February 7th, 2011
I haven’t done pushups in over a week, which means I’m pushing up to 1000 behind. Maybe I’ll do them all tomorrow and get it over with. lol
This morning was usual. We didn’t sing karaoke because Lia Frederick (liafrederick.theworldrace.org) busted out with the guitar. After breakfast, at about 9am, we all hopped on a jeepney we had rented for the day and drove to some nearby towns where people come to the church from. They don’t get visited much, so it was nice to visit them.
Hospitality around the world has so far astounded me. We’ve been in poor parts of poor countries and the people give us the best of what they have, and it’s good. I remember to the stark contrasts of some of the european countries we’d been to where we were served with hospitality, but the spirit (I don’t mean the Holy Spirit) just wasn’t behind it.
Anyways, we had some great chicken chowder soup at the first village we went to. Some neat little fried banana things at the second place, all sorts of goodies at the third, and in the fourth place people climbed coconut trees and fetched coconuts for us so we could have fresh coconut juice and pulp! And it was good!
But we got to see the far reaches of the Threads of Hope (ToH) ministry, and the many small village churches that had sprung up around those bracelet-making communities. We got to meet families and people first-hand whose lives had been changed by God through ToH. I remember one woman Atay Pastora (literally “(bigger) sister Pastora”) who was a single mother of nine children. Making bracelets through ToH had helped her put her children through high school, and will still help put her youngest ones through. She had mothered well: she had a wall full of academic medals given to her children by their schools; awards for good behavior, helpfulness, grades, service, et cetera. It was a privilege to pray for her and the many other people we met today.
Oh Lord, give me the same heart you have for people.
We came back and around 2pm and ate PB&J’s before everyone went their own way. I and Jake (jakevannorman.theworldrace.org) and Joshua (joshuamaisner.theworldrace.org) went upstream to a nice little watering hole we found which is fed by a chute of water curving down through a rock. We took our bars of soap and washed up there. (It’s just more fun to do than a bucket shower.) We goofed around for about two hours and by the time we got back there were mashed potatoes and chicken and green beans for dinner. So we eat. I watched the movie Con Air with Jake, Bethsaida (bethsaidaportalatin.theworldrace.org), and Leah (leahmohrig.theworldrace.org) and now am writing this blog. I’ll go to bed once I’m done.
All in all, good day. We thank God for that!
On the business side of things… I’m technically not fully funded, I’m remaining on the race by promise to pay any remaining balance by the end of the final month. Right now that balance is about $4,000. Please help me pay it down by donating! Also, for security reasons I’ll be out of contact for the month of March. No news is good news.
