Merry Christmas!
First weeks in the Philippines
Greetings from the Philippines 🇵🇭! We have been here now for two weeks and we are enjoying it immensely.
Random fact about the Philippines, people here love Christmas and celebrate it from September to February so a lot of our ministries have been Christmas themed. Philippinos also love karaoke so when we walk down the streets we hear a lot of Christmas karaoke.
There have been some amazing opportunities to serve here! We have been able to do children’s ministry, teach and give testimonies and dramas in churches, give services at the jail and evangelize. It’s been amazing to see God working through the people but also through the team.
One of our students was able to give a teaching on hearing Gods voice to a youth group. After we broke out into small groups and were able to lead the youth into hearings Gods voice for the first time. One girl shared with me after that a few months ago she was doubting if God speaks or is even real, but after we led her through the exercise, she got a word from God and now her faith is renewed and she is recommitting her life to Jesus. The girl is only 14 years old. It’s amazing to see how God can work in these young lives.
We also got to pray for some local officials who just got elected to run the area where the YWAM base that was hosting us is. There I got to pray for a man named Carlos and afterwards he shared with me, with tears in his eye that he had seen many Christian’s from all different denominations come by through this area. But our team was different. That the excitement and enthusiasm that we all have is so special. He has suffered the effects of a stroke for the past few years and had given up hope for healing, but after receiving prayer he had more faith that God will heal him.
Two days ago we arrived in Bontoc Mountain province and are staying at the YWAM base here. We will celebrate Christmas as a team with some pancakes and if the wifi is working, a Christmas movie.
Prayer points:
for the health of the team: a few of us are battling a cold, probably brought on from the shift in temperatures from one location to another. Laoag was around 35 degrees during the day and Bontoc is 20 degrees.
For a good Christmas spent together as a team, even though we are all very far from home
That people will be open to giving there life to Christ. We have many ministry opportunities where we can pray for people and we have been able to lead a few people to Christ. We pray for more of this as we continue our ministries
For energy and unity in the team
Here is a quick video to give you a sneak peak into what life in the Philippines at our first location, Laoag was like.