Hey you all I am heading to the Philippines today,Weds!!! I am very excited to be in this country for the next six weeks! I will be ringing in the New Year on an island. Not too bad :). Here is some good information that Hannah from AIM has been setting up and it is some good stuff. You can look up a map and see how close my team is to the water. I will let everyone know ASAP a P.O. box as soon as I know. Thanks for your patience. 🙂
I would appreciate prayers for travels, safety, and health. That the Lord would show us through clear eyes what ministry opportunities fit each of us, and whom we are directed to disciple. I covet all of you and your blogs and your prayers!!! Thanks for all your love and support!!!
Here’s the update 🙂
For the next few days, they will stay at Jeff Long’s place, a dormitory that used to be part of Faith Academy (a school for MKs) and have a debrief. In addition, I will be briefing them on their ministries in the Philippines. I have put almost 3 weeks of traveling there into setting this up for them. One team (LESS) will be staying in Manila and working with Jeff Long and his ministry. There is much to do, and I’m sure everyone will find an aspect of ministry they can really connect well with. Some examples are orphanage work and slum ministry, but there are even more available, depending on what people are interested in.
The other three teams will each be traveling south into the Visayas and staying in different cities. We are partnering for the first time with ICM (International Care Ministries). ICM provides feeding and medical programs through local churches in the Philippines. As they do so, they have regular fellowships and training seminars for Filipino pastors who are/have recently church-planted. They also train lay people in how to lead others to Christ and do basic discipleship. All of their staff (with the exception of one couple) are Filipino, which makes it an extremely effective ministry. It is funded and guided in leadership by an international executive board in Hong Kong made up of an American, a man from Hong Kong, two Australians and a Singaporean–all who are international business people living in Hong Kong and investing their money and their business connections into spreading the Gospel and changing poverty in the Philippines. So far, the Filipino pastors who are connected to ICM have never worked with foreigners. The chairman of ICM asked me to visit many of them and access the needs they have beyond what ICM provides.
I spent two weeks visiting 30+ pastors, most of whom are extremely poor and pastor churches less than 2 years old. Congregation sizes range from 5 to 60 adults and denominations vary. (ICM is interdenominational, with a basic faith statement.) What WR teams will be doing is each staying near to one ICM base for one month and working with churches there. Poverty is a HUGE problem and something they will see very closely. Their main ministry focus is to help meet needs of pastors that ICM can’t. They will do this through construction, evangelism, delivering supplies, crusades, children’s ministry, leading church services, film showings and school outreaches. Many times they will have huge opportunities to pray with pastors and encourage them. I can’t tell you how many of the pastor’s I met have given up good paying jobs and moved to an area where they can’t even get a job and put everything they can into their church and the growth of their members. As a result, they have no income and they feed their families off of unripened bananas while living in one-room bamboo structures that leak when it rains (every day for 8 months/year). They do all of it because they know the Lord has called them to that place and they won’t have anything but his will. We will help these pastors, yes, but to encourage them in their work will be just as significant as any ministry we do alongside of them.
In addition, each base has about 20 Filipino staff. A good number of the staff are in their twenties and would love foreign friends. There are huge opportunities to build relationships with them and informally disciple them. In addition, teams will be blessed by the genuine friendships they can make with the staff. Honestly, they’re doing much the same work as we are!
Teams can check out my blog to find out more about what these places are like: hannam.myadventures.org. I still have a lot more to post on there as well so if you check today, make sure to check again next week as well.
Team city assignments will be:
MANILA — LESS
BACOLOD — Ignite
DUMAGUETE — Seven:Eleven + 3 members from Beloved One
TAGBILARAN — 3 members from Beloved One (including their leader)
The Dumaguete and Bohol teams will be close enough to see each other for Thanksgiving, and they have been invited to a gathering of western missionaries who celebrate the Saturday after Thanksgiving. The other teams will have the day off for Thanksgiving, but they will be on their own to plan an activity. It’s quite possible that the Manila group can find a gathering of western missionaries as well. There are many in the greater-area. The Bacolod group are likely to be the only foreigners anywhere in their area 🙂
LESS will have no travel except from the airport to Jeff’s base. They will be staying in dorms with beds and bathrooms there. Ignite + Seven:Eleven + Beloved One will all take a ferry from Manila to Bacolod, one day’s travel, but they have rooms and beds on the ferry. (It should be a nice rest day.) Ignite will be picked up and taken to the ICM base there, where they will be living. They have mattresses on the floor and some beds, plus two toilets (called “CRs” or “Comfort Rooms”). Seven:Eleven+ Beloved One will get off the ferry and proceed immediately to the bus station, where they will take a bus to Dumaguete (5 hours, but there are movies on board). Both teams will spend the night at the house of western missionaries who live in Dumaguete and teach at a Bible college there. Seven:Eleven + 3 members of Beloved One will live here their entire month. The next day, the other 3 members of Beloved One will catch a short (2 hour) ferry to Tagbilaran. They will stay in a hotel there for the month. At the end of the month, everyone will do reverse travel back to Manila except the 3 people at Tagbilaran. They will actually stay an extra day for a special outreach on December 21st, and then they will fly back to Manila.
