In all the countries we’re visiting
a big question we try to ask ourselves is, “What are we leaving
behind?� In New Zealand we left behind two successful conferences that
probably couldn’t have been done without our extra 30 people or so. That
was great and we saw some huge fruit from people who were leaving the
conferences with chains broken off, but we didn’t have much of a chance
to be relational. In Australia we spent the whole month diving in deep
with the Aboriginal people and we fell in love with their passionate
hearts and beautiful spirits. We left that country with many tears and
relationships that will continue. We know we were able to bless the
church there and leave behind encouragement and all of us built each
other up in that experience. On top of that a new member of our family
was “born� there and I continue praying for Justin after he has turned
his heart to Jesus.
The Philippines was a different experience for us. We went in asking
for the dirty jobs, the ones no one else wanted us to do. We’ve shared
about many of the relational things we left behind, tutoring, painting a
widows home, etc., but I wanted to share a little more about the
census.
When we started the project, the census was a mess of binders filled
with incomplete paperwork and lots of disorganized information. The
ministry there felt that the census could be a helpful tool, but it
needed a lot of work to get it there. We took on that project, not
realizing the full extent of the craziness it entailed.
In the middle of February, 2010, a team of 11 youth and adult
chaperons from Hong Kong came to minister to the Cuatro Community where
Kids International Ministries is located. The youth group traveled
around the Cuatro area with the hopes of feeding 5000 people. They also
provided every family they visited with a bible and gathered information
about each family’s needs for the census. Each group also gave a cross
to the homes they visited to be displayed outside the home with a house
number and the names of the family.
Over the course of the month, on top of the relationships and amazing
experiences with orphans, we were able to organize all of the
information from the binders and Catherine and Liz played a huge role in
organizing the team and the paperwork. The whole team went around the
entire neighborhood, walking for miles a day sometimes through tiny
alleyways to meet people and get more information about their needs. I
wound up designing a computer program (something I’ve never done before
and probably wouldn’t want to try again) that would track all of the
information gathered and allow the ministry to search for specific
people in the database. It was a tough month for me as a relational
person but Catherine and Liz really pulled the team together and helped
us to be effective, Michelle, Monica and Charlotte spent countless hours
out with a translator gathering data, and we left behind a way that
some of the poorest people in the Cuatro community will now have access
to the things they need.
Hopefully this database can be a
long-term tool used by many more missionary groups that will go to
Manila, just like us, and be able to bring food to people who need it,
assist with medical care, and pray for the brokenhearted, of which we
encountered and prayed for many ourselves.
Thanks for helping make projects like this possible and please
remember that we need your support. We just passed the halfway mark in
our support raising goals but we still need your help. Please support us
by clicking the link on the side of the blog!
Thanks for your prayers!
