Another Week

Another week in the life—in the life of a school. The life of Amano.

Worship

This past Sunday we held our first Family Worship Service of the New Year. It seemed fitting that we would begin the year with a focus on the love of God, for what could be more of a starting point than this most central aspect of the Christian faith?
During the service, Mr. Philip Grove spoke of how love is “only experienced as love is returned,” and of how God is grieved when His people reject the love He extends to us. Our goal here at Amano is to receive the love of God, and to return that love by demonstrating our obedience to God, living in a way that pleases Him.
In this Family Worship Service, I am quite certain that God was looking down upon us with pleasure. For in addition to the message from Mr. Grove, we had our first appearance of the Secondary School Choir, to lead us in the songs: “Beautiful One,” “The Love of God,” “O the Deep Deep Love of Jesus,” and other congregational hymns. We also had the delight of hearing the ladies of the choir performing a lovely acappela version of “I Sing a Simple Song of Love,” displaying their clear gift of melodies, and of harmonies.

Great results!

In other news, this past week brought the returned results from last year’s grade 12 IGCSE exams. It is no exaggeration to say that we have much to be proud of here—a straight A-star performance from one young man, for example! Yes, we are proud of, and we congratulate, these hard-working young men and women.

New Staff

We are also enjoying the new staff members who have joined us this term: Miss Ruth, from Canada, and Mr. Simon, from Germany. Both are here to work in the dorms, Miss Ruth with the girls’ and Mr. Simon with the boys’. We heartily welcome them, and we are already grateful for all their hard work and their helpful spirits.
Once more, thank you all for joining us in our Amano walk of life.

And so it has begun again. With the amount of time I have now spent in the boarding school environment, it really should not surprise me; yet still I find myself amazed at the whirlwind that life is during this start-of-term period. Yes, the term has begun—and not just that, but the new year has begun . . . has begun with gusto!
In the midst of the bustle, I think the challenge for us staff-teachers, dorm workers, and support staff alike—is to pay attention to the moments, and not to let the significance of the small things pass us by because of the urgency of the things needing to be done.
For some of us, these moments come in the classroom . . .
Perhaps the first day of lectures, with all our professionalism rallied up. We plan our lessons, rehearse our scripts, take our notes, and begin as planned—on schedule—with the intended learning of the term. But then a student walks in, sees you there, and with the surprise recognition of one who did not expect you as his teacher, greets you with a quietly proper, “Good morning Miss . . .”
And you stop, take aback by the flood of emotions that comes when you do not realize how much you’ve missed these children until you see a smiling face. The script for introductions in that class is forgotten as you stop to reply. But no matter, for you know that the things of importance have just overtaken the things of urgency . . .
We each have these reminders, suited to whatever our particular school roles may be. And we pray for the wisdom to pay attention to them, and to take them to heart as the nudges from God that they are!
That said, classes have begun! Along with them, we have already gotten fully involved in the athletics and the school. This past weekend we had our first football match here, as it was a home game. What fun it was to get to cheer on both our womens’ and our mens’ teams as they both soundly defeated the opponents from Lechwe! (Pictures here are from these matches)
In the sermon this past Sunday, our local pastor spoke of God as a “promise keeper.” He talked of how He is a faithful God, who will be there is we seek Him. Here at Amano we long to be truly seeking after our God, and encouraging the students to do the same, or lifting them up as they do. So we welcome prayers as we begin this year’s adventures, and we welcome you to join with us, and to follow the adventures alongside us!

AMANO CHRISTMAS CONCERT 3rd December 2010
The end of the school year at Amano was marked by a new beginning. This was the moment when the new multi-purpose hall made its debut as a venue for the Christmas concert which took place on the last day of term, enabling both primary and secondary students to join together with families and friends to celebrate this point in the life of the school.
It has to be said that the hall is not yet finished, which we were reminded of when the dress rehearsal was taking place on the previous day and the rain came through the open windows. However, it was a significant moment to see the hall filling up with so many people and to realise what has been achieved over the last year or two as this hall has gradually taken shape. There were a lot of technical difficulties to sort out along the way, which is inevitable when something like this is used for the very first time, but these were all overcome by the time the concert began.
The first part of the concert included a performance by the lower primary classes of a musical play called ‘Tinsel and Teatowels’. It told the story of a school which was preparing a Christmas nativity play while the school inspectors were in to check on how the school was getting on (something I have often experienced when teaching at schools in England). The grade 4 & 5 students took on the roles of the inspectors, teachers, and even headmaster, as they organised the younger students ready for their performance for Christmas. As the title suggests, there was a lot of time given to the ‘wrapping paper’ of Christmas which many get caught up in at this time of year, but the play in the end pointed clearly towards the more important part of Christmas, the birth of Jesus.
The older primary students performed a musical play called ‘Papa Panov’, which some of you might know as ‘Martin the Shoe Maker’. Papa Panov, in the story, is a shoe maker who had his own shop. On Christmas Eve, Papa Panov read some of the Christmas story from the Bible and then dreamt that night that Jesus would come to visit him in his shop on Christmas Day. We then saw how his Christmas day unfolded as Papa Panov tried to get ready for the visit of Jesus but kept on being interrupted by various visitors who were coming past his shop that day. So we saw the gentle woman and her two children, one of whom had no shoes to wear. Well, Papa felt he had to do something to help them and gave the child a pair of shoes which he had made earlier and which he had had in mind to give to Jesus, when he arrived. He also gave them a room to sleep in rather than send them back onto the street on such a cold day. Then a group of street children came visiting, glad of Papa Panov’s welcome and even more excited when he offered them some sweets and cakes. He made them work, though, as they struggled to pronounce his name and he played a game with them (in the form of a funny song) to help them learn how to say it. I don’t think they ever managed it, but they still got their sweets anyway! Once they had gone, a group of three road sweepers knocked on his door hoping for some warm refreshments. They also did their best to cheer up a rather disappointed Papa Panov, performing a lively dance complete with brooms to attempt to lighten his mood.
All of which led up to the final scene in which Papa Panov first of all expressed his great sadness that Jesus had not visited him on Christmas Day, as he had promised, and then the voice of Jesus explains that he had visited after all, in the form of the visitors which he had welcomed into his shop. ‘Whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did it for me’.
The last performance came from the secondary drama group. This looked at the overall Bible message and challenged some of the arguments people have for rejecting the Gospel. It also included a performance of a song made famous by Casting Crowns, called ‘While you are sleeping’ which highlights the world’s tendency to become complacent even though time is running out.
As well as these pieces of drama, the flautists played several pieces, some of the secondary students performed ‘Mary, did you know?’ and the audience were encouraged to join in with a number of Christmas carols. Everyone was also invited to sing along to the new school song, ‘Wisdom Seekers’.
With that concert and its clear reminder of what Christmas should really be about, the school year for 2010 came to an end. There were a number of primary students for whom it was their last day at Amano, as they are transferring to other schools in South Africa, so I would like to think that the concert and the preparations for it have left them with some happy memories of their last days at Amano. It has done so for me, as I also take my leave after two years of teaching there.
As I write my final entry for the Amano blog, I would like to encourage you to keep on praying for the school, its staffing and financial needs, the clarity of vision that is so vital if the school is to achieve its purpose, and that the students may welcome the opportunity they have there to both hear about Jesus and to get to know Him for themselves. One of my happiest memories of the last week of term is when the primary students in assembly sang a rousing version of ‘The greatest day in history’ by Tim Hughes. It is one which we have often sung together and there is something quite uplifting when we join together on the chorus:
‘Oh, happy day, happy day, you washed my sins away!
Oh, happy day, happy day, I’ll never be the same-
Forever I am changed!’

Have a joyful Christmas and a blessed New Year!
Written by Martin Smith