Back in the swing of things...

We are all three back to school and enjoying being back into the swing of things. Our sweet little students remember us and our teacher friends both American and Chinese were excited for our return. Feels great to be so loved by the people we work with. We are very excited for this new semester. Grace is right back where she left off six weeks ago and absolutely loves her kindergarten teachers Nina, Joyce and Lisa. (two of them are in the pic at the top of the blog) She has the same teachers as she had last year because she is in a special class that has more instruction in English. The parents of the students pay more for that class because they want their child to be exposed to more English.... And with grace in the class it really encourages the children to use their English. With all of that being said the kids and their parents love having grace in the class and I think they feel like its money well spent since their kid is buddies with the American child at the school lol! Grace is understanding more and more mandarin and is learning so much! Her teachers can speak some English but 99 percent of the time they talk to grace in mandarin so that she can learn their language. She comes home and says things that we don't understand, pretty nuts! I never realized what an awesome opportunity this would be for Grace. We are so blessed to not only work at this wonderful school but that she can get a head start on her education at the same time. In other news we are now approved to start volunteering with the Baoan orphanage with their weekend outing program. Most of the children have never been on a trip outside of the orphanage. This program is designed to get them out into the "real world" and let them experience things that they wouldn't get to do otherwise. We will be aloud to take the child to the park, movies, shopping etc. Unfortunately we won't be able to post pictures of the child but we can write about them our blog. One more thing.... I have a bunch of new students this semester that dont have English names yet so I got to name them today LOL!!! So I named them after all of my girlfriends .... They are precious! They will actually keep these names (unless of course they hate their name) ... I will post pictures soon! Peace signs included ;) Not much else to report .... Thanks for all of your prayers. We pray for our family and friends daily and miss you all! Love, Jess

WOW

Tonight Grace came out of her room where she was playing with her baby dolls to ask me "momma is my whole life for Jesus...." wow....

I am sure that God can speak to even a 3 year olds heart... They may not know exactly what it all means but I believe he can start working in their hearts long before they even understand .... I don't think I'll EVER forget hearing those words come out of her mouth.

So long Lakeland, Florida

"Oh,what I would do to have the kind of faith it takes 
To climb out of this boat I'm in and onto the crashing waves.
To step out of my comfort zone into the realm of the unknown 
Where Jesus is, And he's holding out his hand.

But the waves are calling out my name and they laugh at me;
Reminding me of all the times I've tried before and failed.
The waves they keep on telling me time and time again,
"You'll never win.....

With two days left until we start our journey back to the other side of the world so many thoughts are rolling through my head... Feels like  I'm stepping out of this comfort zone of America all over again. Mostly I'm ecstatic, ready to see my husband, ready for Grace to see her dad, ready for routine, and excited to see what doors God opens in these next six months of our life. The last six months of our lives forever changed us as a family and I have a feeling God is going to rock our world all over again. 

Although I know what to expect this time around I feel like God is bringing me out of my comfort zone again to a new place with all new people and a new way of life to get used to. However, this time around, I will be a little more comfortable and a LOT more trusting of God's plan. I have learned the importance of being out of my comfort zone. 

God has shown me that the place we are most vulnerable to His plans and His voice is one that is unfamiliar and uncomfortable. I believe in different seasons of our lives God may ask us to be in a place That's not 100 percent comfortable... If you're too comfortable you won't experience it as He wants you to.

As I started packing today the faces of our precious students, the faces of the children in the orphanages, and the faces of the amazing friends and families from our fellowship rolled through my head ....it became clear once again as to what our purpose in china is.  

Thank you lord for allowing us another six months to serve you and your people in china. We are forever grateful for everything you've given us, and feel privileged again that you've chosen us for this job in this season of our lives.

So long Lakeland Florida.... See you in January! 


"But the Voice of truth tells me a different story
the Voice of truth says "do not be afraid!"
and the Voice of truth says "this is for My glory"
Out of all the voices calling out to me
I will choose to listen and believe the Voice of truth"
-Casting Crowns


To everyone who has contributed in any way and prayed for us along the way.....Thank you. Thank you for taking a risk for the sake of another, for giving without expecting something in return and for letting God shine through  you. 

We're comin' to America

We are SO excited that summer break is here, and feel beyond blessed that Grace and I get to travel back to the U.S. for six weeks over the holiday! Jon has decided to stay in China for the summer and travel by train throughout the entire country with my cousin Matt. I thought I was brave the last time I flew with a 3 year old for 25 hours straight, but I think I am kicking it up a notch this time since Jon will not be with us! Please say a prayer that ALL goes smooth and we are safe and sound on U.S. soil on July 18th. We will be there until August 25th. Lots of time will be spent with family, friends, birthday parties, 10 year highschool reunion, beach weekend with some of my best friends, and of course the daily trips to publix, chick fil a, target, publix chick fil, target.. .repeat, repeat and repeat again =)

See you Soon!

PAY. IT. FORWARD.

To repay the good deeds one has received by doing good things for other unrelated people.

The premise — based on the book and movie “Pay It Forward” — is to act without the expectation of being paid back, but with the hope that the recipient pays the favor forward by helping someone else.

A few weeks ago I bagged up a ton of Grace's clothes that she had outgrown and took them to my school to give to one of my students parents. The clothes were still in perfect condition just too small. We LOVE hand me downs in the U.S. so I didn't think anything of it. When I brought them to the school one of my Chinese co-workers asked me what I was doing with the clothes and I told her I was going to pass them on to one of my students that was a little smaller than Grace. My Co-worker immediately said you can't do that here, did you ask the parents in advance? You can't do that at the school. I didn't understand. She basically said that it would embarrass the parents if I did that here and I needed to ask them in private first. She said we don't do stuff like that here in China. I told her it wasn't targeted at anyone in particular, just that I didn't want to throw the clothes away and wanted someone else to use them. She continued to tell me that it would be VERY uncomfortable if I offered these to the mother without talking to her about it first.

After hauling them back home that day, I left the clothes bagged up in our apartment for a few weeks. I knew that there were tons of people that could use these clothes, so I decided I would take them out into the courtyard of the community while no one was looking and just leave them there for someone to go through on their own.

I went back into my apartment and within 5 minutes I looked out of my window to see a crowd of grandma's and moms gathered around the bags of clothes, checking them all out and all choosing some to take. They looked so excited all chatting with each other and showing the others what they got.

I realized in that moment that sometimes it feels even better to do something for someone without expecting a thank you in return, or without being noticed.

I recently read a quote from Max Lucado that said " Do good things. Just don't do them to be noticed. You can be too good for your own good." How awesome is that... Love it, and it's so true.

It reminds me how great it feels when someone has done a "random act of kindness for me" or paid it forward by helping me. I think the world would be a much happier place if we all we made it a goal to "pay it forward" at least once a week. It doesn't have to cost anything. You never know just how far it will go when you do something nice for a stranger.

I believe each of us has the power to better someone’s life simply by doing small favors, somtimes anonymously.

I'll leave you with one last quote by Max Lucado that I love ....

"Slay the desire to be noticed. Stir the desire to serve God."

God Bless,

Jessica

Dora the Chinese Explorer...

Grace has a lot of friends here in Shenzhen, but I think Dora is quickly becoming her number one "bestie" .... Grace's sunday school teacher told us today that they are as thick as thieves in children's church. During worship service all the kids stay with the adults and these two hold hands and sing like little old church ladies.
I have never seen two little girls hug each other so much. These two girls are PURE JOY.
What's even more amazing is the family that Dora is blessed with. She has two beautiful, parents who love Jesus with all of their heart. After church today we went to lunch with a bunch of friends from the church, and we sat at a big table with Dora's parents and her new born baby brother. Her parents speak great English, and her father actually preached the sermon this morning.

As I was talking with Dora's mom about her family and children, we started talking about the fact that she has two kids. In China there is still a very strict one child law and I very rarely make friends here that have two kids. She starting telling me her testimony and I couldn't believe my ears.

She said that when she became pregnant with her second baby the police were sent out to her house to arrest her husband and to take her to a facility to force her to have an abortion. Because they are Christians they refused to do this no matter the cost. They packed up little Dora and were on the run until they made it to Hong Kong where they were free to have their baby in a hospital there. She said that no hospital in mainland China would allow them to be admitted because they already had one baby. Today they are blessed with two incredibly beautiful and healthy children.

I admire Dora's mom and dad so much. They probably will never know just how much their story touched me today.

Today I am even more grateful that I come from a place where I am free to do just about anything I want. They asked me today how many kids were we allowed to have and I told them as many as I want. I could tell they were in awe.

They have a video testimony that I will post soon... Just wanted to share their story.

By the way.... Grace thinks her friend Dora is the REAL Dora the Explorer.. After all she does have the same hair cut haha! :)

Our Stomping Grounds in China

One of the courtyards outside of our building. In the afternoons this area is FILLED with grandma's and grandpa's and their grandchildren.




Our Building... and there's actually palm trees here. I love that, one thing I never expected to see here!

Another Area where all the grandparents in the neighborhood mingle.

Community Ice cream and drink store we frequent quite a bit!

Heading to the community pool

This is the community pool for the residents in our neighborhood. We usually get swamped with our kindergarten students when we are there. So much fun.

We were VERY surprised to see this pool after our school moved us into this neighborhood... I never expected this for sure!

Swimming Buddies



One of my students Caroline and Grace playing in the pool together.

I'll post more soon... this is just to give you a glimpse into what our neighborhood looks like :)