Tag: Philippines

In December 2003, our first Christmas in this village, a group of carolers stopped by our house one night.  In a way, it was fun.  They sang familiar carols, but the words were in their mother tongue.  After they sang several carols, we thanked them by giving them some of Ginger’s homemade Christmas cookies and […]

. . .  and I didn’t even hear much of it. For the last several weeks, one of my daily routines is to go visit Tay Hesus.  As you know, he has stage 4 cancer and his body is losing the battle.  Over the last few weeks, he has grown weaker and weaker.  Because of […]

“Ouch!” Yesterday, we traveled three hours back to the village, unpacked, and prepared for another week of school and work.  This morning, as Stephen was outside, he noticed that something wasn’t quite right with the outside door.  Upon closer examination, he noticed that a board was out of place.  Our doors have large spaces at […]

The last few months, everything seemed to be going well, very well.  Friend Sunday in May was a success with over 50 visitors to church; Sports Bible Camp reached almost 50 teens; weekly attendance in Youth Group is averaging over 30; the new Kids’ Bible Club started with an attendance of 47 kids; the Luke […]

For several weeks now, one of our believers, Hesus, hasn’t been able to attend church services on Sunday.  So, this past Sunday, after the morning service, Ginger and I took a short walk over to Hesus’ house.   A short walk it was but something Hesus can’t do anymore; he can’t even get out of bed.  […]

As missionaries, we often encourage our kids to get involved in the ministry, however they can and however they want.  Their main ministry, of course, is with the village kids and building relationships.  For Luke and Jonathan, this often comes in the form of sports:  basketball and soccer.  For Rebekah and Abigail, this comes in […]

This Thursday morning we awoke with the news that our Agutaynen neighbor gave birth to a son.  At 6am, the village midwife was at our gate and excitedly shared with us all the details of the event that took place just a few hours before.  If you don’t mind, we won’t share all those details […]

Where there once was green, lush grass, there is now bare, dry land.  The village wells that once were filled are now dry and abandoned.  Everywhere we look, we see the evidence that we need rain.  Even though the rains ceased about four months ago, the flowers still bloom.  However, their beauty is quickly covered […]