2018 Talaandig-Higaonon Ladies Retreat

Talaandig Translation Clip

Tinaytayan Mission Church

Anelia's Miracle.....

We asked for a miracle for our sister Anelia, and God answered our prayers. Her miracle was her first sight of our Lord’s face and of heaven yesterday afternoon about 2 hours after this photo above was taken.

Anelia’s dear doctor told us that it would be better for Anelia to discharge her from the hospital and to take her home as he had done all that could be done for her. The hardest thing was telling her husband Tony, and her daughter JenJen and JenJen’s husband Jimrel, and to see their grief and tears as we hugged them and watched the nurses unhook the machines, tubes and needles and prepare Anelia for her trip home.

About two hours after her discharge, as she lay in the back bench seat of our vehicle, with cushions and blankets beneath her and with her head in her husband’s lap, in a very peaceful way as the familiar mountain scenery rolled past the windows, she was ushered into our Lord’s presence. Her daughter and son-in-law were right there with her, and she went in a quiet moment and without a struggle. God’s plan for Anelia’s time to step into timelessness had come and it was good.

Her daughter JenJen, and the whole family, are so thankful for your prayers. In their grief as they wept, they found great comfort in Philippians 1:21, which we read together in the hospital and talked about during the hours when we were processing Anelia’s discharge from the hospital.

Arriving back home with Anelia’s dead body was not the outcome they were hoping for but they accepted it as God’s plan and the church family there is rallying around them. Her body is laid out in her home as the custom is here, and all the family and neighbours are there helping. The coffin is being hand-built by friends and neighbours as we write this and the grave is being dug by these same friends and neighbours. People are cooking rice and feeding all who are visiting and helping with the work…..and when all is ready, her body will be laid in the ground. Probably sometime later this afternoon.

Death is a harsh and bitter reality in our earthly lives…..but our HOPE does not disappoint. It is a living hope through the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ from the dead. 1 Peter 1:3

Thank you for all your messages and emails and prayers – they have been sustaining us through these days!

Please pray for our sister Anelia......

As we were leaving the place where we went to teach the Word last Sunday, we stopped by to visit our sister Anelia who we had been told only just that morning was suffering an illness. We were totally unprepared for the sight of the skeletal, pain-racked version of her usual vibrant happy self who we found when we arrived at her house.

She has been suffering and bedridden for nine months in spite of two different trips to local hospitals which left them with no answers.

The tears and grief that I was trying so hard to hide from Anelia, prevented me from even finishing my prayer for her and as we left, Paul pressed everything he had in his wallet into her husband’s hand. He’s never done that before, but before we even saw her, that’s what the Lord had already told Paul to do.

The next day we contacted a brother in the Lord who is a highly respected Doctor in town and who had recently offered to help us with any patients we had. He told us on the phone to bring her straight in to him even if it was after hours. So we immediately got to work to bring her out and take her to the hospital to be under this dear doctor’s care.

It turns out that Anelia has schistosomiasis (a snail-borne parasite) which has caused cirrhosis of her liver. She is hugely anemic and is currently receiving a blood transfusion and also treatment for the schistosomiasis. We told her last night that we are going to ask our brothers and sisters all over the world to pray for her that she will recover. Will you please pray? Anelia really needs a miracle to get through this.

Mom Ellen Passed Away Today......

Our beautiful Mom Ellen passed away today. How badly we already miss her beautiful smile and the love she poured into our family! And how all the kids in our family will miss their awesomely fun and wonderful Grandma.

Thank you for all the prayers you have prayed for her since the news of her brain cancer was first known. She really, really appreciated all of those and she spoke of God's love for her during her last days.

In her last days when our sister asked her if she had trusted Jesus as her Lord and Saviour, she nodded yes, and this is our great hope and comfort as we go through this huge loss.

More News From Paul and Deb......

Please PRAY for our Mom Ellen, Paul’s step-mum!

She has been battling with cancer for a couple of years and we know many of you have been praying for her but we just really value special prayer for her right now as the effects of her cancer are really escalating. We are so thankful that Jubab was able to spend Thanksgiving with her last November and they had a really precious Grandma-Grandson time together eating great food and crying together in sad movies. 

Ever since Paul’s Dad passed away 21 years ago, Mom Ellen has continued to be a really great Mom to us. She’s visited us here in the Philippines and in Australia, been so loving to us and especially to her grandkids, and built great memories with us through-out the years. She’s such a brave and beautiful lady, and never complains.

Paul’s sister who’s over there with Mom Ellen right now, was messaging us this morning that Mom had a very bad night last night.  So our hearts and minds are very much over there with Mom Ellen right now.  

We’ve been praying for and with Inay this month as well. Inay is our mother from Cauyunan.

During our very first days in the village of Cauyunan as brand new missionaries and very young, inay and her husband took us under their wing and protected us from people who didn’t want us there, shared meals with us and took Paul into their hearts as one of their sons. That was twenty-nine years ago! Inay has been a widow for quite a while now as Tatay has gone on ahead to heaven, and many of the years since she was widowed she comes and stays with us for a month or two at a time. She’s been here with us almost a month now, and we hope she’ll stay for at least another month!

She went through a very stressful time last year with her youngest son in prison (he has now been released) and she almost wasted away. So we are thankful we have this time to encourage her and nourish her both physically and spiritually.

Inay loves Paul and loves to boss him around even though she is only a third of his size!

We’re currently working on Matthew chapter 17. Only 13 more chapters left unwritten in Talaandig. The completion of the Talaandig New Testament grows closer every day!

The Talaandig bible app is now available on iTunes!!!

This is a screen photo of the app on iTunes and it should be easy to download if you are an iTunes person!

Already in the past two weeks we have had 20 of our brothers and sisters over here in ministry being able buy new phones at a price they could afford because of a huge discount the Lord provided for them and they are now LOVING reading their bibles on their phones. We have twice already been able to pass notes on the scriptures back and forth between different ones. And in the next few weeks we are working on helping a lot more of the people in the churches get phones up and going with the Talaandig Bible App.