Week 4 Summary...

This past week we had Ray and Joy Thomas come and teach us on HIV/AIDS and grief counselling for children. Ray gave us the facts on HIV/AIDS. He shared with us the statistics of the worldwide numbers of people who are infected and affected with HIV/AIDS. We learned about the ways HIV/AIDS is transmitted and about anti-retroviral drugs. Ray also shared with us about kingdom sexuality. Joy taught on how HIV/AIDS is a family disease and how to help people deal with the effects of HIV/AIDS in their family and community. Joy talked about how to help children deal with death and grief that they often experience as a result of HIV/AIDS. With Joy we also learned about play therapy and got to experiment with it as well.

The most impacting information for me this week was learning about the lack of HIV/AIDS education that is really being spread in Africa. I know there is a lot of information being taught but because of the huge stigma of having it and how many little villages there are, it is not enough. A new revelation that I got this week was about how many more teachings on HIV/AIDS need to be out there, and that maybe I might have a part in teaching about HIV/AIDS.

I was really challenged this week by Ray’s Thursday night teaching about HIV/AIDS and the possibilities of God permitting, sending, and withdrawing. I will continue to think on these things and get to know God’s character truthfully through the scriptures to come to a conclusion on what I think about what Ray was talking about.

Since about Wednesday of this week, internally, I have felt… off. I am not sure why and have not been able to fully think through all the things going on inside me this week. I was much more introverted this week then usual. Sometimes I wonder if I really am more introverted and just act like an extrovert or if I maybe am just a balance of both. I was able to work with a number of the SCF students this week on their shorts stories for their author’s night. I felt very blessed to have English as a first language, this week especially. My work duty had to be delayed/switched twice this week. I feel like the way I handled both of the situations were very good. This week I learned about the four calf’s on the farm here. The Leaky girls took me to visit them today. I love living here, with farmland and hills all around.

I am looking forward to this up coming week. Monday is going to be such a blessing to have a day off and just get work done, and I am sure the other speakers during the other days will be great. Also I am looking forward to Lindsay finally coming back, having her as a roommate and our class finally being together!