Hello TOW Hawaii Ohana.
My name is Joni. I give all glory, honor and praise to my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ for blessing me with the opportunity to attend the Transform Our World Global Conference. It was an amazing experience! My goal for attending the conference was to build my relationship with God so that I could understand His plans for me. I wanted to partner with Holy Spirit to guide me so that I could teach in the Spirit and not so much in my own strength. I know God has plans for me to minister to my students as a Kindergarten Teacher but I didn’t quite know how to bring more of Him into my classroom. After hearing Pastor Allen Cardines talk about the core values of ALOHA, I understood that these are the Kingdom values that I can teach to express God’s love with actions.
I had a substitute the day before our Fall break and a very serious incident occurred. So I knew coming back the day after the conference was not going to be easy because I had 2 students who were worried, hurt, and scared. I also had parents who were not very happy about this incident. I have taught my students to have a sense of unity, belonging and to show love at home, at school and wherever they go. So the core values of Aloha were perfect to reinforce Kingdom values that I wanted to teach.
I also learned from Dean and HollyKem the importance of Spirit, Soul and Body. I knew I had to give a lesson on apologizing (no one admitted to the wrong doing) and forgiving. I usually make a heart and crumple it to show how hurtful actions and words cause the heart to be hurt. But when good things happen, the crumpled heart can feel better. I usually say that the hurt never goes away. However, right before I was going to say that, I heard God say “Don’t say that, it’s not true.” So I got another paper and drew another heart on it. Then I told them that when people apologize for their wrong doing and people forgive, the heart can begin to heal. Then your heart is able to give all the love away. Right after my lesson, the child who was hurt said that she chose to have her heart healed and was ready to forgive. The next day, we got a confession, an apology was made, and forgiveness given. The following week was Parent Teacher Conferences. The parents that were involved in this situation, were very grateful for the lesson taught. I was able to minister to them about the Aloha core values that I am teaching to my students. I was able to share the importance of gratitude and being able to pull out the treasures in their child to build them up to who they were meant to be. I am practicing to do this with my own daughters and extended family members too. After my conferences, I now know that my mission is to minister to my students and parents so that they can live the Kingdom values in their homes as well.
Last Friday, another teacher and I were able to pray to a teacher who was expecting. She had swollen feet and high blood pressure. A day later we found out she had to take maternity leave early and was on bed rest. I sent her some scriptures and worship songs. She downloaded the Bible App and used it during her very long labor and had worship music playing during her delivery. She was very grateful for the prayers and thanked me for helping to find her way back to God. Praise God for giving me a vision to work towards and for working through me to minister to everyone at my school, my own family and church family as well. Hallelujah!