it's been a while....

If you are at all interested, I thought I would update you on my happenings since the Philippines as that is where my last entry was from. After taking the last team to the Philippines, I decided my time with YWAM Honolulu was done. No terrible experience or anything I just felt it was time to move on after 3 years. I came back to Edmonton and found it difficult to find a job so worked for my parents renovating our house. I did however get an e-mail from Heather inviting me to take over her English teaching job in China beginning in September. It would be a 3 month substitution while she was in the States. So instead of a paying job I worked at camp for a couple weeks. During this time I got sick with some sort of flu. When I came back to Edmonton I went to the doctor where I learned a liver enzyme was extremely high. During my time at home my ALT (liver enzyme) reached a high of 658 when the count should be below 50. This was a scary time for me having an unknown virus. So not having a job turned out to be a real blessing as I was going for many blood tests and doctors appointments weekly. Also during that time I was house/dog sitting, so it was nice to be able to rest during my time of recovery from the virus. the doctors let me book my ticket for China as soon as they could see that my ALT was on a steady decline, which I was very thankful for.

So I went to China! To the city of Xining (a city I went to last summer) to be an English teacher/dog sitter. My work load was light (2 work days and one professional development day), which left time for making friends and taking Mandarin lessons. At first, I was having a difficult time being alone, taking care of a difficult dog, not knowing many people, but as I met more, I began loving my time in Xining. At one point I was asked to share with all the Chinese teachers about "Love" in a cultural exchange. There I was able to share about examples of love I have seen (good and bad) and the perfect love of God. It was a lot of fun, and I never thought I would get an opportunity like that in China. After that I even was able to share with a Tibetan and a Han friend at different times. Three nights a week I would go to different English corners around the city and which was fun, but could also be wearing answering the same questions over and over again. I would always freeze when they would ask me what Canadian culture and history was like. I guess Social Studies was not my strong suite.

I made some amazing foreign friends while in Xining. Some are there to stay, others are in transit, and some are there for predetermined amounts of time. All have blessed me so much. At times I felt like I had a sign on my back that said "Give Me Free Food" because it seemed that I was unable to pay for a meal while eating with friends. I felt like he Hendersen's third son, the White's were my grandparents, and Paul and Alex were my bros. They made my time in Xining incredibly enjoyable.

I am now back in Edmonton and have yet to get a job, but am planning on reapplying at Moxies in West Ed. I still have to get some blood tests done to see if I still have that virus. Everything is currently up in the air in my life. University doesn't seem like a terrible idea, but I can't find anything that would really fit me so I may continue to put it off for the moment. Working full time at Pioneer Lodge has been something I've wanted to do for a really long time, and I am hoping to do that in the fall. After that.........who knows? University, open a coffee shop, go back to China, open a coffee shop in China. The options are limitless and I am excited to see what doors open up!

Olongapo-2

The Olongapo base is focussed on getting women out of the sex trafficking business. The program they offer is a 2 year and three month long training in witch they are discipled and trained in a trade. In this time they are also able to finish high school and start on a college education. There are currently 10 disciples in the program at various levels of completion. Our team has been getting to know these girls and their children. Most are single mothers with 1-3 children. We have also been trying to recruit new girls for the program. At night we enter the bars, order a sprite and begin chatting with the girls in groups. We have been able to pray for them and invite them to events we put on. We had a Bible study the other day where ten of the girls we got to know in the bars showed up. We played games, shared a testimony and got to share about the program run here. One of the girls is very interested and is on the verg of signing up. She is a mother of three and the only thing keeping her working at the bar is the money she makes there. You see, a girl is able to make in one night with no customers, the amount a male could working full time at an average job for a week. Many girls support entire families. One example is a girl I met who's father died, and her mother, grandparents, and her siblings were all left unsupported, so she went to the bars where she was able to provide for her family. We have a beach party planned for the bar girls tomorrow. Pray that many show up and will even sign up for YWAM Olongapo's program. We leave the Philippines June 2nd! A bit early, but we will be doing ministry in Hawaii as well to make up for the change in plans!

Olongapo

Our time in Baguio was special to us, and we learned much about ourselves, teaching and loving others. Our relationships with our contacts was able to grow deeper than usual because of the amount of time we spent there, just shy of 5 weeks. Our last weeks we conducted a second Discipleship Training Weeks and a VBS where we grew from 40 to 70 children in 3 days. But we as of yesterday we have moved south again to Olongapo. With the change of cities we also changed temperature. We have gone from a comfortable 25 to a ridiculous 35 Deg Celsius. I'm sweating a lot to say the least, but at least we don't have it as bad as the Bangladesh team, where it gets up to 50. We are staying at a YWAM base here, a restoration house for women formerly involved in the prostitution trade. So far we have just been getting to know the women and their children and exploring the neighbourhood. Some have only been here as little as a month, and some are now staff involved with one of the many ministries provided. We get orientation tomorrow when the leader of the base arrives back in the city.

Baguio City

What a interesting place Baguio is. Houses line the mountain sides and all the roads are winding. The weather is perfect here, staying around a comfortable 26 deg Cel. This past week has been busy. We ran our first of two Discipleship Training Weeks. We had around 20 consistent students, with others coming and leaving throughout the week. Everyone on the team got to share at least one lecture and they and they all did very well. Today we are running an entire church service, and tomorrow we begin another DTW at a new church. Thats all for now! Thank you all for your continued prayers!

The Philippines!

Wow! What a time we have had in Manila. From our first hour here we began planning 13 hours of child care that had to follow along with what was being taught on in the 50th year of YWAM celebration for the next day. We pulled it off though, and quite successfully to if I don't say so myself.

It has been such an amazing opportunity to be a part of many things that YWAM Manila is doing. We have been able to work with feeding, and TB programs as well as working with elementary, highschool, and college aged students. There is such a wide variety of ministries that go on here, from bathing the dumpsite children to home visitations of sponsored college students. In this time I have really been able to see the team step out into teaching, for some it is there first time. It is great to see every one of them step out into their gifting, and do it joyfully. The Manila base offers the opportunity to join in the ministry after DTS, and I could easily see how somebody would want to join what they are doing here.

It has been a tiring week, also made worse by the fact that 4 of us have cold like symptoms (including me), but we are not worn down. In fact we are thriving and much fruit has come out of some of the pressure we have been put under.

Tomorrow we leave for Baguio where we will be for exactly one month. We are excited for all that will happen there, and we are especially excited for the cooler weather!

Thank you for your continued support and prayers. Please pray for health for our team so that we will all be 100% by the time we arrive in Baguio!


Myself eating Balut, a Filipino treat. It's a developed chicken egg 17 days old.

Feeding Program & Bible story.

Hakon, on our way to ministry.

Washing the dumpsite children.

A Jeepney, public transportation.

Getting Ready To Go...Is The Philippines Ready For Us?

It seems to me as though this Philippines outreach has snuck up on me. Thats not to say I feel unprepared in any way, just that is feels like this school has whizzed by. This being the second outreach I have helped lead, I feel a lot more at ease and comfortable in the position. It also doesn’t hurt that the Philippines is a english speaking nation, especially in the big cities that we will be visiting.

We will begin our journey to the Philippines in Manila, the capital. There we are helping out at a 50th year of YWAM celebration that is being run around the world throughout this year. We will also be helping out with the slum ministries as a squatter’s village has been established on top of Manila’s main garbage dump.

From Manila we go to Baguio. There we are going to be teaching in three separate Discipleship Training Weeks, a very condensed version of a DTS. We are the speakers for the schools and each member of our team will be leading lectures, small groups, worship, and so on.

Olongapo is our final destination for ministry. It is estimated that 8% of people in Olongapo are prostitutes. We will be working in a restoration home for women that mentors, councils, and restores former prostitutes. There we will be teaching the women and girls in the house, displaying what is means to be brothers and sisters in Christ, and actually going into the bars to talk with these women and the customers. The last team that visited Olongapo, through a move of God, was actually able to get a 16 year old girl named Hannah and her son into the restoration house where she is now thriving and saving up to do her DTS in the Philippines.

The team is excited to go and everyone is doing fantastic. It’s another small team, but another all-star team. Again is seems like this DTS lecture phase has flown by, but I am so excited to see all God has in store for us in the Philippines.



Baptismal service


Performing Samoan dance at the talent show.

Team Philippines!

So since the last time I posted we have had a team member added giving us a grand total of four students. We also have also chosen where we'll be going in the Philippines: Manila, Bagio, and Olongapo. In Manila we will be doing slum ministry and also children's ministry, teaching curriculum during a 50th year of YWAM celebration. In Bagio we will be doing a followup visit to a town struck by mudslides that the last team had visited. We will also be the main speakers during two Discipleship Training Weeks which are basically very very condensed DTS's. Olongapo is a fairly new destination for our outreach teams and they focus on getting women and girls out of the prostitution industry. It will be a very varied outreach as far as ministries, and I'm sure we will be doing far more.

I have started a "gospel choir" with three of the members of my team ( so really it's more like a quartet"). We sing mostly songs I learned from choir in high school. It's been a lot of fun and something kind of new.

The speakers for this quarter have been awesome. Right now we have Tom Osterhaus, base director of YWAM Maui, speaking on Biblical World View. He is excellent speaker who is able to get everyone thinking.

This is the team: Danielle, Håkon, Cortney, Chelsea, Me, Megan

Our car broke down on the side of a highway on our way to go BBQ at a beach.

Since we new it would take well over an hour for another car to come rescue, we had our grill on the side of the highway.

Outreach!

So outreach locations have been announced and decided! My co-leader Chelsea and I will be taking a team of 3 students to the PHILIPPINES! It's been a bit tough to keep it a secret from all the students for the past 3 weeks, but we have made it. There will also be another team going to Bangladesh with 7 students. So thats it! Be praying for my small team that we can bond and unify so we are ready to go to the Philippines in April!

Here we go again!

It has been an amazing start to the DTS this year. We have 10 students, two if which are guys and that is a huge answer to prayer. For this January quarter we decided to introduce an "Exodus". We surprised the students with a camping trip with a limited supplies list, each had a buddy they had to stay within arms distance of, and they did not know how long it would be. It was extremely need to see these people be challenged and pushed in ways they never had been. One of the best parts was we were able to stay at Kualoa ranch (where LOST, and Jurassic Park were filmed) in exchange for doing some work for the ranch. One day we had a five and a half hour hike, and the next we worked in a taro field weeding and planting. It was hard work but fun at the same time. We ended the trip with a feast back at base where each student had there feet washed and prayed for by a staff member. It was an awesome time of openness and brought the school to a level that usually takes weeks to get to.

Teams are being decided next week, so I'll be able to tell you more about that at that time. For now however I am trying to study Romans to be able to teach in Bible Reading over the next several weeks, I am also on the events crew this semester which has been going well.

Thank you everyone for your support!!!