Felix Felicis

One of my Spanish professoras used to give me a hard time because I rarely agreed with her literary tastes, due to her affinity for tragedies. Is it really so bad to prefer happy endings? Growing up I watched The Walton's on TV because nothing ever really went wrong, and it always had a happy ending, "Night John Boy..." Probably because of the same fondness for smooth sailing, the chapter in Harry Potter about Felix Felicis Potion was one of my favorites in the series.

I, for one, am convinced that J.K. Rowling's writing was profoundly influenced by her Christianity. I find it hard to understand how anyone who has finished the seventh book could deny such an influence, with the Gospel so plainly allegorized. And I sometimes wonder if Rowling's meant Felix Felicis Potion to represent the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is definitely not luck and it does not guarantee smooth sailing by any means, but the Bible says it will give us power beyond ourselves, Acts 1:8.

More recently, I've been reading Forgotten God, by Francis Chan, where he asks, "When is the last time you experienced the Holy Spirit?"

All this to say, my English for Veterinarians classes have been going far better than is humanly possible. Since Monday I've had four classes, with the number of students in one class growing between the first and second days to nearly fifty. More remarkable than overcoming my fear/hatred for public speaking, than learning on the job how to teach, than working confidently with professors nearly twice my age, has been my ability to not only lecture in Spanish, but even harder to switch back and forth between Spanish and English rapidly and coherently. Outside of class sometimes I feel like my Spanish is so inadequate that I can barely convey simple thoughts in an understandable manner. This discrepancy leaves me with four options for how I can speak intelligibly in Spanish and English in class, either: 1) someone's sneaking me Felix Felicis Potion before class, 2) I'm really speaking terribly I just don't have anyone correcting me so I don't know it, 3) my adrenaline causes my subconscious to take over with its far superior linguistic skills, or the option I choose to believe, 4) the Holy Spirit is helping me. "...for it is not you speaking, but the Holy Spirit." ~Luke 12:12

Thank you everyone for your prayers, they're nearly palpable!