In the Philippines!

Wow where to begin...

It's been a crazy ride so far! It couldn't have been a more seamless transit over here from Vancouver to Manila! From getting a whole aisle to ourselves on the flight to Taipei, to the check-in guys cutting us a lot of slack for our "overweight carry-on"!

Upon arrival we pretty much walked through immigration and found Pastor Sam and Art without too much problem. We ended up hiring a Van for our ride all the way to Baguio which was more expensive, but gave us a little more flexibility in our 6 hour ride from Manila.
First impressions of the Philippines... it's very interesting. For one, the people are definitely friendly and hospitable! It's almost like a mixing pot of a lot of other cultures i've experienced. Predominately a mix of latino and asian cultures I think , but I even see a bit of the Congo and China.

Getting to know Pastor Sam and his family has been so good. Well first of all we're living in their home... which is also the Balacbac church... which is also where about 7 other family members live. Oh yeah, the whole living-in-community thing didn't end with training haha... But yes, its been such a blessing to get to know Pastor Sam, his wife Auntie Evelyn, and the rest of his family as well as his church family.

We got a chance to sit down and discuss the ministries we will be involved in and we're getting excited. From the looks of it, we will be doing community bible surveys and bible studies, a few VBS programs with ENTIRE schools, planning and playing in evangelistic concerts with the local youth, and who knows what else to come. Yeah, God is definitely working and theirs lots of prayer that's going to have to go into these next few months, but we're excited.

Anyways, that's all i'm going to get off on this post before my jet-lag overtakes me. But here are a few pictures of our home for the next 3 months! Enjoy.

View from the balcony!

Me and Heart!

Sasusnod!

And so it ends/begins. . .

So departure time is immenent... And the training phase has been one heck of a ride. I can understand why TREK alumni have said that they would have paid for the training alone. God has really stretched me and grown me in this last month and a half and it's been a blessing to live in community with some awesome people.

A quick recap of (some) of the things we have learned...
- Hearing God's Voice
- Personal Holiness
- Spiritual Authority
- Team building and conflict resolution
- Evangelism
- Cross cultural ministry

It's hard to sum it all up... iand t's also hard to describe how excited we are! Its funny that today we talked about expectations... the ones we should have and the ones we may be unrealistic. I'm expecting to face a lot of challenges, but also that God is going to be doing something amazing. In each of us as disciples, but also in our ministries... regardless of how different they all are.

We know we're gonna miss each other here at TREK, but the way I see it... as corny as it sounds... it's almost like we're all on the same team, but just covering more ground. These last 2 months have been a real blessing, and I know that next 3 will be as well.

Until next time folks...

An awesome day around home...

one week

Mangandang Araw... its exactly 1 week and counting until we're on a plane heading to South East Asia. The excited, nervous, unprepared feeling is starting to really sink in. It's hard to believe 2 months has gone by just like that. We've finally reached the part of this whole thing which we looked forward to in the first place and the ironic thing is I don't feel like leaving! It's gonna be tough going from 11 fellow trekkers to 3...

Yesterday we got a chance to hang out at Steve K's place and wow... it is quite the house. Not even kidding, between the acre of hazelnut trees and a trail in the backyard leading down a ravine to the Fraser river it's hard not to admire. Anyways, after spending some time in the book of Mark, we started some trail maintenance, reinforcing the trails and laying down tires and mulch. I may have also nearly taken a tumble to my death, but thank goodness for a bouncy butt! Here are some pics, just cause i'm THAT impressed...

Welp here we go...

party time!

Partaayy..

Its been a week of celebration starting with Corina's birthday on Monday and then last night Sarah opened her home up to us for a little shindig!

It was good times all around with a great meal by Corina, and then some gaming. "What's yours like?" left us with some memorable quotes for the evening and telephone pictionary was a crowd pleaser as usual.

It was also good times seeing the girly for a sweet, if not brief, evening. Although I have to say that apparently I don't bode well around cats... or atleast cat leftovers. My nose was still runny when I got home.

Anyways, there's a lot to be thankful for this week including the sweet weather. We are all keeping Alex in prayer though as his health has gone from kinda bad to worse. We're hoping he'll recover soon...

Alrighty, until next time

Mo.


"Don't your people eat cats??"

First Post!

So here it is! I've put it off until 2 weeks before leaving for assignment, but it now exists!

We're in week 6 of TREK training and man has it been a good one. We've been talking about Evangelism, but really its been all about "Disciples making Disciples." The first step is to BE a disciple... Stay close to the vine and only then can you bear good fruit.

There's really too much to say about what I'm learning, but what I can say is that it has been good. We had a chance to attend a prayer meeting eaarrly this morning with a seniors fellowship at Central Heights. I love old people... or "older adults" to be PC. It gives me encouragement to know that there will be an army of people praying hard for you... and not just saying they'll pray for you to be nice but like ACTUALLY praying for you. Plus the A&W breakfast they bought us was sweet. =)

Anyways, there will be more updates to come... most likely after I actually leave the country... but UNTIL then, some things you may want to know!

The Commissioning service will be:
Thursday, March 3rd @ 7:00PM
Columbia Bible College Chapel
(Abbotsford, BC)

There's a good chance we'll be flying out that same night and so please come out if you can! Enjoy the following video and see the beautiful faces of my teammates!

Until next time...Blessings,

Mo

Meet Team Phillipines. We're ridiculously good-looking.