Erin.

My friend Erin is a university student and a new Christian.  She was baptized three years ago, and since then has dealt with a lot of strife in her family because of it.

She's going to school full time and working three jobs.  On top of paying for her apartment every month, she's trying to save up money to go to the National Youth Gathering in Texas this summer.  I asked her why she wanted to go so much.  She had been there once before, and she said that it helped increase her faith to see so many Christians gathered from all over the world.  For so many Taiwanese Christians, they don't have the support of family or many friends.  They have small churches and Christian friends here or there.  They want so desperately to know they're not alone in their faith.  There is no big worship meeting like the National Youth Gathering in Taiwan.

My request:  please pray for Erin, as she fights the battle that comes with becoming a new Christian in Taiwan.  Pray that God gives her wisdom to know when to work and when to rest.  Please pray that God would provide her with $1,000 to go to the Youth Gathering, to encourage her in her faith and make Christian friends and connections.

In Christ,

Anna

Giving Thanks

Dear friends and family,


I regret that so much time has passed since I last wrote.  It´s been a whirlwind of activity here.

Last weekend our house was saturated with the smell of turkey and apple pie as we celebrated our  Thanksgiving meal.  We invited our entire church, some friends, students, and teachers from the school.  Even though there were only 40 people (I guess in years past they´ve had close to 200!), our house was packed with food and people.  We had done a lot of work in preparation, with the cooking and cleaning, but it was worth it to see connections made between churched and unchurched people, to see friends enjoying stuffing and mashed potatoes, and to muster a little of the home-for-the-holidays feeling.


I´ve found myself overbooked with tutoring on top of teaching and ministry, and next semester I need to cut down.  It´s always been easy for me to be overly busy, and even now in Taiwan I´m learning to balance time.  The pace of life is different here; it's slower, and yet not lazier.  You are expected to do less things at one time but also expected to do it more consistently, without breaks or change.  Not exactly the way I like to do things, but I have to adjust.  We worked on Thanksgiving and we'll work on Christmas Eve day and Christmas day.  (I suppose now I know how pastors feel.)  We have one day off at the end of the year, and then go straight on until February.  We rarely have to rush from one place to another, but we're always doing something.  I'm trying to keep my Sundays as free as possible to rest and be rejuvenated in God's word, but even on Saturdays and Sundays we often have team responsibilities.


Thankful....  it hardly felt like Thanksgiving the holiday that I know and love so well.  On Thanksgiving Day, we had school and did nothing special and ate curry instead of turkey for lunch.  But the ideas of joy and appreciation go beyond turkey and getting a day off of work.  We can be thankful in any situation.  We can be joyful anywhere we are and regardless of what we eat and even regardless who we are with.  Tonight, I am so thankful that God only gives us what we can handle.  When you work in ministry, as with many other jobs, your work isn't quantifiable or measurable, and it's easy to get overworked.  Tonight, after school, I sat down at my desk to plan a tutoring lesson.  But I was so brain dead that nothing came.  I was fresh out of energy and ideas, literally nothing came to me.  After a full day of teaching children and thinking how to explain things in English, I was tired.  So I prayed and told God that, and I asked Him to either give me an idea or a way out.  He gave me peace.  So I mustered what crumbs of a lesson I had and went to their house.  When I walked in, they were decorating the Christmas tree and asked me to help.  No lesson tonight, they said, just tell us about Christmas.  (Yes!  Just what I needed!)  So God knew I needed a break and a little taste of Christmas.  I asked the mom tonight if I can teach the girls Bible stories, and she said yes.  I wasn't sure if she would because they follow the traditional religion of Taiwan, but I am so excited for an opportunity to share Jesus with them, because it was the reason I took the job.  Next week those girls are going to hear about Jesus' birth, maybe for the first time.  I am thankful, so very thankful, that God is gentle with us, and never lets us drown when we call out to Him for help.  It reminds me of these verses from Philippians 4:

"Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.  And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus."

No matter where we are for the holidays, or what we eat, or how empty or full our table and chairs may be, we are so blessed.  May you ever be aware of the many good things God generously showers on you, and in turn thank him for all of them.

In Christ,

Anna

Prayer Requests

Please pray about:

~ My student Lionel (she's a female).  She came to Friday Night Bible study two weeks ago to play guitar with me afterwards, and is coming again this Friday.  We've talked about faith and she thinks believing in herself is the only safe thing to believe in.  She used to go to a church until she felt pressure to be baptized, so she left.  Please pray that she's willing to go into the Bible study class on Friday night, or if not, that God would give us opportunities to talk about faith again just between the two of us.  I have so much compassion for this girl and want to see God bring her to faith.


~  My 11th grade Spanish students.  We had a big fieldtrip to Taiwan's 2nd biggest city to see a museum and eat Spanish food, and God really blessed our trip-- I didn't lose any students (can never take that for granted!) and we had a wonderful time.  It gave me time to observe how the student's interact with each other and also helped me to build my relationships with them (They nicknamed me "Shia Shia Shao Jie", which means "Miss Shrimp".... it's a long story).  Lately I've been hearing students saying inappropriate and hurtful things (in general, not just this class), so I decided to have a discussion with my 11th graders about the Power of Words.  We watched a video, read some Bible verses, and discussed the affect that words have on us.  I told them that if I teach them to have perfect Spanish, but they don't know God's love or how to love other people, then I have failed.  What is the point of knowing how to speak another language if you use it only to say evil things?  This is the class that I know the best, feel the closest with, and I pray for them every day.


~ Endurance.  Like life anywhere, it's hard to stay on top of everything.  I think I've taken on too many activities outside of school, and now I'm trying to cut down on my schedule to not sacrifice the quality of my work.  Please pray that our team's endurance and joy in the stress and monotony of life would shine throughout the school and community.  It's easy to "get comfortable", and want to sleep or relax instead of helping out with the Bible studies and fellowship events.  Relaxing is important sometimes, but too much can make me greedy for even more than I need.  Pray that I and the rest of the team can find a healthy balance.

~Homesickness.  As Thanksgiving is coming up, I often find my thoughts wandering back home.  I assume the rest of the team is more accustomed to being away for the holidays, but they still deal with homesickness from time to time.  Please pray that this won't be a distraction for us.

How about you?  Prayer requests from home?  I'm hungry to hear from you my friends back home, so if you have prayer requests or just want to tell me how life is going, please email me: anna.gruen@cuw.edu or anna.gruen@lcms.intl.org.


Thanks for your prayers!


Anna

Grace

"But he said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.'  Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me.  That is why, for Christ's sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties.  For when I am weak, then I am strong."  2 Corinthians 12:9-10


I don't enjoy traveling as much as I thought, and I will explain why.  It's true that being a tourist behind a camera can be intriguing for a while.  A short visit somewhere exotic often eludes the cares and pressures of normal everyday life.  Experiencing the vistas, aromas, noises, flavors, and textures of Taiwan has certainly been an adventure for me.   However, there's something special about finally settling down here.  It feels less like visiting and more like living.  Working with the people, learning from them, laughing with them, joking with them, sweating with them, shivering with them, sharing anecdotes and advice with them, praying with them, even crying with them-- it's much too up-close and messy to have a rosy, perfect picture of each other.  But isn't that the point?  Ministry is done living along side each other.  Ministry is not about showing our strengths, our abilities, our confidences, our perfection.  It's about Christ showing his perfection and faithfulness through our lives, the good and the bad of us.  God can show His glory even, no, especially amidst our weakness, failure, and doubt.

The cultural norm in Taiwan is to never mention social imperfections.  They don't talk about insecurities, depression, abuse, rape, or death.  Sometimes a student will be gone for weeks, and we won't know why until someone mentions that their mom or dad died, and it isn't brought up again.  When my friend and team member Rachel tried to console a high school student after her dad passed away, she simply forced a smiled and said, "I'm fine!" It's probably a natural reaction to try to synthesize false strength rather than admit honest weakness, and it's a trap many a Christian falls into as well.

I think one of our crowning characteristics as a school body and a Christian team (American and Taiwanese together) is our transparency.  When someone is struggling with adjusting to life here or missing home, we pray about it as a team.  When someone is stressed to the maximum, we pray about it.  When someone is doubting their calling here, we pray about it.  When we are heartbroken over our students who are lost, we pray about it.  When we are stressed about health concern or financial problems, we pray about it.  We are not perfect with this by any means, but it really stands out because it's so anti-cultural.  And when we do share with each other, God's grace is ever-present.

We have to be transparent in our classes too:  acknowledging forgiveness for students who constantly make class difficult (though not withholding discipline), and asking for forgiveness when we mess up as teachers.  It's a bit humbling when we discipline our students for coming late to class and then show up late for class ourselves.  We learn the importance of grace.  God's grace must cover me as much as it covers anyone.  Even in discipline, God is gracious and loving with us.  And even in our discipline, we must show grace and love to our students.  Last week I got particularly upset with a group of unruly 9th grade boys in my Spanish class.  They continually showed disrespect to me and their classmates.  After disciplining them sufficiently, I took time to talk to them about why discipline is important and why I had to do it.  "I love you guys and respect you," I explained, and of course they looked to each other and giggled (they are high school boys after all).  But I could tell that they understood.

Like my students, I'm not perfect.  A couple days ago I was planning to make piñatas in my Spanish class, but while I was handing out materials, I realized I didn't have enough balloons!  Now, you can't make piñatas without balloons (or if you can, please inform me!), so mid-class I had to resort to a plan B.  The students could tell I was a bit flustered, and they were amazingly helpful and rushed to clean everything up and prepare for "plan B".  I was so thankful for their grace!  At that moment, I needed it and it was such a beautiful thing.

Obviously we never plan to make mistakes, but when we do, it's so good to be honest about it and immediately receive grace.  I have a bad habit of thinking I need to clean up my act before I come to God, to get it all figured out before I pray and explain it to him.  I know it's ridiculous!  If I wait to pray to God until I've got it figured out, I won't ever pray!  But we know we can simply take our trash to God and let him sort it out.  We don't have to hide it, because obviously we can't hide it.  1 John 1:9 says, "If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness."  David says in Psalm 32 that he was in anguish until he was honest with God and confessed his imperfection, and God was gracious to David.  God is the source of all grace, and ultimately is the reason behind the grace we are able to show and be shown with and from each other.

My Chinese name, reflective of my English middle name, means "Beautiful Grace".  I only pray that God will use even our weaknesses and imperfections here in Taiwan to His glory.  His grace is sufficient!


In Christ,

Anna

谷恩娜   

Acts

In our adult Friday night Bible study group and also our team Bible study on Tuesday night, we're going through the book of Acts.  I must admit, it's always been a bit difficult for me to comprehend it, especially now that I am on the mission field.  I understand that God does not change, but the way in which He interacts with people throughout history changes.  We no longer have a theocracy like in ancient Israel.  God does not appear to us in a pillar of raging fire.  The way God was present in the Old Testament, He is now present in our lives in other ways:  The Word, Communion, His Spirit in our hearts.

But what about the early church in Acts?  They were also part of the New Covenant.  God displayed His sovereignty and did mighty things.  The believers at that time fasted, prayed ceaselessly, gave all their money to the poor.  It was a time of extremes.  Extreme persecution, extreme sacrifice, extreme turnover.  Peter and Paul and the other apostles walked into temples and preached the Gospel in truth and love, without reservation or shame or timidity.  People would bring their sick to them, trying just to reach the span of their shadows, that they might be healed.  Now, we probably don't have hordes of people fighting over prime spots in our personal bubbles so that they could be healed.  The Bible says everyone has different gifts-- some healing, some prophesy, others teaching, still others encouragement, etc.  Well, maybe our gifts are not that of healing.  But we do have the same authority to do amazing  things-- the name of Jesus.  Right?

       John 14:12-14:
"Very truly I tell you, whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father.  And I will do whatever you  ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son.  You may ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it."

As a youth, I always imagined the mission field to be like the early church.  Extreme.  Raw.  Dangerous.  Some mission fields are like this.  We hear about exorcisms and healings in India and Africa.  But I suppose I'm much more "comfortable" here than I imagined.  The school gives me a "safe" place to tell students that Jesus loves them, where it's embedded into the curriculum and it's very convenient and it's what I get paid to do.   I absolutely love teaching my students about the Bible, so hat's all fine and well.  However, I suppose I am desiring more.  I know some people write off street evangelism as ineffective.   But in a place where only 0.04% of the population is Christian and many have never even heard the truth of the Gospel before, would it really be a waste of time?

What would happen if I sit down with the people at the local temple with my Chinese English Bible?  What if I tell the girl who makes me dumplings that Jesus loves her?  I've done some of this when the time is right, inviting the girls at the tea stand to Bible study (and they came).  But for the most part, it is still something that makes me a bit nervous.  I don't want to spout words without tact, but I don't want fear or timidity to be holding me back from sharing God's love to people who desperately need it.

When should we witness in Chiayi?  How should we witness?  To whom should we witness?  How is it similar and different than witnessing in America?  How is it similar and different than the early church?  I've emailed professors and mission supervisors these questions, looking for any clues to the answers within the shifting contexts of society and individuals.  What does God have in store for me to do here?  Whatever it is, I want to go at it at full speed forward, fueled by love, and unhindered by the brakes of fear.

How about you?  Thoughts?  Similar questions?  Input?  Scripture?  Email me at anna.gruen@cuw.edu.

Garden.

It's been over a month of teaching now, though it hardly seems possible.  Although I miss the colors and smells of fall, the air has changed here and no longer drips with humidity.  It's cool enough to wear a jacket at night, and the days have been breezy and pleasant.  I've started a little garden of vegetables and herbs-- something I never had too much patience for in the States.  The plant growth is so slow you can hardly see a difference from day to day.  But after a month, I look back and think of how those ambitious, gangly, vivacious shoots came from dry seeds and it seems impossible.  I think teaching is a lot like that-- day to day, you don't see the difference you are making.  But we still till, sow, water every day.   We work, we watch, we wait.  And eventually, we will be amazed at how our students have grown.  Gardening is teaching me patience and persistence despite a lack of instant feedback.  I almost wish we grew a garden as part of our education degree, because it's a powerful picture of what I'm learning as a first year teacher!

I officially received my first salary paycheck (huge excitement for the recent college grad!), and used part of it to buy a nice guitar.  It allows me to lead worship at a local church, Friday Night Bible Study songs, On Campus Student Fellowship on Thursday nights, a student worship band at the school, as well as enjoy personal worship time.  What a blessing!  I really cherish my new "baby".  :)  My newest project-- learning Chinese worship songs!  It's a good way to connect with Chinese Christians and learn more of the language. :)

I started tutoring for a prominent family in the community.  The family is quite rich and owns many different businesses in the area, so it could be a very influential job.  The girls are 6 and 8 years old, and it's definitely a stretch out of my preferred teaching age group (junior high and high school).  I need to look into kindergarten teaching strategies!  The family is Buddhist, but I wear my cross necklace and we'll see what opportunities God gives me to share His grace in love.

Part of my vocation here is improving the Spanish program.  Concordia Chiayi prides itself in being a prestigious school for the area as well as an international school.  The principal and administration are seeking to globalize the school as much as possible to increase it's draw to families in the community and to raise the school's expectations and vision.  As the sole Spanish teacher, some of this opportunity falls to me.  The Spanish program has only been around for 3 years at the school, and there are many changes that can be done to make it more effective and the students more successful.  I had a good meeting today with my advising senior teacher in which we discussed how we can stabilize and integrate the Spanish program into the school's higher vision.

God is faithful.  Every time I become discouraged at the number of students that don't know Him, He shows me that there are always people that are faithful to Him.  It reminds me of when God told Elijah about the 700 faithful in Israel that did not bow to Baal.  Simply knowing that there are students at Concordia who love Jesus gives me indescribable hope and joy!  Today I talked with an 11th grade student in my Spanish class who is heavily involved in her church, teaching Sunday school and attending youth group during the week.  Her parents are not Christian, but God planted the seed of faith in her and her sister through her local church and made it grow strong roots in their lives.  Now, it is a part of who she is.  She is a leader, a servant, and a reflection of God to her family and classmates.  I'm in awe of the way God changes hearts!  The plan of salvation and the work of the Holy Spirit is so much bigger than us!  We have to give all the credit and glory to God.

I should be sending out an official newsletter soon.  Until then, I hope this will suffice.  If you'd like me to write about something specific, or if you have any questions or are curious about different aspects of what's going on here in Taiwan, please feel free to email me at anna.gruen@cuw.edu.  I would love to hear from you all.

If any of you know of a good devotional book, I'm in the market to find one.  Tomorrow night I'm teaching the story Caleb and the topic of "Fear" in our Friday Night Bible Study senior high group.  So glad that God calls us out of fear and into His infinite love:

"There is no fear in love, for perfect love casts out all fear."  1 John 4:18


I pray that this is true for you all in the name of Jesus.  God's blessings!

In Christ,

Anna

español

A huge part of my missionary position here in Taiwan, if not my main position, is being the best teacher I can be for my students.  This includes finding innovative and engaging ways to teach them, not once in a while, but every day.  Especially with my Spanish classes, for which I have no curriculum, this takes a lot of time and effort!  But God always gives me the grace to do my job.  I especially notice His power on days when I´m so tired I don´t know how I´m going to get through the day.  I´m DEFINITELY not a perfect teacher, but I try my best and we know that God can use even our mistakes for good.

Here is a video I made for one of my Spanish classes including Spanish vocabulary for hobbies.  The video stars some members of Team Taiwan, so I thought I would share it with you.  Humor is a huge tool that we use to connect with students and people in general, so it´s stuffed with silliness (maybe you need to know these characters to really find it hilarious! I don´t know).  Well, enjoy!


In Christ,

Anna Gruen

Galatians 6:9