We never like to say goodbyes but they are a frequent part of missionary life.
A few weeks ago we said goodbye to Josh and Belinda and their children, Daisy, Ally and Neo.....tears and hugs and that last wave and then they were in their vehicle and driving off down the road.
This is a photo taken during our farewell team dinner with them. They have been a close part of our lives and partners in the work since Sept 9, 2006 when they joined the team here. And even when they were way past their furlough time, they kept working away here with us while we all prayed and waited for the paperwork for Neo to be finalized.
(By the way, since you might not have seen a photo for awhile of our whole Lapoc missionary team: the couple on the left of the photo are Ben and Leonie, then it is Jubab, Paul and I with Neo in between us, next to me is Annie with her hubby Rodel sitting at the front of her. Next to Paul is Josh. Then it is Bugs and Elsa, Belinda standing behind Elsa, and then Wing and Hazel. Hazel is hugging Gwen their oldest daughter, and at the bottom of the photo are their other two children Cled and Jella. Daisy and Ally on the bottom right and Chingx2 in the stripped hat next to her Dad with her brother Nel beside her.)
Back to our farewells, the long-awaited day finally arrived in the second half of May - Neo’s passport was ready!!!! So in a few short weeks Josh and Belinda were able to finalize plans, finish Daisy and Ally’s school year, pack up their house, say many, many goodbyes, pack their suitcases and head for their passport country - looking forward to hugs and much awaited times with family and friends. We hope and pray that they have a very refreshing year and ask for prayer for them as they adjust to what is now somewhat a foreign culture to them even though it looks familiar.
Please pray for safety for them as they travel, and for spiritual refreshment and renewing in their lives.
PS – Aling has colon cancer – Please keep praying probably will undergo chemo.
The elderly lady will have cataract surgery (Lord Willing) tomorrow – July 22
The little girl is also scheduled to have her eye removed tomorrow – we will try to get an artificial one for her.
The man with huge growth on his back will be operated on (Lord Willing) on Aug. 9
Bible study with the primary school teachers continues tonight and is going fantastic.
The new outreach in Lantod is also going incredibly well – please pray.
Debbie, Jubab and I came to Cagayan De Oro City on Saturday after attending our NTM missionary conference in Malaybalay. We had a bunch of things on our agenda.
We wanted buy food to supply us for the next 2 months on the Saturday, then catch up with some friends in CDO on the Sunday and then on Monday (yesterday) our driver Wingwing was to go to Cauyunan and get all of the elders from our first work for them to have an elders meeting with me in CDO and Debbie while I met with the elders was to care for some patients who Wingwing was also bringing out of Lapoc due to them needing special medical care out here.
We ended up having an emergency ---- Rony who is my dear friend from Lapoc and one of our first converts came out with his wife as she had a mass in her abdomen that we wanted to have looked at. We ended up having to have immediate and urgent surgery and they removed a 6 inch length of her small intestine due to it being engulfed in a large mass/cyst/abscess???. Please pray for them. We first took them to the government hospital and there were patients literally littering the whole area and no room or ward vacant for them to be admitted into for surgery, so we took them to the next hospital and it was the same so in the end we admitted them into one of the best hospitals in town and had the surgery performed last night at about 8PM. Must be just what God had planned for them – He is so gooood!!!! Rony has been my right and left hand J ever since we arrived in Lapoc, we watched him experience the tragic death of his 14 year old son due to an asthma attack and he hurt and hurt and hurt but never even missed going to his outreaches where he has led many to the Lord. He has helped me with designing and heading up most of our construction as well and we work very closely together.
Please pray for Rony’s wife’s recovery – her name is Aling. I will be going to see them once I get this e-mail sent.
We will be caring for the other patients today now – to give you a bit of an idea of our days patients:
1.We have a little 11 year old girl that has an ulcerated eye. We have to have it removed.
2.We have an elderly lady from our new outreach of Lantod who we are having cataract surgery on.
3.We have a middle aged man who has a gigantic cyst on his back that we need to have operated on.
4.We have a lady who was shot up some years ago and pus is still coming out of her wounds. Her condition has just come to our attention. She will need LONG time care for which we have rented a room out here for her to stay in. We also employ another lady out here who assists us with these patients and others which are quite common when we cannot be here due to us being home translating.
5.A lady with a skin disease.
6.And a poor little boy who has a spinal fluid leak causing swelling between his eyebrows. Not sure what they will do with him yet.
So in addition to Aling there are all these patients that we would appreciate prayer for.
We are going to try and go home on Thursday and have “Naring” (our employee out here) finish off caring for these patients. We just need to get them all set up for all their surgeries and then she can handle the rest.
Meanwhile yesterday until about 4PM I was in our elders meeting. It was a good time and it is exciting for me to see the work going on in the area where we first worked for 12 years. There are 8 churches there now. Will write a few things down about some of the highlights. Please pray for these people as well as they serve and grow.
1.We are setting up a new mission station in Kalamalamaham – it was the very first village that I surveyed as a young missionary back in 1987 but they rejected us and would not allow us to live with them as they believed that we wanted to sacrifice their children to the evil spirits. Almost 25 years later they want to hear the Word of God so we are currently constructing 2 houses there and will soon send 2 missionary families to reach the area. The men are already there.
2.They had a baptism in Kapisahan which is a brand new outreach – there are 15 believers there now. What great joy!!!!
3.We have to rebuild the medical centre in Cauyunan as we constructed it from wood some 20 years ago and it has been eaten by termites. Hopefully this year.
4.A big youth conference is being planned.
5.Many of the kids of our initial believers in the Cauyunan area are being trained as Bible teachers and going out to other areas.
Lets pray that we can set the place on fire for the Lord through the power of the Glorious Holy Spirit.
There is a battle going on for these people’s souls! Already we have lost some. It is too late for one of the ladies who just started listening to the Word here in Lapoc. She passed into a Christ-less eternity a week later.
Pray for the Word to continue to go out with power!!!
Pray for the new school year here and for the women scripture teachers as they start again this Tuesday, taking the Word to the school children!
On a spiritual front – the new bible study with the school teachers, and next week Paul and some of Lapoc bible teachers will be going to an area where there are supposed to be about 40 families wanting to be taught the Word!! The Lord is opening up more doors!! The name of the village is Lantod.
And on a substance front the Lord is also supplying and strengthening.......
This month about 19 000 fruit tree seedlings are being
delivered to over 12 different
places to give close on 400 families a
boost and to give them another avenue
for providing for their families.
Also happening is a lot of building and the believers in San Aquino and in Tinaytayan are so thankful for the huge amounts of dirt that have been moved to accommodate room for future extensions!! The cement courts outside the churches are in the finishing stages and in San Aquino a new building project is about to start which will provide accommodation for their missionaries, for outreach, for youth groups and conferences!
For Paul, all this building means an awful lot of planning and brainstorming on his part, constant checking of lists and coordinating of a lot of work happening in a lot of different places.
To keep this all going smoothly is nothing short of a series of miracles that God keeps doing for the furtherance of His kingdom and behalf of His people!
Please keep praying – for the new bible study with the school teachers on Thursday nights, for the meeting next week with the 40 families that want to be taught the Word, for safe passage on the roads as building supplies are brought up, for the loads and loads of cement and gravel needed, for strength and encouragement when the way seems to be getting too hard, for the lenses of our faith to stay focused on the ONE.......
Last Thursday evening a very unique bible study started here! Unique because firstly it was in English, here in the middle of Tala-Andig land!
Secondly it is unique because all the people who attended are professionals - this bible study is for all the school teachers from the schools in the surrounding area.
And thirdly it is unique because Ben and Leonie hosted and taught this Bible Study which is something new missionaries usually don’t get to do because of the language and cultural barrier.
It was a really great evening. Leonie and her team of helpers did a wonderful job serving a hot meal and making everyone feel very welcome.
Ben really enjoyed teaching the Bible Study and discussing God’s truths with the 27 school teachers who attended.
Many of these teachers we have known for years and are good friends with and we are thrilled about this! Please pray that nothing will hinder our coming together each Thursday evening to study God’s Word and please pray that the results will be lasting relationships with our Saviour being formed and firmly established!
The book of Romans has been approved for publication!!
Thank you so much for standing with us through prayer during these past two weeks and the many hours of work at the desk with our translation consultant, poring over each verse through the means of a back translation to English from the Tala Andig text.
Although it looks all happy and orderly in the picture above, things were happening that reminded us that our enemy does not want God’s Word to get into the hands of our Tala-Andig brothers and sisters and that he would love to hinder this work. Amongst other things there was:
1.Sickness – the consultant got sick within a day or so of arriving.
2.Spiritual trials and weakness – one of our key people on the translation team, Nanah, had some very serious spiritual trials effecting her family.
3.Weariness – It was a big load having the consultant check going on in our home as well as our usual responsibilities.
But because you prayed us through this time, and because of God’s grace, the consultant check was finished on schedule, and the Tala Andig book of Romans is now officially approved for publication – and will be available in print very soon!
Praise God!!! We praise Him so much for His Word – for more and more of it becoming available in the Tala Andig language (and also for the Higaunon people group).
Another great bit of news is about 10 year old Jenita who has cerebral palsy. School started three weeks ago and nobody in her family seemed to be planning a way for her to go to school. Her little heart was despondent as she saw all the other children going off to school looking so cool in their school uniforms and so excited, while she stayed at home because her feet were too weak to climb up and down the mountain every day. But God had a plan for her and He brought her here to stay – actually it coincided with the first few days of the Romans Consultant Check (which for me was bad timing but for God was perfect timing!!)
During this time we were able to observe how she has progressed with her walking since her surgery earlier this year, we were able to open our home and treat her like a daughter, hear her giggles and enjoy having her cuddle up to us whenever she saw a chance, and we were also able to help her family work out a way for her to go to school.
God has been granting Jenita’s little heart’s desires in a series of amazing things He is doing in her life!! First in healing her feet so she can walk (6 months of living near the hospital, endless checks, surgery and then therapy) and now, He has provided a horse for her so she can ride up and down the mountain from her place to the school, and as of two weeks ago, she is now an official Grade 1’er, learning how to read and write like the other children, carrying a school pack, wearing school shoes, being able to WALK and play during recess.....like she’s longed to do for years. It absolutely delights us to have a part in what God is doing in Jenita’s life.
So.....the Tala-Andig book of Romans....and Jenita walking and going to school....all in God’s Grace and all in His timing and all because of His Body working together in fitness and unity!!
