THE TAYLORS' NEW SCHOOL YEAR :)

As usual, September has brought in some changes and new beginnings into our lives:

*FAMILY AND SCHOOL

- Reuben (7) - our youngest is now in class 1 of primary school at King David's, enjoying himself and enjoyed by teachers and friends.

- Benjamin (11) - is 'taking a sabbatical from school' for his class 5 - meaning it's home education for him this year. With electronic access to his school's everyday activities we can see how fast learning at home goes compared to learning in class, and we are able to do other things as well; like 'nature studies' in the garden (sowing new grass, weeding, etc.) or focusing on the events of September 1939 - much closer to our hearts than all the Ancients of the curriculum must for his year.

- Abigail (13) - along with all her class from primary school, joined by several new young people, she is a proud student of year 1 in King David's junior secondary school (gimnazjum). New subjects, new challanges, new teachers, yet all within good and friendly atmosphere of her old friends and school.

- Sarah (15) - this year is a year of 'lasts' for her - last year of homeschooling and last year of music school. She's in class 3 of junior secondary school (gimnazjum) which finishes with Polish GCSEs at the end of April. An important year of decision-making about future education.

- Hannah (16) - it's all new for her! After 6 years of relaxed 'taking-my-time' home education she's back into  hectic madness of state school system - in class 1 of senior secondary school (liceum) - 3 years preparing for Polish A-Levels before university. Her chosen subjects are history and languages (English and German).

- Dale (50!) - has become a full-time teacher at King David's. He teaches English every day to primary classes 5 and 6 (11 and 12-year-olds) and secondary classes 1 and 2 (13 and 14-year-olds). Also, - new!- he teaches worldview to classes 4, 5, and 6. He enjoys lessons with kids, but hates admin and paperwork that come along with teaching in a school. :)

- Asia (well,ok-43;-)) - for the first time in family history she is a 'proper stay-at-home mum' - meaning no trips to King David's or else at all this year. Supervising Ben and Sarah in their home education, trying to run the home properly, teaching private English classes at home, hoping to do more translation and cross-stitching, :)

KING DAVID'S SCHOOL

 Comprises now of around 140 pupils and students in 3 levels: Nursery (3 years), Primary (6 years), Junior Secondary Gimnazjum (3 years).

This summer King David's moved location and now we are right in the centre of the city. The building is shared with another school and rented from the city council. We have the use of a small gym building opposite as well.

There is also another building in the grounds that the city are willing to let to us if we have the funds to renovate it. The estimated cost would be around 12-15,000 pounds and it would be taken off the future rent if we went for it. The building would be potentially used as a Christian Education Centre in the city. This would give us the possibility to develop our vision for a location for the Outreach Exhibitions I organise based on History, Polish literature and set books, as well as a place for Royal Rangers and other ministries to develop. We'd value prayers about this development!

***

All else continues at Kordeckiego:

- NEW LIFE FELLOWSHIP meeting on Sundays (whole family)

- ROYAL RANGERS on Saturday mornings (all the kids)

- MODEL CLUB on Friday afternoons (Dale with the boys)

- CITHARA SANCTORUM medieval music on Monday Evenings (Dale and Hannah)

- HISTORY EXHIBITIONS for libraries and local schools

The three girls are involved with the pentecostal youth group and a sign-language course for teenagers.

***

Last but not least :)

Blessed as we are that:

-we are safe home

-our old van was dealt with - paid for and gone :)

-King David's new location is closer to us

-public transport is very good

-the nearby Tesco opened a 'you shop we drop' service - especially for us :)

We are nevertheless looking for a new minibus - big enough for the family and for carrying equipment for exhibitions, as well as being more reliable than our last white chariot.. :)

Thank you... and please remember to keep us in your prayers!

Asia, Dale, Hannah, Sarah, Abi, Ben & Reuben ><>

The Taylor Clan

 

The Taylor’s English Summer

The plan:

1. Drive from Poznań to Dorking, spend several days in Dorking, seeing friends and be in St.Paul’s church on Sunday
2. Drive up to Nantwich, Cheshire to spend time with Dale’s family
3. Drive to Lincoln to visit the Baptist church and plan next summer’s teen mission to Poznan
4. Drive back to Poland in the minibus full of stuff: King David’s School uniforms from M&S, yearly supplies of some English specialities, as well as things for different friends of ours …
    
“Many are the plans in a person’s heart, but it is the Lord’s purpose that prevails.” (Prov.19;21) 

The reality: 

1. On the way through Germany, after several breakdowns, thought and prayed about turning back to Poland. Disappointed, but ready to go back, we knew there would also be many disappointed people waiting for us in England. Asked the Lord for wisdom – if we had to stop one more time soon, we’d be driving back to Poland. Spent the following 5 hours praying and worshipping the Lord and driving smoothly non stop. Took it as the Lord’s yes for our trip. In Holland and Belgium the problems reappeared, accompanied by an ominous sound from the gearbox. Got to see Dunkirk beaches just before the sunset – one fulfilled dream. 

 How we got to Calais, and then from Dover to Dorking, is God’s mysterious doing.
2. As usual on our stays in Dorking, had the privilege of the luxuries of our ‘holiday mansion’ at Rose Hill, courtesy of Nick and Marie Goddard - in their lovely home.

3. Friends started looking after us – David Basset took us to Box Hill,

 

Colin and then Tim Stevens took our poor car to the garage, Jackie Natt from St. Mary’s Reigate came up with a friend willing to pay for the repairs, Paul and Allie Studley and their homegroup organized a barbecue for us.
4. The garage people were very ingenious trying to trace the problem – we all thought they succeeded. 

5. Packed all our belongings, cleaned the house, left the key in the house and at 4 am left for Nantwich. Waved goodbye to the Dorking Cockerel and … here we go again … - decided the best direction was back to Rose Hill and the garage. As we left the key inside, we could not get into the house, so we parked outside till the decent hour 8 am, when we could ask Marie’s dad, Tim to come rescue us with his key. Read 2 separate devotionals for the day. Seemed to have the same theme: “...the voice of the Lord saying, 'Whom shall I send?'” He definitely sent us back to Dorking. Unpacking time, kids!
6. The garage people continued scratching their heads,
 the bill continued growing, we settled back at Rose Hill, continued praising the Lord for His protection and asking Him for some decent way out.
7. Uncle David B. came to the rescue and sent the bored kids ...

 ... to the cinema. Asia entertained herself doing some decoupaging and cross-stiching, Dale entertained different options for the car as well as met up with some old school friends. Survived a Ninjas' attack in Rose Hill garden.

8. Found out that we could visit Barbara Richardson at the Nower Care as often as we wanted, so we did on several occasions. Realized how much of our girls’ success in homeschooling may have depended on prayers of formerly Kay and Barbara, and in the past couple of years Barbara. 

9. Took a nice walk to Elisabeth Teesdale for tea, where we met two Polish guys working for her, with their young families. Found out there are about 150 Poles living in Dorking, mostly attending St. Joseph’s church. Enjoyed the view of the river and a pheasant in the garden.

 

10. Our friends from Lincoln, Jonathan and Evelina with little Elijah came down and spent 2 good encouraging days with us.

Left their baby cot to take back to Poland and a spade and a pick for the wartime land rover of a friend of ours in Poland. Sure, there is space unlimited in our van to carry such things to and thro.
11. On the eve of the return of the legitimate owners of ‘our summer residence’, we were kindly invited to spend the rest of our enforced stay in Dorking in St. Paul’s vicarage.

12. Continued to attend St. Paul’s on Sunday mornings, surprising some, and surprised at the number of people approaching us and saying they regularly pray for us and our work in Poznan.
13. Dale’s family came down for their holiday just outside Dorking, so had plenty of time together, though in a different setting than planned.

 Attempted to produce a live genealogical tree in the Nower wood.

 

 14. Enjoyed fresh eggs, blackberries and the gate into the woods at the vicarage!
15. Did all the ‘necessary’ shopping in Sainsbury’s. Filled half the van with baked beans, weetabix and big bottles of orange squash. 
16. Filled the rest of the van with all the belongings, ours and others. 
17. On the last night in Dorking felt rather concerned about the state of the van and a thousand miles ahead of us. Prayed frantically for a safe journey home.

18. Our first attempt at the journey home lasted some 15 minutes. Having stopped twice before reaching Reigate, parked outside St. Mary’s in Reigate

and phoned our Polish PZU insurance company. They were willing to take us to the garage. We said the car would make it back to Dorking, but we couldn’t have it fixed – it wasn't worth it. - Scrap it and we’ll fly you home, they said. Bewildered, we hang up and drove back to the vicarage. This time we had the key handy at Shona's the curate. Unpacking time, kids, here we go again!
19. Humbly went to Sainsbury’s asking them to kindly accept back our yearly supply of English specialties we had bought the day before. Stuffed ourselves with wine gums and short bread.
 
The process of elimination began – cheap airlines allow each passenger to take up to 10 kg of cabin luggage, with the size limit as well. The fun began...
20. Necessities: Sarah’s schoolbooks (yes, apparently she studied Maths, Biology, Chemistry and Geography during the holidays! – that’s homeschooling for you); library books – we had some 15 of them, due to be returned on our coming home; King David’s School’s uniforms – no, we couldn’t leave these behind. A monkey and a leopard – no, Reuben can’t sleep without them; Bibles – why did everybody take their full Bibles with them?

21. Can we take the guitar? No. Can we take the table football game and the croquet set? No. Sewing machine? (You didn’t … ?!) Mixer? A football and a basketball? Swiss Army knives? Kitchen knives? Scissors? (why did everybody travel with all these knives and scissors on them?) Cross-stitching needles? Bedding? Mattresses? A tin of sand from Dunkirk beach along with a bag of seashells from the same? The list went on and on. The vicarage study room was covered with things left behind. 
22. Morning 29 August – farewell to our dear minibus, we’ll miss you!

 23. A 7-seater taxi took us to the airport. Several pairs of heavy army boots in a row and a small bag of girly make-up made the security guys think twice before they let us on board.

 

24. 3 hours later we were sitting round our table at home, eating a lovely Polish dinner prepared for us by our friends

 25. Did we get to England safely? Yes. Did we see everybody we wanted to see? Yes. (only Dale’s dad couldn’t make it). Did we see some extra people we wouldn’t have seen otherwise? Yes. Did we spend time together as a family? Yes. Did the Lord bring us safely home? Yes, He did!

("camme back fromm England to Poland!" - by Reuben)

*** 

It may seem that we didn’t have a brilliant holiday and that it was a disappointing time, not to mention the loss of the van and the costs involved in trying to fix it (kindly covered by a friend). Yes, the holiday didn’t go as we envisioned it, there were tears and stress and all the ‘why ?’s. However, throughout all this time we kept praying – asking the Lord to solve our problem as well as to show us why we ‘got stuck’ in Dorking and what could we do while there. Nothing spectacular happened, the Lord didn’t miraculously fix our van and our stay in Dorking didn’t bring any impressing fruit. What we have learned though, is to be thankful ‘at all times’, depend on the Lord deeply – as the situation really surpassed our human possibilities. We also kept reminding ourselves that our ‘hardship' is not that serious, it’s rather a mishap in which the Lord faithfully kept us safe and provided for us by surrounding us with caring people. That alone was worth the experience. Our problems have not been solved – we have no vehicle - however, we were given some money towards a new one; a lot of our stuff will stay in Dorking for a while - some not at all important, some we feel the lack of. Yet – can we really say we lack something when we have God’s love and grace?

 

 "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? (...) nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord." (Rom.8;35-39)

Having had to leave our belongings and scrap the van is at the most just awkward. Our lives don’t depend on these things, we just got used to having them at hand. May this experience give us all a renewed trust in the Lord’s sovereignty and a gratitude for what he gives us every day which we so often just take for granted.

***

Last but not least, our stay in Dorking this summer reminded us again how many people in St. Paul’s support us through their regular prayers and how much of what happens in our lives is the result of these faithful prayers, often heard only by God.

"And pray for us, too, that God may open a door for our message,

so that we may proclaim the mystery of Christ" (Col. 4,3)

Thank you!