Ramblings on the Thoughts and Life of Kristy Lorfeld

As I'm reading some of my past blogs, I realize that I've been horrible with this blogging thing this month. I would blame it on the Christmas cards, but I didn't send them out this year...I think everyone is just going to get a Christmas email newsletter instead. But I haven't written it yet, so in the mean time you just get to read this random blog. Today I've been thinking a lot about a woman's role...in the church and in society. I think I have a little feminism inside of me (but I still do shave my legs everyday...so I guess I can't be a total feminist yet). When someone tells me that I can't do something because "it's a man's job," or even worse, if someone tells me that I have to do something because "it's a woman's job," I go crazy. I think more about this now that I live in Latin America, where sex roles are a lot more definied than in the United States. Maybe that's my problem, I don't want to put myself in a box and have my life defined based on my gender, race, nationality, or anthing else. I just want to be me. I don't want people to expect things of me and not appreciate it because people think "that's just her role in society." So, where am I going with this? In the LCMS, women cannot be pastors. Honestly, I've been struggling with this one for years because I don't think it's such a black and white topic. At the same time, I don't want to okay it based on my own thinking (Let's face it, God's a lot smarter than me...I know I'm a close second). On one side, God has given men and women different characteristics both physically (shocking!) and emotionally on purpose from the very beginning. Paul also talks some about a woman's role in worship in the New Testament, however I have also heard different interpretations from various theologians that I respect very much. On the other side, I have known some great women pastors. Who am I to say that God did not give them those gifts? The Bible also speaks of great women leaders, such as Deborah, who was the leader of Israel for many years as a judge. And then I look at this world and see that there just aren't enough pastors. In China, I attended two worship services with women as the pastors. In countries where people are sometimes risking their lives to be pastors so that others will know about Jesus Christ, can I really sit back and say, "Those women shouldn't be pastors."? God is doing amazing work through those women. Hmmm...I'm kind of curious about all your thoughts about all of this. Whoo..I could get a good debate going. OK...so now on to what I've been actually doing the last week or two instead of what I've been thinking. Since it's a week before Christmas, I don't have any English classes or Spanish classes. So I've had some nice free time, but it's also been a week full of graduations (The school year ends in December). These graduations are in the morning, get started late, and seem to drag on. Today was Yamilla's graduation, Tuesday was Hazel's graduation, and tomorrow is Heidi's graduation. Today I took Romeo to the vet to get his puppy shots and I found out that he has an ear infection. While my Spanish is still not good, I am becoming a lot more independent and comfortable trying to use what I know (like going to the vet on my own). Good news! My Christmas package finally arrived today from my parents! It's been sitting in customs for like 1 1/2 weeks. I ordered a camera that got sent to my parent's house and my parents put it in my huge package...so I'm excited that I finally have a camera again after a month of not being able to take pictures. Bad news...I had to pay $108 to get it because of the weight. So lesson being learned...don't ship anything to Panama through Air Box...is very expensive for me. Also, if the packages are small and don't weigh much...it's also good because many times they won't open it to see what's inside. Yesterday Thomas, Jaime, Jeramed, Yader, and I spent the day at the beach. I now have a little color to me. You'd think that after 3 1/2 months of living so close to the equator I would be tan...but I'm never outside during the times of tanning. But that's okay...I just won't have skin cancer later on in life and I'll look 30 when I'm really 50, like my mom (although my mom is just celebrating another year of being 29). After the beach, I went over to Los Andes to help Yader pack for Nicaragua (He'll be gone for almost a month). Wait...correction, I didn't help...I was the one packing for him. So back to the woman's roles...I kind of liked packing for Yader, I'm good at it, I liked helping him, I felt needed, and it was fun, but I don't like the idea that as a woman I'm suppossed to be the one to pack for the man. Can you women relate to this? Then after packing, we had to run to drop his keys off, went out for dinner, and chilled at my place while we waited for Ruthie and Pastor Henry to come back from the airport, picking up their son (Yader was staying over at their house). My goodness...this is getting long again. Is anyone still reading this? I really need to blog more so that these aren't so long. Okay, I'm only going to tell about one more day...or at least one more night. Tuesday night I went to a Kareoke bar with Jaime, Thomas, Yader, Jeramed, Chris, Becky, and Becky's husband, brother-in-law, and brother-in-law's girlfriend. Becky, Chris, Thomas, and I did a little "Love Shack". (haha...that sounds a little dirty...but I'm just talking about singing the song people) Towards the end of the night, Jaime and I got on stage to do who better than a little Britney Spears...singing "Oops I Did it Again". Fun times, fun times. Well, thanks for reading friends. I'm seriously going to try to do a little better at blogging. Feliz Navidad