Valedictorian Speech

Here is my Valedictorian Speech. Hope you like it!

Good evening, thank you all for coming tonight. It is an honor and privilege to stand and speak in front of you this evening. To my classmates I would just like to say how amazing these past few years have been. Life just wouldn’t be the same if I hadn’t met you guys. Thank you for that. I’d also like to thank God for the opportunity to attend such a wonderful school. I’ve learned so much over the years. St. Paul not only teaches you math, science, language, reading and social studies, St. Paul also teaches its students good morals and values; about being our best and respecting others. Most importantly they teach us about God. About His love for us, how much he cares for us, and how he died for us. The teachers at St. Paul also set the standards high. Sometimes they may seem a bit too much but they only do that because they expect our best efforts and know that we all have the potential to succeed. Their faith and belief in each of their students is just another great quality of this school.
With everything said about the great teachers, I would like to take a moment and personally thank every teacher that helped us make it this far. They are: Mrs. Pacilli, Ms. Koewn, Mrs. Hennrich, Mrs. Easley, Mrs. Sherrill, Mrs. Bishop, Mrs. King, Mrs. Judge, Mrs. Revoir, Mrs. Smith, Mr. Sherrill, Mrs. Johnson, and Mr. G. They made our journey through St. Paul so much more enjoyable, fun, and meaningful. THANK YOU for that. There are also a few other people that should be mentioned: Mr. Joe for the great coaching and all the times he’s had to clean up after us; Mrs. Rickus for every scrape she’s put a band-aid on, every headache she’s medicated, and every paper she’s copied; Mrs. Woods and Mrs. Province for the numerous school lunches they have cooked for us; Mrs. Voglesang for all the times she’s had to clean up after us also, Mrs. Hovis for teaching us the value of reading, Mrs. Towler for teaching us the value of music, and Mrs. Gierse for keeping us in shape.
As we stand before you all now and we finally graduate, there is only one question left in our minds: Do we make you proud? Have we done enough, said enough, become enough to make you proud of us? Parents? Teachers? Friends and other family? Are you proud of us? This past week one song keeps playing in my mind. Some of the lyrics go like this:
I've never been the one to raise my hand,
That was not me and now that's who I am
Because of you I am standing tall,
My heart is full of endless gratitude,
You were the one, the one to guide me through,
Now I can see and I believe it's only just beginning
This what we dream about
But the only question with me now
Is do I make you proud?
Stronger than I've ever been NOW
Never been afraid of standing out
But do I make you proud?
I hope that we do make you proud. I hope that each one of the teachers that helped and encouraged us along the way are proud to say, ‘I taught those kids.’ I hope every parent in the room is able to stand tall, and stand by their children and say with pride, “This is my child. I am proud of him or her.” The same with all the friends and family members. I know we’re proud of our accomplishments and we’ve worked hard to earn them.
Our journey to this moment hasn’t always been easy. No one ever said that it would be though. Along the way we’ve had some bumps and bruises and low and hard times. But they all have on thing in common: they brought us closer. Yes, sometimes we may have fought or gotten in an argument but we always got through it. We realized what we were fighting over was a small matter, so we let it go, forgave each other, and kept moving forward. There were other times though, that hit us harder. There were some really difficult situations; both personal and as a class. At the time, the situations were awful, almost unbearable. But we all came together as a class and worked through our problems. We encouraged and comforted each other. The end result? A stronger and more mature class. Looking back today, I’m almost thankful for those hard times. Those times are what helped shape us into who we are today. Every time we overcame a problem a little piece of who we are fell into place. So, if trading those bad times for some happier times meant losing who my classmates are today…I wouldn’t do it. These people sitting here, whom I’ve grown up with, have become some amazing people. I wouldn’t trade them for the world.
So, as the year has wrapped up and we’ve come to the end, all of us eighth graders have realized just what we’ve taken for granted all these years; all of the fun activities that won’t be the same at public school such as chapel services and National Lutheran Schools Week. We’ve also begun to look back and remember all the good times we’ve experienced and how quickly all the years flew by. The things we’ve enjoyed everyday without even noticing it have become cherished events. We realize now that nothing can truly last forever. Even though we may be leaving St. Paul physically, it doesn’t mean that we’ll be leaving it emotionally. With all of the memories, experiences, life lessons, and friends we’ve made, it would be impossible to leave St. Paul all together. The people that I’ve called classmates for the past 8 years are no longer just classmates; they’re family. Even though leaving here is incredibly hard, it is inevitable and the necessary next step for us all to take.
For the kindergartners here today it is the beginning of a new chapter in their lives. For the 8th graders, it’s the end of that same chapter we began 8 years ago. But it doesn’t stop there for us. We’ll all move on to high school and begin yet another chapter. We may move into a different setting with different people but we’ll always remember St. Paul; all the things we learned, the people we met, and the memories that we made.
I pray that as we all go to high school we’ll always remember that most important thing St. Paul taught us about. I hope we never forget how much God cares about us. About how He’s always there for us. Just like it says in Isaiah 41:10, “So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.” I hope we’ll always trust and put our faith in God. To rely on him and seek his guidance. So…congratulations St. Paul class of ’08! WE MADE IT!!!!!

It's All from Your Perspective

You wake up and look in the mirror. There, glaring at you is a huge zit. You freak out, you can't go to school, your life is over. You determined to stay home today, not even world war III is going to get you out of there. Then you get a phone call from a friend, co-worker, or family member and you whole perspective changes. That little pimple on your forehead is now nothing compared to your friend, co-worker, or family member's problem. You pick yourself up out of bed, get dressed, and are out the door. That pimple means nothing to you now.

I'm sure you've had one of these days. You have a problem and suddenly life is miserable for you. Then you take one quick look outside your own world and realize its nothing compared to the real world around you. Now, I'm not saying you don't have serious, big problems (you know who you are. Just Kidding! :-P ) but..sometimes...you're "Goliath" is somebody else's speck of dust. There's hunger, AIDS, war, poverty, and the list goes on and on. But not only is it world wide, it's locally too. It can be even closer than that with friends and family. Sometimes you don't even know they're hurting, and here you are going on about that zit on you're forehead when they're breaking inside from a divorce, death, illness, or so on. Sometimes its best to take a minute and look at life from other's perspectives and not just our own. Sometimes...It can make a world of difference.

So...before you start freaking out over that pimple...think of that other person's Goliath. I know it gave me a perspective check today.

I'm Back! Sorta

Hey! I'm back! Sorta.... I'm with Kayla (www.aheartlikedavid.blogspot.com) I got tired of looking at the same blog every time I signed in. But anywho..I've been thinking and thinking and trying to find something to write about but I've come up short. And then I tried writing some more one-shots and have a story started but...I have yet to finish it. So...I am working on starting up my posting again...hang in there! Most likely my next post will be a one-shot but...then again..who knows..I may have another sort of inspiration. So stayed tuned! The best is yet to come! (or so they say...)

~*BLOG ON!*~
!BLOGGERGIRL!

Light Through the Madness

As many people around my area know, we have had some MAJOR rain and some MAJOR effects. Quite a bit of flooding has been going on. If you drove down by the park and soccer fields yesterday you would know how bad it got. I know many people weren't exactly excited to get all the rain and flooding, I know I wasn't exactly enthralled. With water leaking into the basement and having to use a shop vac to get it up wasn't exactly my idea of a good time. But, anyhow, back to my point.
Today as the rain continued to pour down for the probably the 30th hour straight, something happened. It started to SNOW! And I'm not just talking these little flurries or whatever, I'm talking BIG snow flakes! Thankfully we had a substitute today (yes, I was one of the "lucky" ones who got to go to school today) and she took us outside for a quick minute. As we got outside we realized it wasn't really snow, it was more like slush falling from the sky. It was the wettest snow I have ever felt. We all returned back into the classroom and continued our work. As I looked down at the red hooded sweatshirt I was wearing today I saw all of the rain/snow drops that were still clinging on. I began to wipe them away but stopped. One dropped looked a lot like blood. I checked my wrist, I wasn't bleeding. I then realized it was because my sweatshirt was red that it made it looked like blood. It reminded me of something. It reminded me of the blood that Jesus shed on the cross for our sins. It was so amazing to me how symbolic it all was. There I was covered in the "blood" of Jesus, and then I looked out the window and realized the whole reminder went one step further. It was snowing. Because I am I covered in the blood of Jesus Christ, I am washed as white as snow. It was just so awesome how even through all of this flooding and crazy weather, God was able to use it as an opportunity to teach me something through it. He used the whole thing as kind of a reminder of what this weekend is about. All of this flooding is so symbolic of Him washing away all of our impurities, all of our dirt, and sins. Then with my slushy snow and "blood" symbol. So, for all those affected by this is some way. Think of it as a blessing. As a message from God. I think He's just preparing us for Easter weekend in the most memorable way there is.

Never Alone

Okay, so I thought I would go ahead and post this one-shot I wrote (In case you're wondering, a one-shot is a short story, very short, in fact, what you see written here is the entire story.) I wrote it awhile back. Hopefully you guys think it's alright.

Never Alone
A One-Shot

An icy, stinging rain poured down all around her. She pulled her coat tighter around her frail, thin body but it didn’t help. Nothing helped anymore. She had no one who cared about her and nowhere to go. She felt so helpless, so alone. She was one in a crowd of millions; she was invisible.
Her breath came out in short quick puffs. She watched as her breath formed quickly into a little cloud and just as quickly dissipate. Her whole body shook as she cried. Her tears were lost; mixed in with the rain running down her face. Her clothes felt heavy, her shoes sloshed with every step.
She stumbled and fell into the flooding streets. She didn’t even bother to exert any of the little energy she had left to pick herself up. She lay there shaking. Her entire body stung with cold biting at her. She felt panicked but relaxed at the same time. It would be over soon. She wasn’t in the physical condition to live much longer. Her eyelids grew heavy, and her head felt light. She slowly let her eyelids relax until her eyes were fully closed.
She felt herself drifting off when she heard a voice. At first she thought she had just dreamed it and ignored it. Then it came again. She felt someone’s hand on her shoulder. She gradually rolled over and saw a man looking at her.
“Why are you just laying here, Jessica?” He asked.
How does he know my name? She wondered. She didn’t respond but instead just looked up at Him puzzled.
He gently lifted her onto her feet.
“It’s going to be alright,” He said.
“Who are you?” She asked. The first words she had been able to speak since her encounter with this man.
He looked at her lovingly. “I know you better than you know yourself, Jessica. I was there the day you were born and every day since then. You are mine.”
Under normal circumstances she would have felt worried and frightened. For some reason though, she felt extremely calm and at peace.
“I love you Jessica,” He said. “I love you more than you know. I died for you.”
Suddenly Jessica was in awe. She knew who He was. He knew she had made the realization. He embraced her in a hug. She cried on His shoulder because she knew soon it really would be over. Her pain and suffering was about to cease and eternal life and joy was awaiting her.
“Just have faith and follow me,” He said. And she did.

The Lake View

Me and a couple of my good friends went to the lake in FredTown...(i had no idea we had a lake...lol) and it was absolutely amazing!! It was so beautiful! And we got a good workout in the process!! I definitely recommend going down there sometime if you haven't been already.

Student Life Tour '08

Okay here is my long overdue blog about Student Life Tour '08. I'll try not to leave anything out.
Alright, so we left on Friday afternoon at about 2 o'clock. We drove for about 2 hours when the unexpected happened. We blew a tire while driving down the highway. When this happened we were next to a really big truck, I think an 18-wheeler. There was a loud POP! and then we served over and then Dave Ruhman, (the best bus driver ever!) managed to get the bus back into our lane and then off onto the shoulder. So, there's a school bus on the side of the road, with 40 kids and Life Group leaders in it. Jeremiah and some of the other adults managed to get a hold of someone to come fix the tire. The high school bus took the high-schoolers to an eating stop and then came back for us. Looking back, it was probably quite a sight. 40 kids and some adults, walking along the side of the highway and then up the hill to the overpass and onto a school bus. It was quite the adventure. The bus took us to where the high-schoolers were and we all ate dinner. We were back on the road at about 6:45-7:00. We were going to be late for the conference.
We reached the conference at about 8:45 or 9:00. That left only 1 hour of that night's session. We managed to slip in for music and that was it. We all headed back to our hotels and then got some sleep. In all it totaled to about 5 hours of sleep. Then we got up ate breakfast and headed to the church for the morning session. Then we ate lunch and went back for the afternoon session. The speaker, David Platt, was PHENOMENAL! While I was ready to head home at that point, I was also sad to see it end.
We headed off once again for another 5 hours of driving. We stopped along the way to eat some dinner. We reached Jackson and decided to stop and get some gas. They filled it up and Dave got back into the bus and tried to turn the bus on. Nothing. He tried again. Nothing. The bus wouldn't start. We had to get someone to help and like...jump start the bus or whatever it is they did. They managed to get the bus going and we headed off again although we knew the bus ride home could and would be tricky. To begin with, it was dark, rainy, foggy, our headlights barely worked, and we were on curvy back roads. On top of that we were running on the bus's low battery. We were about 10 miles away from Fredericktown when I heard Dave tell two of the small group leaders to pray. He said our battery was running really low. One of them got up and lead us all in prayer. Then we were told not to talk so we wouldn't fog up the windows or anything and Dave had to turn off everything he possibly could. He had to turn off his wind shield wipers, defogger, heating, everything. People were getting up and wiping windows for him when the windows began to fog up bad. I sat there in that bus seat and prayed and prayed that we would make it home safely. We came up on Calvary Temple and Dave goes, "Praise God, we made it." And we all began to cheer. I had never been so happy to see Fredericktown in my life. We pulled into the parking lot of the church and I was off the bus in a heartbeat. In fact, I probably won't get on another bus for a long time.
But let me just say this. You can read my story and think, "Oh my goodness! That had the worst luck! Their trip was probably awful!" and come off with a negative perspective. Or, you can find God in this story. It was God that pulled us away from the truck to safety. He was with Dave, our bus driver, and the driver of that truck next to us. The truck next to us was able to swerve at the right time so that we didn't hit him. Had he not moved, it may not have turned out so well. Thanks be to God for getting us through that situation safely. When the bus wouldn't start, when we were on those dangerous, curvy, back roads, when the battery almost died on us, God was there. God was with us and taking care of us, and God got our little old rickety bus home to Fredericktown. I thank God for this past weekend and all that He showed me through our tricky bus situations.
At first I was beginning to have second thoughts about going on the trip at all. I began to fear that I wouldn't make it that far away from home. I stood in the parking lot of the church before the trip with my dad and he told me I had to make a choice. I stood there unable to decide. And then, with the strength only God could have given me, I turned around and walked into the church building. Then getting onto the buses I almost decided to go over to the office where my mother was and just stay with her but I got on that bus with God helping me the whole way. After our tire incident I began to wonder if going on this trip was a mistake but as the weekend went along it was made clear to me that it was no mistake, no accident, and there are no regrets now. I thank God for giving me the strength to go on that trip and for those bus situations. (weird I know but bear with me) Through those tough times, God was able to show me that He was always there with me and that He is strong enough to overcome anything. His strength was made perfect in our weaknesses with the bus. So don't take negative things away from this story, take positive God things away from this. Maybe its time for you to get on the bus and let God show you just how strong He is and how much He cares for you.