just be tilting their heads a certain way!

so, much has happened since my last post.  the biggest news is that i am now employed!  no contract or paycheck yet, but my picture and bio were in the church bulletin last week, so that's gotta count for something, right?  :)  i am so thrilled to know that i am the new leader of a school community that undoubtedly has a great deal to teach me, but also one which my heart is burning with a desire to serve.  i already know that the road ahead is filled with challenges, but i also know that i can choose how to respond to those challenges, and that my response will affect others' responses.  there is without a doubt a need for great changes, but there is also much to celebrate and maintain.

i am many things right now- anxious, apprehensive, thrilled, excited, uncertain...but mostly grateful.  it took a long time to get to this point, which makes it all that sweeter to know that this is where i am supposed to be.  i have already been welcomed with open arms into this community, and the outgoing principal has really taken me under her wing and done her best to tell me and show me everything she can so that i don't come in blind.

i have been reading a book by henri nouwen lately called Can You Drink the Cup? and it is really challenging me to think about not only this specific ministry of school leadership that i have been called to, but the greater calling of being a christian.  it is based on the passage in the 20th chapter of the gospel according to matthew where Jesus asks James and John, "Can you drink the cup that I am going to drink?"  nouwen proposes three actions, the last of which is the actual drinking.  first comes holding, then lifting, and finally, drinking.  he takes these actions from what Jesus does on the night of the Last Supper.  i guess what i am most taking from this so far is how NOT easy it is to do this task that we are called to do; to drink the same cup that Jesus drank.  and knowing how challenging it can be, to make the decision and the commitment over and over again to hold, lift, and drink- is nothing short of amazing, and absolutely requires grace.

i feel a bit as if i am all over the place in this post, and i apologize.  my mind has been spinning as in the past week i have received over 30 emails from the principal i am replacing, i have spent a day with my new staff doing professional development, i have said goodbye to my old staff and mentor, finished the year at my old school, said goodbye to our beloved family dog, and attended a conference.  it's all beginning to happen so fast, and it will require a significant amount of grace from God and self-control on my part to keep it from spinning out of control before the school year even actually begins!  i am going home next week to just relax a bit and hang out with my family, so that should be a nice bridge from my life as a student to my life as a principal!  hopefully i can come back rejuvenated and ready to get to work building God's kingdom here on earth!  (what a task!)