The Philippines

Hey guys, it’s been a while. Sorry. I have been in the Philippines for three weeks now, and it has been wonderful! My team has been very blessed in our previous country’s on where we have been staying. In Colombia we were in what was basically a furnished apartment, and in Vietnam we stayed in a touristy town in a comfortable hotel. Here in Antipolo City we are staying in a house. This house has a downstairs with a bathroom and some kitchen cabinetry, and a big dinning table, and upstairs is a room that can’t fit all 11 of us. That is our bedroom, and we sleep on our sleeping mats. Two of the guys sleep in the kitchen because they can’t fit in the bedroom. We all have no WiFi, one bathroom, one bedroom, and have almost no personal space. We do have a yard which is awesome. The living situation is more uncomfortable here, and it’s exactly what we had been praying about.

For ministry here we are working with a foundation called Children’s Garden. They help house and take boys off the streets and out of poor environments. Over the past few weeks we have really gotten to know the 20 boys that reside there. They play a lot of basketball, and they are good. We help a lot on base with things like inventory, construction, and a lot of work in the garden. We are basically remodeling it. They have given us a lot of opportunities to do ministry off base. The past two Fridays we have gone to a local high school and gotten to testify to the students as-well as getting to know a few of them individually. Three times so far we have done something called outreach. Outreach is the chance to go to a poorer part of the neighborhood and hang out with the kids there. We get to do Bible story’s and crafts and snacks, and lots of games and running around. It is amazing! Saturday, the 24th, we went to Quezon province, which is three hours away and on the beautiful coast. We helped out at a house church that was started three years ago. It is a house church that the cook at Children’s Garden had been apart of. I got the chance to be part of worship. Lou is the teacher at Children’s Garden, and she was singing with Blake. Issac was playing the guitar, and I was on the cajon. I had never had any desire to do worship before this week. I really couldn’t tell you what changed, but I’m glad it did.

Our days usually start at 8:30 am. The latest I have woken up here is 7 am. I usually wake up at 6 am. My mornings look like, wake up, make coffee, spend time with God for a while. I have loved it. Over my time in Vietnam I grew such a big desire to spend time with the Lord, something I never had once in my life. I found peace in my time with the God, peace like I have never felt. While I had that desire In Vietnam, a lot of the time I put it off. I probably thought, “I will do it later”. That mindset left me in the Philippines, but the desire stayed. While it has been great, the more time I spend with him, the more I want to learn from him. And some days I have felt like I haven’t learned anything. But even then I have learned from that, sitting in God’s presence. The goal shouldn’t always be learning something, but to be with God. I think that I have never loved God more.

Before we left Vietnam we did a mini debrief in Ho Chi Min City for a few days. My team and the girls team also in Da Nang took a sleeper train 20 hours. Even in the small six person cab, I slept eight hours! I also dropped my phone out the train window with about 3 hours left. Whoops. I’m probably gonna write a blog more about that later, but without a phone I have really been able to focus on more important things. I had always thought that I did a good job on not spending too much time on my phone, but clearly I was wrong. So far in my no phone journey, I would recommend throwing your phone out of a train window in Vietnam.

Right now I am 80% fundraised. Thank you to those who have supported me this far. Thank you for prayers. I have been praying for those who support me and those who will support me. I have had time of stress when it comes to fundraising but along with everything I have learned from the Lord during my time, I have learned to trust in the Lord. Trust that he will provide.

“And this same God who takes care of me will supply all your needs…” Philippians 4:19

“And God will generously provide all you need. Then you will have everything you need and plenty left over to share with others.” 2 Corinthians 9:8

I have learned to give my worry’s and anxiety’s to God. God has given me such a passion for missions. To live out the great commission. To make disciples of all nations. To love those around the whole earth. Not only do I want that, I want to be able to testify to those at home, family and friends and fellow believers, to share what God has done with my saying yes to him. I want to share how God has worked in my own life, and used me to work in someone else’s life. It has felt so hard at times here but something I can testify to anyone who wants to hear, is that saying yes to God is not saying yes to an easy road. For me the yes was missions, for others the yes may be first believing in God. I’m praying for you. Thanks for reading.