The plane lands, once again, and we arrive into the Philippines with the welcoming announcement of 87 degree weather at 6 o’clock at night. Another promising month of hot, humid weather awaits our new team as we travel the Philippines meeting contacts for AIM and setting up ministry opportunities for the June and September World Race teams.
Our first contacts welcomed us at the Airport with a big sign and even bigger smiles. Immediately the 8 of us were split into three teams to spend our first night in different areas of the slums here in the capital city of Manila. Mission Ministry Philippines (MMP) has a three fold vision of reaching out to the poorest of the poor in the slums, through holistic church planting, pre-school programs and community organizing.
Today we were given statistics by MMP saying 60-70% of Filipinos are poor, with 30% of those being in metro Manila, totaling about 400 slum communities here in the city. Jesus did say that there would always be the poor among us, but I don’t think that was to give us an excuse to ignore the problem. If you are in the slums of Manila it is pretty hard to ignore.
Last night ended up being a restless night sleeping on tables in the pre-school/church in a part of the slums along the Bay of Manila. After being greeted by our host, we had other, not so welcome, greetings from a couple cockroaches, a small mouse and a not so small foraging rat. This morning we rose early to walk the surrounding area with the local Pastor and see with our own eyes what the community here along the bay was truly like.
I couldn’t believe my eyes. The poverty that surrounds us is some of the worst I’ve seen the entire World Race. While the trash, small homes built practically on top of each other and putrid smells stood glaring in my face, I saw even more clearly the beautiful people of the Philippines. Smiles were quick to share and kids chased us laughing and hiding behind the nearest obstacle, too bashful to remain in the open. Through their circumstances there remains a joy in the spirit of these people that is unmistakable. I cried out in silent prayer, “God! Do you see this?! Do you see these people!? What are you going to do about it?”, but maybe He’s asking us the same thing.
Please keep our team in your continued prayers, as well as the ministries we will be visiting during our month here in the Philippines. To check out other racers blogs that are on my “new” team look for; Scott & Linnea Molgard, Josh Daniels, Rusty Jackson (.myadventures.org) and my long time team mates; Lynette Lee, Amy Morris and Alissa Gibson.
* I have not reached my full support yet, please keep that in your thoughts prayers, as well as the other racers in the same situation. Click the “Support Me!” link on the left hand side if you would like to contribute. Thank you all for all the prayers and support to date. GOD BLESS
