Genezing

Hij dreef de boze geesten uit met een enkel woord, en Hij genas allen die er slecht aan toe waren, zodat vervuld werd wat gesproken was door de profeet Jesaja toen hij zei: Hij heeft onze zwakheden op zich genomen en onze ziekten gedragen.
Mattheüs 8:16-17

19.00 uur = Bijbeltijd

Dat is het streven in elk geval. We gebruiken een rooster van Kind op Maandag om onze bijbeltijd invulling te geven. We lezen een verhaal uit de Bijbel, praten erover, zoeken er een lied bij en bidden samen. 

En nét nu waren de verhalen van genezing aan de beurt. Het kón gewoon niet mooier. Wat hébben we gebeden. En wat héeft Hij gehoord!

Onze vrienden uit Madrid, bij wie ons thuisonderwijsavontuur 2,5 jaar geleden begon en die een geweldige inspiratiebron voor ons gezin zijn, deelden onderstaand bericht. Neem alsjeblieft even de tijd om het  te lezen en geniet! (Mocht je moeite hebben met het Engels, kopieer de tekst dan naar Google Translate oid)  

Juan En Hannelie Escabias

Now that Han is at home I thought it helpful to summarise what happened over the last 3 weeks. At the beginning of this month Hannelie was hospitalised with a urinary tract infection. The oncologist saw that her hemoglobin levels were about half the minimum level, and based on his experience he gave her 2 weeks to a month to live. We were shattered by this news and I took a month off to be with her all the time. Over the next 2 weeks her condition gradually worsened. She became so weak that she could no longer walk and were delirious 90% of the time. It was apparent that the phases of death were running their course. Her one kidney started to fail as her urine had a very dark colour. The doctor explained that the brain was not getting sufficient oxygen, hence the delirium, and that was common in dying. Friday before last I rushed her to the hospital with another blockage of the intestine. When this happens the body ejects its waste via the only opening possible, upwards, if the normal downwards route is blocked. The same thing happened last year when the tumor grew so much that it obstructed the intestine. Her oncologist examened her and said that the end was immenent, his assistant confirmed that she would go the same or the following day. He also indicated towards Hannelie's very strong muscle twitches as that her brain was busy dying. That evening she reached a state where she was white as a sheet, ice cold and hardly breathing. I rushed the children to her bedside to see their mother maybe for the last time. Afterwards myself, Nito and Lili prayed earnestly for and over her and we trusted God to save her. More that 2 years ago when Hannelie 1st became diagnosed with cancer God said that he would do a miracle before the nations that would be for his glory. We pleaded with him to uphold his word. The next morning Hannelie was awake and amazingly she had a clear mind, for the 1st time in 2 weeks. She could not stop smiling and told us of the experiences she had with God. She also did not have anymore muscle twitches. The doctor on duty was astonished and at least recognised that they could not explained what happened. Since then Hannelie's morphine dosis has dropped from 1260mg per day to 480mg with no recurrence of the constant hip pain that she lived with for 1 year. She also used to take up to 6 fast acting morphine rescues per day, which she does not even need anymore. We are continuing to reduce her morphine intake daily to avoid strong withdrawel symptoms. She is still very thin with weak muscles, so still a long road to full recovery. O, I almost forgot, the blocked intestine sorted it out by itself, without any surgery or any other treatment. She is also free from the chronic diahrea that she made her life a living hell for one year (this is due to the radiation therapy). We are very happy to testify to this miracle which shows that God still heals today, and that even cancer, the dreaded disease of our time, is under his authority. May his name be glorified in the nations because of this. Thank you Lord that you uphold your word.

 ·  · zondag om 18:27 · 

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  Jijzelf en 28 anderen vinden dit leuk

Koninkrijk

We hebben het gehad over de bergrede, de belangrijke dingen die Jezus eens vertelde terwijl Hij met een hele groep mensen op een berg zat. Hij belooft ons alles te zullen geven wat we nodig hebben, wanneer we ons richten op God. De kinderen vinden dat we erg rijk zijn! :-)

Dit liedje vertelt het prachtig:

Licht

 Boas bouwt een doolhofje waardoor de aardappel naar het licht toe kan groeien.

 Het idee vonden we in dit boekje, weer eens verkrijgbaar bij Action.

En als je dan toch bezig bent met licht....

Het goede

En toen Fera pas boos was, besloot Boas om haar een koekje te brengen, zodat het kwade weer overwonnen kon worden door iets goeds.

Zwitserland

Over dwars door Zwitserland. We kwamen die eerste dag niet ver. Wat een moois was er te zien.

Alleen de reis was al prachtig.

We stopten regelmatig even om ervan te genieten. In Simplon even lekkere broodjes bij de bakker halen om ze vervolgens op een mooie plek hoog in het dorp op te peuzelen.

Aan de Simplonpas werd hard gewerkt. We moesten even wachten voor we erdoor konden ivm tijdelijk eenrichtingsverkeer. Terwijl ik bij de camper bleef met daarin een slapende Jona, gingen Jos, Boas en Fera lekker klimmen.

De kinderen deden dapper hun best en het uitzicht boven was erg de moeite waard. Boas was zo onder de indruk dat hij voorstelde om te gaan bidden, zodat ze God konden danken voor al dat moois wat Hij gemaakt heeft. En dat deden ze. Ik denk dat Charlotte Mason  gelijk had, met haar aandacht voor de schepping. Hoe kunnen we God beter leren kennen en genieten dan door zijn eigen werk?

Tegen het einde van de middag vonden we een camping. Het was niet meer dan een grasveld en we waren nog maar aan het begin van onze doorsteek door Zwitserland, bij Brig-Ried, maar er was hier zoveel moois te zien dat we geen haast hadden.

We gingen natuurlijk nog met een gondelbaan de bergen in.

Wauw, wat waren we daar hoog! En wat een ijskoud meertje, waarin Fera uitgleed. Gelukkig is ze wel een bikkel en was het tropisch warm, dus we gingen vrolijk door. Nóg hoger zouden we. Door de velden met de duizenden bloemen en vlinders, bladerbootjes laten varen in een bergstroompje, griezelen bij de steile helling. Awesome! Ik kan er geen beter woord voor bedenken.

En verder ging de tocht. Op naar Frankrijk!

heartfelt

I was looking for a nice way to learn Bible passages by heart and discovered this website: www.bijbelinbeeld.blogspot.com

(The blog happens to be from one of my former colleagues, isn't that fun!?)

We started right away and it seems to be a succes! We enjoy it, used signs to help, and the first passage is in our hearts:  "Laat het veld van vreugde opspringen met al wat erin is; dan zullen alle bomen van het woud vrolijk zingen voor het aangezicht van de Heere. Psalm 96 vers 12 en 13"

We've placed our 'Bible Plate' (Bijbelbord) on our dining table, and it offers nice opportunities to practise the passage and talk about the meaning. So in the past week we talked about how God's creation honours and praises him, by simply being there and doing what it is created for. And in this way we can also praise God: being the person God made us to be and living a God-centred life.

Homeschooling approaches

Although every 'homeschool' is unique, several 'standard' styles of home education can be distinguished. Below I will mention some, to give an idea of the many opportunities there are.

• School-at-home: most often portrayed in the media, because it is so easy to understand. Families who follow this approach often buy a boxed curriculum with text books, study schedules, grades and record keeping.


• Unit studies: using a child's interest in different subject areas like math, reading, spelling, science, art, and history. For example, if your child likes dinosaurs, you would learn history about the dinosaurs' period, you learn geography about where they lived,  you read books about fossils, you write stories about ancient times, etc.  This home education method recognizes the fact that people learn best when they are interested in a certain topic.


• Relaxed or Eclectic Homeschooling: Eclectic means, chosing the best, and that is what most homeschoolers do. They use a little of this and a little of that, using certain workbooks for math, reading and writing, and taking an unschooling approach for other subjects.


• Unschooling: Also known as natural, interest-led or child-led learning. Unschoolers learn from everyday lif experiences and don't use formal lessons or school schedules. Founder of the unschooling movement is schoolteacher John Holt. According to him there is no difference between living and learning.


• Classical homeschooling: This method began in the Middle Ages and was used by some of the greatest minds in history and its goal is to teach people how to learn for themselves. The five tools or learning, also known as the Trivium, are reason, record, research, relate and rhetoric.


• Charlotte Mason: Core belief of this method is that children deserve to be respected and that they learn best from real-life situations. Children should be given time to play, create, and be involved in real-life. Students of the Charlotte Mason method take nature walks, visit art museums, and learn geography, history, and literature from "living books," books that make these subjects come alive. 

So what do we do?

I think we can be called eclectic/relaxed homeschoolers. We use whatever we find appropriate. The ideas of natural learning speak to us, as well as Charlotte Mason's concepts. These approaches exhibit a lot of freedom. We don't use any formal workbooks yet, because our children are still young and don't need them. Maybe later we will.

 

 

RELAXED seems a good word to me

 with a little help from www.homeschool.com

I will kill her with a stone ...

... I beg your pardon?????

We thought we offered our kids only good books. Living books, according to Charlotte Mason. Youth literature, decent picture books, nature study books, and of course the Bible. You would expect they would learn only good things from these books. Especially from the Bible. And of course we don't expose them to violence.

This week Boas returned from preschool and said: Rebekka and I chased all the other kids away. We've said we would kill them!!! I carefully replied (although a bit shocked) that it maybe isn't that nice to kill children? Then he continued. With stones. Just like David did with Goliath!! I couldn't help myself laughing (silently..).

I notice Boas feels at ease at preschool. We notice he outgrows it. He needs more challenges. He is one of the oldest kids now, and together with his best friend Rebekka I believe they sometimes act like little terrorists... Only four times.. then it's over for him (and from February 18 on it will  be Fera's turn).

And regarding Goliath, maybe it's time to do some craft, like we did with the kids in Suriname, way back!!

Obedience

More and more, I discover that you learn at best when there is full attention and complete obedience. Seems logical, but is not always easy. Because obedience requires from us consistent behaviour and sometimes I just don't want to be consistent and consistent and consistent... Sometimes I just want to do my own thing, without being distracted by behaviour that I need to correct immediately... 

What inspired me the last time:

Raising Godly Tomatoes; Loving Parenting With Only Occasional Trips to the Woodshed written by L. Elizabeth Krueger. (see: www.raisinggodlytomatoes.com, with lots of other useful upbringing articles).

Charlotte Mason, about whom I probably will tell more later, has written a lot about raising and educating children. She includes obedience in education. Literally she says 'Education is a discipline - that is, the discipline of the good habits in which the child is trained. Education is a life, nourished upon ideas; and education is an atmosphere - that is, the child breathes the atmosphere emanating from his parent; that of the ideas which rule their own lives'. (see: www.simplycharlottemason.com, where you can buy books or download (some free) e-books that are based on her ideas.

'How to talk so kids will listen and listen so kids will talk' and 'Siblings without rivalry' written by Adele Faber and Elaine Mazlish. These are books that focus on how to communicate with your kids. They aim to bring about more cooperation from children than all the yelling and pleading in the world.

And the website http://aolff.org/sermons/kindness-vs-obedience , which focusses on godly behaviour and obedience through a living and godly example of the parents.