Spiritual Retreat

Greetings once more!

We are back from an eventful week!  It is still hard for us to think that our fourth and last spiritual retreat at IA has come to an end.  Spiritual Retreat has been a special part of each year that we have been part of IA, and this year proved to be no different in that respect.  Due to a last minute change of plans, I ended up going on the high school retreat instead of the junior high retreat as had been originally planned.  Once again, we were blessed to be part of this time of seeing our students grow spiritually and in friendship with one another.

In yet another sign that Amanda and I are now veterans and no longer the new people, we were the only teachers on the high school retreat who had been to more than one retreat at IA.  I was also in the unusual (for me) position of being the teacher who spoke the best Russian and therefore got to handle the logistical details with the staff at the seminary facility where we went. Its strange that we are now often the go-to people for things like this, and is a reminder of just how much turnover and lack of continuity there is in schools like ours.  Teachers who stay who for four years are relatively rare, and it is even rarer for teachers to be able to stay for four consecutive school years, but that is probably a topic for a different blog post.

Our theme for retreat this year was Not a Victim - Victorious, and our speaker was actually the person who served as our interim headmaster two years ago.  While most of the students knew him as a stand-in administrator and teacher, his greatest gifting is his heart for Third Culture Kids and the issues that they face, and this retreat bore it out.  

Our sessions focused on the Book of Daniel and the ways in which Daniel represents someone in the Bible who was torn away from his homeland and was forced into situations were he lost friends and family and suffered persecution, all the while refusing to feel and act like a victim and glorifying God.  This is something that resonates deeply with our students as they have all been moved to Russia due to their parents work and ministries, and many have mixed and confused feelings about being in Russia and their own identity. 

The temptation to feel sorry for yourself or to feel powerless and marginalized is a big one for our students, and this retreat spoke to those very issues. Our students were challenged to live victoriously by looking to God for stability and identity.  We left feeling that the messages given at retreat were exactly what our students needed to hear, and were excited to see the way they responded in our group sessions and small group times.

As always, getting away from the busyness of life in St. Petersburg and out into the countryside was a wonderful time to refocus ourselves, and our students all seemed refreshed by it.  Please keep praying that the decisions and convictions that took place during our time would continue in the lives of our students.  Its easy to focus on God and hear from Him during times like retreat, but much harder once the normal pressures of life come rushing back in.

The retreat was also filled with lots of fun games, team-building exercises, and even some spontaneous musical theater (more about that below).  Here are some photos that documented our time!

The first night we played Castles and Cats, a game that Amanda found for her literature circles last year that has rapidly become a favorite for our students.  They even play it on their own sometimes:-)

This game was a variation of musical chairs that involved people having to fight over possession of a football to continue on in the game.  Much action ensued.

Amanda getting ready to toss the football into the melee. 

In the courtyard area next to our dormitory and near the dining hall.

One of our sessions on Daniel.

An intense game of Red Rover was also a part of the festivities.

Steal the Bacon, another favorite game, led to some epic grass stains and a few minor injuries.  What can we say, we have some tough and competitive students:-)

One of our team-building games involved trying to complete an obstacle course while blindfolded.  The point was that the obstacle course was unsolvable and the only way to find what you were looking for was to ask for help.  The idea was to teach the students that asking for help is not a sign of weakness and in some situations is the only solution.  It took quite a while for many of the students to catch on, and it was over an hour before everyone had figured out what to do.

One student even scrawled a message on the blackboard while blindfolded:-)

Trying to balance people on wooden pallets stacked on top of tires was another team-building exercise.  After successfully completing it with two pallets, they were forced to fit the entire group onto a single one.  It took some doing, but they achieved (very briefly!) the goal.

After team-building it was time for some good, old-fashioned every man for himself games.  The object of this game was to force other people to touch the tires or to let go of their partners hands.  People kept getting eliminated until only two remained.

The first game ended with no winners, but in the second game I participated since more people were needed and was actually the winner!

Things got quite acrobatic.

Amanda was a great sandcastle cheerleader.

Our last night always ends with a bonfire where we sing, roast marshmallows, and share what we heard from God during our time.  It's always a fun, emotional, and bittersweet moment.

Our students loaded up onto the bus on the way back to St. Petersburg.

One of the special highlights from retreat was when our students secretly organized a flash-mob to perform a song from the musical Les Miserables during lunch in the dining hall.  The incident was captured on video and was a hilarious and unexpected moment:-)

As you can tell, retreat was a great time and we pray that the things that took place will be used by God as a foundation for even more growth in our school.  Next week marks a normal school week, but its the normal routines where we are often challenged the most to live out our faith and we pray that as a school we will rise to this challenge.

Thanks for reading and for your prayers!

-Matt

Settling In

Hello again,

Our school year is off to a good start, and we are enjoying fall-like weather here in St. Petersburg.  It already feels like summer was something that happened ages ago, and it feels normal to be back at school.  Our classes this year have been going very well, and it has been great to see old students again and to get to know the many new ones we have this year as well!

This past week also marked the start of drama for this year.  This year drama is an after-school elective program, and not a required class as it has been in years past.  Amanda is once again directing the play, and is also working with Natalie, one of our new teachers this year.  Natalie has done theater before in her previous teaching job in the U.S., so it will be good to have two people to help with rehearsals.  Since drama is not required, Amanda was a bit nervous that not enough people would turn out, but thankfully there was an excellent group of students who showed up.  Casting was made difficult by the fact that we had so many students who were capable of doing the roles, which is always a good problem to have.  I'm sure we will have more about theatre as preparations for the play continue.

While Amanda has been working with the drama, I have been involved in our after-school tutoring program and continuing my Russian language lessons.  Both of those things are going well, and its good to be having formal lessons again after a summer of self-study.

This week is going to be a bit shorter class wise, because we are having spiritual retreat starting on Wednesday!  We have decided to schedule the annual high school and middle school retreats for earlier in the year (usually they have been towards the end of September).  Amanda will be going with the high school students to the Finnish Lutheran seminary just outside of the city where we have had retreat in past years, while I will be helping out in St. Petersburg for the one day junior high retreat this year.

This will be the first time either of us has had the chance to participate in the junior high retreat, which should be a good experience.  This year Amanda and I are the veterans since most of the teachers who will be going on the retreats have never done one before.

Please be in prayer for these retreats and in the days leading up to them.  The high school leaves from school on Wednesday afternoon and returns on Friday, while the middle school will have its retreat on Thursday.  Spiritual retreat has been such a blessing every time we have been on it, and God has consistently used this time to work in our students' hearts.  We have had students accept Christ as part of the retreat, and many more deepen their walks with God.  In addition, the retreat has been a great way to build up a sense of friendship and community, and we believe that God will work in a similar way this year.

Outside of school, we had the chance last weekend to enjoy one of our favorite annual events: Agro-Rus!  Agro-Rus is an annual farmers' market held at the convention center near our apartment in which hundreds of vendors come to sell honey, meat, produce, honey, clothes, gardening accessories, and honey. (Seriously, over half of the vendors are selling honey.  There are literally over a hundred different stalls selling different kinds of honey).  It was a lot of fun, and we enjoyed seeing the livestock, eating delicious food, and buying some interesting honey (it has pine nuts in it!).

Below are a few recent pictures that show what we've been up to:

Just one of the many rows of tents for vendors selling things at Agro-Rus.  This was the part of the exhibition that was mostly selling clothing.

Some of the produce stalls selling delicious looking vegetables:-)

The yellow stall with the bears is the honey vendor that we bought our honey from.  The woman working the tent was extremely nice and had us sample at least a half dozen different kinds of honey.  They were all delicious!

This was the map of the exhibition.  The areas in the dark golden/yellowish color (mostly on the right-hand side of the map) are the areas that were set aside for honey.  As you can see, honey took up quite a lot of space!

This has nothing to do with Agro-Rus.  Its just a picture of an enormous pepper that I bought at a store a week ago. I had two peppers on my grocery list, but for obvious reasons decided that one would be sufficient:-)

I can't really explain my fascination with Angry Birds.  I don't even play the game, I just find the birds extremely amusing, so of course I couldn't pass up a chance to buy Angry Birds soda.  The beverage was pretty mediocre, but seeing that big cardinal always brings a smile to my face.

Thanks for reading, and thank you for being in prayer about the upcoming retreats.  We will post something soon afterwards to let everyone know how things went this year!

-Matt