The Best Thing About Today...

I always try to begin each class session I'm teaching over here in Russia a little differently.  Since the class is an evening class (6:00 PM- 9:00 PM), today I had them fill in the blank:  The Best Thing About Today is ______________!  Thought you might like to hear a few of the answers:

There was the obligatory The Best Thing About Today is coming to this class... -- though I think this person really meant it!  Or maybe he was just saying he had a bad day!

One student named Lena had a meaningful conversation with another student named Lena and that was her best moment.  I couldn't tell whether the other Lena agreed or not!  Perhaps she was just touched to be the best thing about anybody's day.  (For the record I have 3 Elena's and 3 Vladimir's in my class)

A married couple in the class said, The Best Thing About Today is we are celebrating our 9th wedding anniversary...  I'm wondering how that would go over with my wife:  "Honey, let's celebrate our anniversary listening to a lecture on church planting..."  Either this couple is way more spiritual than I am or anniversaries aren't that big over here.

While we were doing this little exercise, this lovely young blonde student walks in carrying a rose.  I'm thinking now here is a person who has a story for me.  Turns out that the best thing about today is that it is her birthday.  In Russia, when it's your birthday, you buy the cake and share it with your friends.  So at the break we enjoyed some birthday cake provided by the birthday person.  I told her that's not the way it's done in America.  It doesn't seem right that you have to buy your own birthday cake and feed your friends.  I felt so bad about this that I gave her one of Jenn's CD's as a birthday gift -- but only after eating a piece of the birthday cake!

I made this awful mistake on the first night of the class.  I had asked a question -- can't remember even what it was now, but nobody wanted to answer.  I do remember that the answer to the quesiton was "Jesus."  This reminded me of the old joke about the Sunday School teacher who asked, "What's furry and gray, climbs trees and eats nuts?"  No one had ever asked this kind of a question in Sunday School before.  After a lengthy period of silence, the teacher repeated the question.  From the back of the room, a little kid's faltering voice replied, "I think the answer is a squirrel but I'm going to say Jesus!"  Since jokes generally don't translate well across cultures, I squelched the urge to tell the joke, but couldn't stop myself from offering a little adivce.  "Whenever someone asks a question at church and you're not sure about the answer, just guess Jesus and most of the time you will be right!"  So Volodya, who has this wonderful sense of humor has been interjecting "Jesus" in answer to any and every question.  Sure enough, after asking for one more response to The Best Thing About Today... the silence was broken by a smiling Russian saying, JESUS!

So, what about you?  What's the best thing about today?  Take a moment and celebrate something (or someone) good in your life!

Blair