A Week of Ups & Downs!!!

I am not sure where to begin! :-)  It was an up, down, up, down, up week for me at ICS-Pyeongtaek! I guess I will begin with Sunday when I had the privilege of meeting up with my friend from way back in my senior year in high school.  During that year, we were privileged to have Eiji Takano as our foreign exchange student at Chambersburg Are Senior High School.  Eiji was always so kind!  A couple years ago we connected with each other on Facebook.  We started writing back and forth and catching up.  He told me his son, Hidehiko, was moving to Seoul to take a position for his company near Itaewon.  A couple weeks ago, Eiji wrote to me and said that he and his wife would be in Seoul October 8 - 12 visiting Hidehiko.  They were wondering if I could meet them in Seoul for a reunion dinner.  I was able to readjust my schedule to travel to Seoul after church last Sunday to meet Eiji, his wife, and Hidehiko!  It had been 49 years since we had seen each other face-to-face!  It was a very special reunion!

Here we are at Glucks Schwein restaurant near Seoul Station.  This was a new restaurant for me and it obviously specializes in pork!  We had a great time of food and fellowship!  Clockwise starting with GGG: Gregg, Eiji, his wife, Tom Coyner, and Hidehiko!  Yes, Tom Coyner is the father of Ben Coyner from ICS-P!  It is a small world.  I had never met Ben's Dad until Sunday evening.  Tom Coyner is a longtime friend of Eiji!  Eiji asked me if it was OK for him to join us since they had not seen each other in a long time.  It was great to finally meet Ben's Dad.  Ben's mother was down in Pyeongtaek doing "motherly things for Ben" according to Tom! :-)

                   One of the main pork dishes we shared!

And here is another of the main dishes we enjoyed together!     

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I stayed overnight in Itaewon so that I could travel with the Headmaster of YISS, Ray Johnson, to our sister school, International Christian School - Uijeongbu, for our monthly Directors' meeting.  It was my first visit to Uijeongbu and the directors of the three NICS schools in South Korea and the director of the NICS school in Japan (via Skype) enjoyed a great time of fellowship and sharing and praying.  At ICS-Uijeongbu, I was reunited with a new friend I made at the NICS Fall Conference in Singapore.  The Business Manager of ICS-U is Jim Woo.  We made a connection at the conference and Jim was the first person who greeted us when we arrived at ICS-U!  It was another special reunion.  He and his wife are a very special couple.

Here I am with my new friend, Jim Woo, in the reception area at ICS-Uijeongbu!

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When I returned to ICS-P early Tuesday morning, I was greeted by Tony Kuhn, ES/MS Assistant Principal with some sad news.  Our wonderful T.A. (Teaching Assistant) for grades K and 1 had submitted her 2-week notice. :-(  Mrs. Han has done a great job assisting our Kinder and Grade 1 teachers with their cherubs.  She will be greatly missed.  She leaves a big hole to fill in a very short time.  I would appreciate your prayers as we seek to have a smooth transition for the students and teachers in Kinder and Grade 1.  God has provided all year for us, and already we have a few possibilities, but nothing firm yet.  Your prayers are appreciated!

There are a couple other pressing needs for teachers at ICS-P!  Please join us in praying for the right person to coordinate and teach in our ELD (English Language Development) program.  We need a Librarian by January to take over for our current Librarian, April Mooney, who is expecting a little one in January.  We are in urgent need of an ELD Teacher/Coordinator!  That person could begin immediately!  Since it is not quite as easy to hire someone at an international school (a lot of paperwork must be completed for NICS as well as South Korea), we are urgently praying for the correct persons for these positions.  We have two we are considering, but cannot do any official interviewing until all of their paperwork is complete.  (This is one of the areas that I was "down" about this past week.)

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Tuesday evening I was invited to the home of Ross and Renee Sortore for a yummy meal and great fellowship!  This is the up I needed after the news on Tuesday.  Ross teaches Science at ICS-P to mainly HS students, but he has one period each day where he does an interactive Science experiment/project with our Kindergarten through Grade 4 classes.  The kids love it!  Tuesday evening I enjoyed meeting officially the three Sortore children and enjoying a great time of conversation and laughter over a very delicious meal!

After a very tasty dinner, we posed for a "Weefie" in the Sortores'

                       living room!  A wonderful evening!

Ross and Renee Sortore with their three beautiful children!      

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Another "down" this week has been the numerous cases of students and teachers who have been sick. Most of the sickness has been with respiratory-related illnesses.  Numerous students were in and out of school.  Our HS Principal, Charlie Mooney, picked up what his daughter had.  Charlie has had a very difficult time of recovering from his respiratory illness.  He has had several IVs at the hospital, but they can't seem to isolate the problem.  Charlie was only in this past week for an hour or two.  He would value your prayers.  In addition to Charlie's sickness, Mr. Hannings was sick (only out of school one day) and several other teachers have been fighting off colds, sore throats, coughs, etc.  We all could use your prayers.

Here is Charlie Mooney at the hospital for his third IV on Saturday.  Thanks for praying for him.

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Since Charlie was out sick, one "up" event was the opportunity to do some sharing in MS/HS Chapel! I really enjoyed the opportunity that Charlie and Ricky Hannings gave me to share with some of the HS teachers in Chapel on Tuesday morning.  We had a wonderful discussion of the will of God especially in the lives of MS and HS students.  The students had some excellent questions; so many that we did not have sufficient time to address all of them.  That gives the teachers many opportunities to follow up with some great conversations!  Please pray for them!

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Wednesday afternoon was another "up" for me!  Mrs. Cho, our Kindergarten teacher, had asked me to come to her class and read the new book, The Day the Crayons Came Home, to her cherubs.  She had read The Day the Crayons Quit, the first of these "crayon" books by Drew Daywalt on Tuesday and wanted me to read the sequel on Wednesday.  I always love reading to any group of children - even those who are over 60!  Reading to children is always great medicine for me.  The only problem with this book was that it was a bit long for some of the cherubs.  One of them fell asleep on me! :-) Other than the sleeper, I had a captive audience. :-)

GGG reading to the Kinder cherubs on Wednesday!

GGG still reading.  If you look at the little girl on

 the far left of the picture, you can almost see her

                  dropping off to sleepland! :-)

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Thursday was a mix of "ups" and "downs!" ;-) Mr. Hannings and Mr. Mooney were out with sickness and we did not have enough available subs from our Sub List so I agreed to substitute for Mr. Hannings' Kinder ELD class.  It would have been an "up" experience except Mr. Garman thought it would be OK to have these cherubs meet in the Library during a regular Library class with Grade 2. BIG mistake! :-)  I am soooo glad no one had a video camera available as I attempted to teach these low-level English speakers a little English!  (It would have gone viral on the Internet and caused a great deal of laughter.)  I made it through, but I told Mr. Hannings that I would never teach that class in the Library when there was another class in there.  :-)

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Thursday evening I went home feeling really down.  After subbing in Kinder ELD, I discovered that ICS-P was going to have not one member of the Home Office staff coming to ICS-P in November, but four!  I didn't know how we were going to be able to handle accommodations, etc.  So after sending emails out to those who were planning to come at the same time, I went home and ate a sandwich and then got my Bible and was about to read a certain passage I was going to use for staff devotions on Friday.  Before working on that, I decided to look at Facebook.  Our HS Principal, Mr. Mooney, had posted a short video clip entitled The Messiah (Cartoon Animation) that gave a wonderful telling of the Gospel and the amazing redemptive narrative of the Scripture and how Jesus Christ put to death Satan forever at the cross.  Here is that clip.  (You may have to copy and paste the link below into your web browser if it does not automatically take you to the location.  I have been having trouble placing links in my posts.  It says that is working but when I preview it, it doesn't often.  Must be doing something wrong.)  Here is the link.  I hope you will be able to see it - one way or another.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n_FAbUKZc2w

As I watched it, I was drawn to the passage in 1 Corinthians 15:54 - 58!  Here is what I read:

"When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: ' Death has been swallowed up in victory.  Where, O death, is your victory?  Where, O death, is your sting?'

The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. BUT thanks be to God!  He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Therefore, my dear brothers, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain."

As I read this, I knew I thanked the Lord for His finished work and knew what I needed to share for staff devotions on Friday.  Jesus Christ has each one of us at ICS-P there for a reason - the main reason being that we are to let students and families know that although Satan is at work, Jesus Christ has finished the work and we are to stand firm and give ourselves fully to the work at ICS-P, even through the "ups" and "downs" directing young people to the one who can change their lives.

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Friday was a wonderful day!  Things worked out with the Home Office staff coming.  Adjustments were made by them and us!  We have some leads of a few persons who might be open to filling some of our needed positions!  There is still lots to be done and a lot to work through, but He is in control; NOT me!

And one more "up"date from Mr. Coyner.  Many of you have been praying for him and his tongue cancer.  On Friday, Ben went to his doctors to have a check up on the first round of chemotherapy. Here is what he had to report on a fb post to our staff, family, and friends:

"PRAISE! The Chemo Doctor believes that my cancer tumor has shrunk after 1st round of chemotherapy, so there is a  very good chance of strong recovery by next month after a 2nd round of chemo!

a 3rd round of chemo and perhaps radiotherapy to try to eliminate the tumor. If chemo is extremely effective, then no surgery will be needed!

Original chemotherapy effectiveness probability was 30-35%, so God has shown favor to me! I feel very blessed to have had so many prayers!"

Mr. Coyner - after his checkup on Friday!  He is wearing his LA Dodgers' cap.  It made him a little happier when his team moved on in the Baseball Playoffs! :-)

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OK, I better stop for this week.  I trust that you are doing well.  I always love hearing from you - when you have a few minutes.  Thanks so much for your faithful love, encouragement, emails, mail, prayers, and support.

Love, Gregg