I started this blog a little bit ago while we were still in
the Philippines-
Since I have slacked big time on
the blogs I feel obligated to write a big huge blog summarizing all that’s
happened to me over the past 3 weeks… But how can one describe the movement of
God in mere words? How can I tell you about what I learned while Gary and Lisa
Black were here, without you meeting this crazy man and woman first-hand? Will
you really grasp all of the hurt and pain we see every day as we walk to and
from ministry “sites” or get even a glimpse of the change in our hearts after
praying for men and women who have neglected their own families in order to get
drunk? Maybe. I’m not completely convinced you will really get it without being
here, holding the hand of a broken heart or seeing the shame in a man’s eyes
when you tell him he is great. But I must try. I must push on through my
growing hatred toward modern technology to let you hear as much of my heart as
I can bear to show you. To start off, I’ll fill you in on some of the more
physical aspects of our time in the Philippines:
living
environment:
We stayed at the home of Jeff Long and his family
(runs KIM ministries here). They’ve been in Cuatro (named this because this
community is right by the 4th tee/hole of the golf course down the street from
us) for about 20 years, though only in this house for less than 2 years. Each
bedroom has its own full bathroom with a flushing toilet (have to throw TP in
the trash can…) running sink (safe drinking water), and shower (with heat,
though it’s always so hot and humid we always take cold showers). We have a
full-time cook who makes breakfast and dinner every day (some really good food,
but obviously not American). She actually thinks American’s are obsessed with
Peanut Butter and toast, so there’s always lots of that. However, the PB in the
Philippines is not nearly as good as PB in the US. Again, the water on the
property is clean and everything so we don’t have to worry about getting sick
off the water. It’s not as rugged as we all expected, but we know there will be
much tougher environments in the next 10 months.
local area:
Again, we live in a community/neighborhood called
Cuatro, in the “town?” of Antipolo outside of Manila, the capital of
Philippines. Manila is quite a large city, but we’re on the outside of it, so
we don’t really go into the city for anything. Cuatro is basically a
“squatter town.” I’m not going to go into what this means, but
basically everyone’s essentially poor. Jeff Long has built a children’s home
(orphanage) just up the road from our house (the Green House- it’s green…)
less than 100 yards away. And then if you walk through the
“Cut-Through” a little path cutting right through the community (more
on that later), you will find the school building that the kids from the
orphanage go to, as well as the church (one story above the school) that locals
go to. All of these buildings are in the heart of the community, surrounded by
“houses.” When I say Houses, they’re more like large boxes… Just
whatever the families can find to nail together to create walls and a roof.
Some times there are families of 5 or 6 in these houses no bigger than 100
square feet (10X10). All of these houses are stacked next to each other and
sometimes on top of each other. There is trash and the smell of bodily waste
everywhere you go. Chickens everywhere, dogs everywhere, cats everywhere, some
goats. Vehicles don’t really have any safe exhaust systems on them, so you
smell bad exhaust all the time.
ministry/the
people:
Many of the people in the area don’t have jobs.
This could be based on a number of factors: many of the men and women in the area are drunks- Just plain old boozers. It’s not unusual to introduce yourself
to someone and have them stumble around, giving you all of their nicknames
(mumbling, of course) and such, and it’s only 10 in the morning (some start
drinking at 8am). There is actually a family we ran into, where the mother
(Lonnie) was out drinking from 10am to 10 pm every day, and neglected her two
toddlers at home. This family actually lives in a sub-community we have deemed
“the Tunnel,” because the entrance into the community is a hole in a
cinder-block wall no bigger than 3.5ft X 3ft, then you walk on some logs
suspending you over an open ditch filled with gross water (as well as human
waste, probably), then back into the town “center” that is outside,
but the houses are so close (and 2-stories tall) it’s essentially an ally way
with a crack of sky you can barely see past the roofs. We (Team Karis) prayed
and made this community, “the Tunnel,” our main focus for ministry in
the Philippines. We took the family with the two toddlers (twins) food, and tried
to build relationships with the mother. Back in The Tunnel we also met a family
that lives next door, who’s head is Mario. Mario is a house painter, but hasn’t
had work for years. He has 3 (?) daughters, and 1 or 2 granddaughters (though I’m
personally confused by all the different relations), who all live with him. He
is a shy man, but is very good at guitar, and he actually approached me one day
about starting a bible study. He had led a bible study at one time, along with
a local pastor, but for some reason that ended and he doesn’t have much of a
connection to anything. We invited him and his family to church with us on
Sundays and it was good to see them there, speaking with old friends and the
pastors. We actually took him and his family out to dinner to Pizza Hut one
night, and it was so fun to just spend time with them. Mario is a light in a
really dark place. The Tunnel is not just literally dark, but you can feel the
spiritual oppression of evil and darkness. There is lots of drunkenness,
laziness, sexual oppression, perversion, and mockery in just this little
sub-community. We try to make it a point to stop in The Tunnel at least once a
day just to say hi and pray for anyone who wants/needs it. We don’t want to be
a burden, but we want to raise up the people in that community who have the
ability and voice for change (Mario). There is also a man, Jason, who speaks
English very well, and who has deemed himself our official community
tour-guide. He tells us he is gay, and he really seems to be consumed with
mockery and gossip, but we believe he can be used for greatness. Brandon and I
got the chance to sit down with him and talk to him about leading a life with
Christ as the center of it. He has already been a huge blessing to us in
introducing us to some sick people, as well as Mario and his family. And Jason and
Mario have risen up to pray and hopefully begin something big in The Tunnel. So
our hearts are in this community, and hopefully God has worked through us.
The Cut-through, as I mentioned earlier, is a
commonly used path from one side of the community to the other, used by most,
if not all, of the people in the community. When we first arrived in Cuatro,
the path was simply a big drainage ditch, muddy, slippery, and dangerous from
years of flooding and people walking on it. Many of the kids don’t have shoes
or even flip flops, so it’s even more dangerous for them. Even the kids from
the orphanage use this path daily to get to and from school. Also, the path was
literally covered in trash and garbage, making it absolutely disgusting (and
more dangerous, considering all of the bugs and rats that feed on all that
crap). So we talked to Jeff Long about maybe trying to clean that up for the
community, and Jeff jumped right in saying he’ll buy concrete and gravel for us
to make a 2 ft wide path all the way through! The people of Cuatro now have a
safe and efficient path to use to go to church, the store, school, or whatever
as we worked our tails off to finish the path in about 4 days. We worked the
last week digging out sufficient drainage alongside the path so it wouldn’t get
washed away with heavy rains, and it’s all been amazing to see how it’s all
come together.
I spent some decent time at the children’s home
trying to be a father to the 30+ kids living there. It’s awesome just to be
able to play with the kids, learning new games, cuddling, and reading stories
to the kids. Since our first week and training, I’ve really been trying to
focus on intimacy with God as my Father, not just some distant King who asks me
to serve Him. So it was good to see how God is my Father through my
interactions with the kids. I’ll probably say this about all of our locations,
but I could see myself coming back here someday to work with these kids more in
the future.
There was a boys home in the next town over that
has a 10-month program for boys rescued from the streets. We spent four days
(two Tuesdays and Thursdays) with them, teaching them math and English,
everything from basics in writing letters and numbers to some doing advanced
algebra. Then we played basketball and praise songs with them and just hung
out. It was a great experience and we all loved it so much.
God’s doing a lot in that area and it was so good
to be a small part of it.
Continue reading in Philippines Wrap-Up Part 2.
