Georgina

Language is so neat.  In Christian Beliefs, Pastor Nixon was explaining how we are made in the image of God and that there are three facets of that:  rationality, spirituality, and morality (plus a forth which combines those three: relational capacity).  Three more facets are included in rationality:  future orientation, transcendent thoughts, and speech.  He defined speech as the use of words to creatively communication with others.  I like his inclusion of speech as a part of our rationality and creation in the image of God.

I helped Georgina tonight at our ESL class.  She is a dear old woman who hobbles in with a cane and gingerly takes a seat at the table.  For a couple class periods, the main teacher would include her in the group's rounds as we went through examples of conversations and such.  We soon found out that she was not up for it and could hardly understand anything, which made it difficult to advance with the group without dropping her like unnecessary cargo on a fleeing ship.

This week, I worked with her one-on-one and we seemed to do all right.  I don't know exactly what country she's from, but we got along well in Spanish and made some progress in English as well.  It's so interesting to watch her grasp concepts and relate things she knows in Spanish to their English counterparts.  It's sometimes difficult for me to explain things and difficult for her to wrap her mind around some ideas or words, but we were both thankful for the other's efforts by the end of the lesson.

There is not much that I can teach God. Ok, there is nothing I can teach God.  But I certainly feel like He's patient with me more often than is right.  I mean, He goes beyond right and hits downright merciful every day.  My mind is feeble and my efforts weak.  I don't yet speak His language.  But I'm slowly learning and He is patiently teaching me.  Someday I believe that we will use just the right words to creatively communicate with each other in speech.  Until then, I, like Georgina, allow a small, but sincere smile, and a quiet gracias.