Rostom's Testimony

“I was like a cooking pot full of holes before I met Jesus. Do you know what a cooking pot full of holes is good for? Nothing! But then I heard about Jesus and how He died to save me and I trusted Him and now, He has transformed my life and is using me for His glory. Jesus took the broken holes of my life and He filled them and He made me complete…..”

Rostom is a 21 year old young man from Tagbak who was saved as a teen through the outreach from our church here in Lapoc and from the time he was saved he has grown steadily in his faith and has shown a keen desire to serve our Lord and to share the good news with others. Since he was saved, he has not allowed the fact that he was born with missing limbs – one hand and one foot – to slow him down.

His childhood though was very painful. As he endured the slights and snubs of other children and even adults, there were times he plunged into despair and felt his life was worthless. But since the day he trusted Jesus, he has seen God’s value on his life because as he likes to say, “God was willing to pay the same price for me as He did for everyone else – the precious blood of His own Son!”

Rostom’s joy in life today is to teach the Word and through much study of the Word and allowing himself to be  discipled, God is developing Rostom into an effective instrument and a strong light in his community of Tagbak. He is bringing 11 other young men to the Youth Camp being held here in Lapoc at the end of this month. He led these young men to the Lord himself.

Recently one of the unsaved leaders of their community publicly spoke about the impact that Rostom is having there as a preacher of the Word.

Rostom may be looked on by the world as ‘weak’ – he has no physical dexterity, no worldly influence, he is poor in earthly goods - BUT God’s power is being shown through Rostom’s weakness and God is being glorified through him.

May Rostom’s testimony and the wonderful plans of God for his life encourage you as it has us and let us continue to encourage one another and to speak about the marvellous works of God!!!!

Survey Report From Rodil

It would appear that the Lord has expansion planned for the work over here once again. So far over the past 25 years we have opened up 4 mission stations across a wide area and many churches have been planted and leaders and teachers trained and discipled. Well it seems like the Lord is directing us to open up another new horizon - (Bisigan-Bangkirs-Tignapuluan areas). Each time the work expands it is with many growing pains, many sacrifices needing to be made, people giving their lives to be used, funds and effort also. God is the great provider of everything we need from people to wisdom to our very strength and breath, and once again we are wondering ---  What is God going to do this time.

Our prayer often is –   “Lord show us where you are working and let us work with you”.

In our last update, Deb mentioned that the guys were going out on a survey into a neighbouring area. Well they have been and come back and below is a transcript from the survey report which our Higaunon co-worker Rodil recorded. We will put what he said in a different colour below.

 

Quote from Rodil  

              “From Lapoc, us elders and leaders left at dawn and we set off, stopping first in San Aquino to pick up our fellow leaders there and then continuing on to Lantod. There were 17 of us and we found the road very rough – even for motorbikes. Some of the ‘road’ had become overgrown with weeds and brush, there was lots of mud and in some places, parts of the ‘road’ had washed away. We had a guide with us called Danny who comes from this area but as we passed through the forested area where many rebels and groups of bandits live, even he was nervous.

            We got to a village called Unsi and found the road there was paved for a short distance. People stared at us in fear as we passed and one woman in particular looked terrified of us and we wondered if her family was in hiding from the police.

            From the village of Unsi we could look down and see the Bisigan area and we saw scattered villages in the forest. Just past there we came to Bangkirs, a village at a crossroad where a road comes up from Tignapuluan and there is an occasional truck or jeep that comes up that road to Bisigan. At Bangkirs there are a lot of houses, power lines have reached there so electricity is available. It is located on a hill and has easy access to the whole area because of the crossroads. I think this might be a good place we could consider locating a missionary team. I don’t know though what the water situation is like there as we didn’t see their water supply.

            Next we continued up to Dongguan. There are a lot of people there almost purely Higaunon. Only one religious group has infiltrated that area that we saw – there is a catholic church there. The government is currently constructing a highway which they started in Unsi and which will go right through the centre of Dongguan. This highway is the Illigan-Aglayan pass.

            Currently Ruel and James, our missionaries from Ricodo, are teaching a group of 30 people in Dongguan. They are listening well and starting to love the Word and are currently being taught the Good News about salvation in Jesus. Ruel and James travel there and stay overnight every Tuesday. They also teach a second group in another nearby village called Malumpayad but we didn’t get to see this group.

            We arrived in Dongguan at 10 AM and Ruel and James were in the middle of teaching and we saw all the people gathered to listen. By about 11 AM we continued on to Ricodo and found the roads steep and dangerous and some places where there were some steep drops on the side.  James and Ruel bring machetes with them and some weeks they have had to hack their way through fallen trees and other debris.

            Amazingly, we met some of the road crew coming along with two bulldozers and the next day when we came back, the road was cleared and widened and now even a vehicle will be able to get through apart from the dangers of landslides as all the edges are still very soft.

            This part of the road went through quite some distance of uninhabited areas of forest but then we came to Ricodo in Rogongon where again we found many houses and villages and lots of people. We were very excited to arrive at Ricodo and to see Ruel and James’ homes, their families and the work they are doing. They have everything organized and well-kept and they are working hard at their ministry. From where they are located they can travel out to the areas of Illigan or across to Tumpagon. God has established the church in Ricodo and now they are reaching out through 22 km of forest to the village of Dongguan.

            We came home to Lapoc the next day but when we got to the cross-roads at Bangkirs, we took a different road and came back via Man-ay and Tignapuluan. We saw that these places have electricity, schools, lots of houses and the people seemed open and friendly. Some women asked us what we were doing and we told them that we are spreading God’s Word and they seemed interested. God is no doubt working in people’s hearts there and preparing the way for His Word. Man-ay would be another good place for a missionary team with its central location and large community.

            Just down the hill from Man-ay is another big village called Litig and beyond that is an even bigger place called Tignapuluan where we noticed that Jehovah’s witnesses and other religious and cult groups have already come and set up buildings.

            These areas we believe are where God wants us to reach out to next with the Gospel. We saw huge unreached pockets of people and over beyond where we surveyed is another whole group of unreached people in the Mambuaya area and all the way from there to Tagpangi.

            We need to work together in teams: we can put a full-time missionary team into the Bangkirs-Man-ay area and help them from all sides, from Lantod, Ricodo, Lapoc and all the other churches. As we did the survey, we felt so impelled with the need to reach these areas with the Gospel…….”

From Paul again:

We are planning on doing a secondary survey in October. Please pray with us as this area can be dangerous and the roads bad. Pray that we will be able to make friends even with the rebels and bandits and maybe even reach them eventually with the Gospel. Pray that we will shine for our Lord Jesus as we travel and that people will be drawn to listen to His Word.

We are thinking perhaps by the middle of next year we may be able to have materials prepared and start building some housing for the missionary team. We don’t know yet who this missionary team will be comprised of – there are several families in our church here in Lapoc and in the other church plants, who are willing, prepared and equipped spiritually for the job. So pray with us (our team here and all the church leaders) for God’s clear leading in who He has chosen for this special job.

Overwhelmed by the task but confident in the Lord, Paul and Deb (on behalf of us and all of our Higaunon and Tala Andig Co-workers)

Breaking New Ground!

These are some of the pastors and evangelists who left at 4:30 am yesterday (Wednesday) for a ground breaking journey! (The picture though is of them at a different time.)

There were twelve of them, armed with the Word of God and with hearts full of joy to be setting off on a quest for the Gospel!

They were traveling in a convoy of nine motorbikes to the area of Tignapuluan which has many remote villages. It is a large area which we have been burdened for in prayer and it is an area where we have been considering locating a team of missionaries who would be jointly sent from the Lapoc and Dulangan churches.

We are expecting their return on Saturday afternoon and all the churches from here to Lantod are expectantly waiting for the news they will bring back from this survey.

Please pray for safety as they travel. They could encounter areas where there are bandits or rebels and they are unknown to that area. Please also pray for open doors to the Gospel in the outlying villages they will be visiting and for direction from the Lord as to exactly which place we would locate a new team of missionaries.

“Pray also for us, that God may open to us a door for the Word, to declare the mystery of Christ…..” Colossians 4:2b

Evangelism in Tagbak - Pray!

On, Saturday, as you can see from the pictures above, our family had a beautiful day in Tagbak with the Lord’s people there and also with the village leaders and others in the community that attended the new church opening.

Paul spoke and encouraged the many unbelievers present to make time for God’s Word because they do not know the hour or the day when the Lord will require their souls from them. An evangelistic bible study is starting this Saturday at 9:00 am. Pray that many will come to hear God’s Word.

Annie, who is the wife of the village head, hugged Deb and told her how happy she was that her husband and married sons have committed to come to church to hear the Gospel. She has prayed for a long time that her whole family would come to the Lord.

Jubab and the other young people from our Lapoc church, sang several songs that brought tears to the eyes of some of the unbelievers present. A sign maybe that God is speaking to their hearts.

Our whole time there was beautiful and we look forward to the unfolding of God’s plan for the people of Tagbak. One thing that has become evident is that God is speaking to the children in the school and to the young people. One young guy has been teaching his friends and has led about 10 of them he told us, to trust in the Lord Jesus!

God’s work is amazing and we are so honoured to be a part of His work in this corner of His field!!

Update on Talid-Talid!

September last year, angels celebrated in heaven over a small group of people in Talid-Talid who trusted the Lord Jesus as their Saviour! The church here in Lapoc also rejoiced at this news of the fruit of their labours. During that month, our family, along with others, went to Talid-Talid to meet these new brothers and sisters. When we arrived, we found the believers waiting for us at Jerwin and Erica’s house where they held their meetings each week. We worshipped the Lord with them, shared a meal together and had a pretty awesome day of seeing what God had been doing in this remote and ‘wild-west’ type of frontier.  Just one time of experiencing the difficult terrain and the dangers that our fellow-servants of the Lord travelled through every week to take the Gospel to Talid-Talid really gave us a huge new appreciation for their courage and endurance.

Paul was invited to share a message of encouragement from the Word during our day with them and his message included a challenge to the new believers about the many who still haven’t heard the Good News. When Paul asked them who would be willing to go and tell others the message of salvation, Tisyu – the man in this picture - was one of 3 men who stood up and said, “I will go.”  Jerwin was another who also said that he would go.

Not long afterwards, the young church in Talid-Talid was scattered when Jerwin was killed, another believing family’s house was burnt down and much persecution followed. The believers fled to various places for refuge and for months, we had not heard word of them apart from scanty bits of news about Jerwin’s wife and family.

But praise the Lord for great news He brought to us this week through some believers who had been away for months working as sugar-cane cutters. During their travels they came to a village far away from Talid-Talid and there they met Tisyu and guess what he is doing? He is preaching the Gospel!

We don’t know how many people he is teaching, we don’t know how many have been saved through his preaching, but we are thrilled to hear that in spite of losing his home, his livelihood and being driven away from his village through persecution, he is sharing Christ, he is telling others the message of salvation.…the Lord has preserved him and given him this ministry!

This place where Tisyu was seen preaching, is a place Paul went to a few years ago when he was surveying an area on the other side of a huge mountain range that forms a boundary for the Tala-Andig people group. He went there to see how many unreached villages are in that area and he even stayed overnight in someone’s house in that very village. We thank the Lord that today, some of the people in that place are hearing the Gospel through this dear brother!

Please pray for Tisyu as God speaks through him in this new place where he is, and please pray for the many more unreached that still need to hear the Gospel in this huge valley that we live in and on the other side of the mountain ranges that surround us.