God Rewards Perseverance

My last post was "Where does the time go?" because I only wrote twice in February.  Now March has flewn by and I've only wrote one post, and it's April and I have been working on this one for a week.  Time does fly by but this month I know where the time has gone!  On SPEECH!!  It has been an amazing month with God doing way more than we could imagine (Eph. 3:20).  All I have to say is that God is SO faithful to bless us when we don't expect it!!!  About a week ago we came home from San Diego totally blessed beyond belief - everything about the trip was a blessing, but in particular God rewarded our perseverance.

 

Brandon and Brittany are a part of a speech class called Touche.  It is a homeschool group of students learning how to speak comfortably in front of anyone!  It is Brandon's third year and Brittany's second.  Each year in March our group puts on a Speech Tournament called the Santa Rosa Classic and it's where the students in speech compete against others performing the same type of speech.  The last two years Brandon has done a duo, which is a speech with another person where they interpret some type of literature.  In their speech they use drama and humor to interpret their story.  The two partners can't look at each other or touch each other, so it's challenging.  The first year, Brandon performed a rendition of his favorite cartoon, Calvin and Hobbs, with his friend Justin.  They did a great job and it was very cute, but they did not advance with it at the tournament.  I was so pleased that Brandon just did something that year that challenged him.  Last year, Brandon performed a duo of the Wizard of Oz with his friend Lanea.  He was mainly the scarecrow and she was Dorthy.  They did an excellent job with it and I felt that he was even challenged more, but they also did not advance at the tournament.  It built character though - more confidence and perseverance. 

Last year was Brittany's first year, and she decided to do a duo with her cousin Kasey.  We picked the children's book "Hubert's Hair Raising Adventure" by Bill Peet.  It's an adorable, funny book and it rhymed throughout.   When they first started it, they were not animated and they looked scared to death.  After they practiced many hours, the final result was amazing and they were wonderful!  They too did not advance at the tournament but they built character - confidence and perseverance. 

This year we decided to have Brandon and Brittany do a duo together so that they could practice anytime that they wanted.  We picked the book, By The Great Horn Spoon, by Sid Fleshman, which is a book on the California gold rush.  It took us half the year to decide on the perfect book and they thought this book had some very funny parts that they could animate!!  So in January, I started cutting parts of the book to make it into a 10 minute speech, and that was quite a difficult job.  After many hours of reading and writing down different parts, we finally picked our favorites.  Then they needed to work on blocking movements and to my surprise they took the piece and did amazing things with it.  They were so creative with their movements and I didn't have to do much at all, besides tell them it either looks good or not!!  The hardest part has been them listening to me and really doing what I ask of them, and the motivation to constantly work on it.  I would constantly get frustrated with them because every time they were working on it they were mostly playing around and laughing trying to figure out blocking.  I would have them do their parts for me and they would forget their lines constantly.  We went to speech class and they couldn't perform it because they kept forgetting their parts.  Because I was so frustrated and discouraged that they weren't on top of their speech, we almost decided not to go to the San Diego Tournament.

When I told Brandon and Brittany that we probably weren't going to San Diego, they gave me the saddest look!!  I prayed for days and realized that we had to go because this may be the only time in their lives that we might do this - they are only this age once! 

The other side of my discouragement was finances and figuring out how we could afford to go, but God took care of every detail of that for me.  We were able to get an amazing two story hotel room on the marina - an upstaris bedroom, downstairs living room, two bathrooms - close to everything we needed.  We got four nights and fifth night free with our hotel points - no cost to us!  We brought all of our food and did all the free things.  And to top it all off, Shelly's cousin was able to get us all FREE tickets to Sea World!  The only thing we spent money on was gas and parking.   God provided!!

God blessed us beyond what we could have imagine in every way on this trip.  We went to the tournament just for the experience of it all, not expecting anything.  Brandon and Brittany performed their speech twice, with mistakes each time, and I was expecting that to be it.  BUT when quarter finals were being annouced at the outside ampatheater, with the sun setting, their names were called!!  SO EXCITING and I felt God's glory shinning down on us!  What an amazing feeling of accomplishment for all of us!!

They went to perform their speech again one more time and then we waited until the next morning to hear if they would move on.   Fully expecting that they wouldn't, only because there were amazing duo speeches, THEY DID!!   They moved on the semi-finals!!  So one more time they performed their speech - I didn't watch but I think it was their best performance.  Then we waited for announcements of finals and at this moment I didn't know what to expect because they had done so well - I thought maybe they could make it to finals!!  Although they didn't!  BUT we felt fully satisfied with their performance!

That night we went to the awards ceremony.  They received metals, and they called them in order counting down to number one.  Surprisingly they were number 11 - they were thrilled AND they made it to nationals!  It couldn't have been a happier night!

In everyway God's presence was with us throughout this trip.  He always is anyways, but we were continually blessed beyond what we could have imagined.  He blessed our perseverance!!!

This last weekend was our Speech tournament at Santa Rosa Bible Church.  Brandon and Brittany performed their duo again two times before they were to announce semi-finals.  They didn't want me to watch them this time around because I make them more nervous, but they had MANY friends come to watch them which thrilled Brandon especially.  He thrives on people and I think they did really well because so many people were there to watch them.

Well we were so excited when we heard their names called for semi-finals.  They performed it another time again with a big crowd who came to watch them.  I didn't get to watch them again, but I think it was their best performance because they got two first place and a second place on their ballots for that room.   We waited anxiously to hear if they would make it to finals, and I really thought that they could actually make it.  And they DID!   It was amazing.  It is such a privillege to make it to finals!  And nerve-racking at the same time.  They had to perform their duo on the stage in the sanctuary AND they had to go right after the other duo that did the same book!  They did amazing, but they went a little fast because they were nervous.  We prayed right before they went and I reminded them how amazing it was to be in this position and that the least that they could do was 8th place.  And they even did better than that and got 6th place!  We are so proud of them and thankful to God for rewarding them for their perseverance. 

It has been an amazing month!  Praise be to God!