Life and Ministry update

WARNING LONG POST AHEAD READ AT YOUR OWN RISK It has been more than a year since I have updated this blog. Last time we updated the kids where finishing a school year and we had just gone into lockdown due to COVID-19. The Island was in lockdown for several months. Travel to and from the island was an only as needed basis and anyone coming onto the island had to quartine for 14 days. travel around the island was harder also. There where check points set up at every town. You would have to exit your vehicle and have your temprutare taken and then reenter your vehicle to get through the town. kids where only allowed in the town for doctor or emergency. this went on for several months. soon the lockdown was lifted but there where strict rules in place. Facemask and shields required everywhere and kids where only allowed out on certian days times. In the village things where not enforced as much but the towns and the city where strict about enforcement. Just recently Travel to and from other islands has opened back up to the general public. Leaving the island is easy but coming back requires a negative swab test. And the test, results and travel all have to happen within 72 hours. If the test is positive you will either not be allowed back or special circumstances will allow you to travel but you will have a medical drive to a place of quartine till the test comes back negative. travel around the island is easier but the rules for stores and malls are still strictly enforced. November we where allowed to have our youth start meeting again but had the mask and social distancing rules. We live in the village so is not strictly enforced. We do our best to follow the guidelines. We where allowed to have a Christmas party with our youth. We made a full day of it with some worship time, teaching and games. The youth had a great time and where excited to be meeting again. January came and saw some health concerns for Jessica. A couple of trips to the doctor figured out I had a severe kidney infection and kidney stones. The infection was brought under control with a two week course of antibiotics and the stones where small. I felt better after that and thought everything was great. We continued meeting with the youth two Sundays a week and Precious started her won ministry with the church, more about that later though. Fast forward to the end of April and Saw health concerns for Jessica again. This time it was a trip to the emergency room for severe abdominal pain. after an ultrasound and a Catscan. The doctor found a mass on my colon that led to an emergency surgery. The mass was removed along with two smaller ones on my small intestine. They where all sent off for biopisy and after ten days in the hospital I was finally able to come home on mothers day. The first seven days in the hospital I had no food or drink. It was not till the last three days that I was slowly able to start eating and drinking again. The biopisy came back positive for colon cancer. I was refered to an Oncologist and started Chemotherapy the beginning of June. I am almost done with the first cycle and have seven more after this. I have one course of IV Chemo and then two weeks of oral meds, one week off and then start over with the IV. I have to do this for eight times and then they will test again. When the Chemo is done and I am in remission then the Surgeon will reverse the chlostomy. God is Faithful though and I have been recovering well and so far have not been sick or had reactions to the Chemo. The first two to three days after the IV cycle I sleep a lot but other than that I am thankful to be feeling really great. I have had some questions recently about our ministry and am not sure that I have made it really clear what we are doing here in the Philippines now. The Orphange was shut down due to the difficulty in registering it with the government. There where for kids living in the orphanage at the time and they have a home with us. We are still working on the adoption of all four of them. The process has been delayed even farther due to COVID. Instead we have started a youth program in the church. We meet two Sundays a month with the youth. Youth here is from 9-when you get married. This means we have some youth in there 30's. The older help out in a leadership capacity but are still part of the youth program. At our meetings we have a time of sharing about how God is working in peoples life, 5-10 young people share each time we meet. We then have a time of praise and worship, a teaching by Jonah or I and then small group discussion. The whole program is one that we have developed and the teachings come from resources we can find for free or purchase online. The youth have really enjoyed this and if for some reason we can not meet they are always asking when we can meet again. We also try to have at least three youth camps a year. The youth camps last for 2-3 days and have youth from all over the island. Our church youth is about 75 young people but our youth camps are about 150 young people. The youth all stay on sight and we have fun and a time of growing and learning in the faith. Precious has grown into a missionary in her own right and has taken on a big ministry. She asked Jonah and I if she could start a Sunday school program for our kids kinder to grade 6. With funds provided from the mission budget she has taken this task on with a diligent and humble heart. She prepares a lesson every week for two classes and also finds and provides at least four to five activities to go with each lesson. We do not have prepared and premade curriculums available to us so everything we do is from research and whatever God gives us. She prepares the lesson at least a week in advance so the teachers can prepare and study and if the activities are harder they are given in advance as well. The kids are split into two classes one for younger kids, kinder to grade two and the other class is grade 3-6. The younger class does a lot of color pages and other easier activities and the older kids are more on word puzzles and that kind of thing. Precious does all of the research and printing. She also does the schedule for the teachers and all of the teachers are given a love gift at the end of each month she also makes sure that is done. She ask help in typing the story for the teachers once in awhile but otherwise this has been 100% her ministry. If you ask her She will tell you it is not a big thing and she has lots of help. She is quite humble about it and loves it. She loves the kids and has made it her mission to get to know each one on a personal level. The kids know she cares and they love her in return. We are so proud of her for hearing Gods call and answering it all while living her everyday life as a daughter, sister and student also. Faith has been gettting involved a little with the worship team and loves music and singing. Mickiala, Andrew, Mark and Marah are all either part of the Sunday school or youth and are growing up to fast. School this school year is coming to a close again the end of this month and it has been a unique and growing year for all of us. It was decided back in October that the students would not be allowed to do face to face learning with the teachers. Some of the larger cities where able to do online classes but those of us on smaller Islands and in the villages had to do modular learning. We as parents go to the school every Friday and recieve a packet from the teachers that have all of the concept notes and activities for the kids to complete for the week. They get one packet for every subject. The older kids can for the most part complete the work themselves with some help from mom dad or a young person we have hired to tutor some of the older ones. The three youngest is hands on for mom and dad. We found out the beginning of this month that the school year will be done the end of this month and that most of our kids are having to do two weeks worth of school in one this whole month so they can be done on time. The start of the next school year is still a question mark as to when and weather they can return to face to face is still being decided. It has been discussed to do half and half but not sure. Precious Has continued to do well with school. This year has been harder for her but she has a couple of friends that have been a great support for her. Faith has done well also and needs a little help with a couple of subjects but most of the time does great with school. Sometimes getting it done is hard but that is lack of motivation. A pep talk from mom or dad usually gets her back on track. The rest of the kids have had a harder time of this year but they are learning and getting it done. We always want to thak God for his faithfulness in all he has done for us. We thank all of you for your support as well. Sorry for the long post and thank you for reading it. GOD BLESS!!!