I told you in my last post that I would be helping conduct a Nehemiah training for our first ever franchise in Leyte. Here are a few pictures from that:
The training went really well! As you can see, there were only four team members and Ate Cecil was there leading the training, but the six of us had an amazing time learning from one another and just getting excited about the work God would do through these four passionately unreserved young people. We had some great nights of worship sitting in a circle with one guitar and a tambourine, going through every praise song we could possibly think of and sometimes singing in three different languages at the same time. It was truly an uplifting and encouraging week!
Next, Ate Cecil (“ate” is the title given to any girl that is older than you as a sign of respect, it means “big sister”) and I flew to Manila to meet Ate Wendy, one of my supervisors and lovely counterpart of the NT founder Jess Jennings. We dropped Ate Cecil at home in Batangas and continued on to our first orphanage in the beautiful island of Mindoro. Oh! you HAVE to see these:
I flat-out-fell-in-love with these beautiful children and was completely heart broken by all their stories. It was even harder when we did hospital visitation to check on two children the foundation was planning on taking in - if they lived, that is. They were severely malnourished children, one with a skeletal like appearance and the other with edema, pale skin and distended stomach. The latter did not make it. Both babies come from a tribal group in the mountains, called the Munyons. Many of the children at the foundation are Munyon, in fact one had just arrived a few days before us and was still in wide-eyed shock with all the colors, modern building, white people and oh yea, no one wearing a loincloth!
Ate Wendy and I went to the next orphanage in San Pablo. Their set up is completely different, because the one in Mindoro does not take children over the age of 6 and the one in San Pablo does not take children under the age of 6, so we were with much older children this time around. It was nice to have the contrast; both are amazing places!
After a very brief half-day visit and over night, Ate Wendy went on to Manila to fly home to her kiddies and hubby in Davao and I started my ridiculous journey through Luzon as the fill-in Nehemiah National Teams Luzon Franchise Supervisor. Say that three times fast! Basically, I travel around to the teams and check in on them, see how they are doing, how I can help or encourage them, is the team getting along, are they doing enough ministry, are they completing their discipleship materials, especially their memory verses, etc. That was the easy part. The teams were all great and I really enjoyed getting to meet them all and join in their daily ministry routine. Here are a few pics of the four Luzon teams:
As for the hard stressful tiresome portion – TRAVEL! I went from San Pablo to Batangas to Tingloy Island back to Batangas to the pier in Lucena to the island of Maranduque back to the pier in Lucena to a nine-hour bus ride to the pier in Pillar to the island of Masbate back to the pier in Pillar to Bicol to the Naga airport and back to Manila – all in a week and five days! I know that’s mostly Greek to you, but just trust me that it wasn’t easy! I didn’t have a travel companion, I don’t speak any of the language in that area and I look like a walking $! Needless to say it was a long exhausting and many times frustrating trip, but God is so good and all was accomplished that needed to be, I never got lost and I never killed a porter (the men that rush the boats like vultures when you dock and try to carry your bags for money and yell a thousand things at you and in that regard remind me of a squawking flock of seagulls)! I was also thoroughly encouraged by my successful completion of that task with only one emotional out burst. If I learned nothing else from that trip, I definitely increased the scale on my patience meter. What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger: James1: 2-4.
On May 6th I flew to Manila and over-nighted in the IMB’s guesthouse. It was nice to have a break. I had Mexican food and Starbucks coffee for the first time in four months and even got a haircut! :)
May 7th, my supervisor and I had a meeting with one of the Pastors of a church here in Manila that one of our American teams will be working with this summer. Since I will be that teams immediate supervisor we all agreed that I should spend a few days with the Pastors family and observe some of their ministry. I spent that night in the guest unit again and even splurged and ran a little aircon that night! The next day I transferred over to the Pastor’s house. The Pastor’s family is great, laid back and totally make me feel at home. I got to join their youth fellowship that afternoon and they asked me to be their speaker. I did my usual spiel of my missions testimony and a Christian’s responsibility to the Great Commission. I joined their worship the following morning, but the exciting thing was joining in their prayer fellowship that evening. Today, May 10, is their presidential election, so last night they had a prayer fellowship at the church to pray for their country.
“If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and will heal their land.” 2 Chronicles 14:7
I was truly blessed by their love for their country and desire for it to be a land surrendered to the Lordship of Christ Jesus and a little convicted about how little I pray for my own country - especially when it is so desperately needed at this time!
I will travel tomorrow back to Tacloban for the Leyte franchise debrief. I am so excited to hear how the fabulous four’s summer went!
Thank you, as always, for all the love and prayers; they have truly been felt!
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