Making Friends for Eternity
Off to a good start
The new year started with joy and sleepless nights for missionary pilot and nurse Andriy & Tanya, and daughter Anzhela, with the birth of their first son Nazar! The end of January brought much appreciated help from Dwayne’s brother, Eric and wife, Katie who sacrificed a month of vacation time for manual labor and cold showers! We took them to Palawan where Eric visited old friends from his time there 5 years ago. Dwayne finished the annual inspection on the Cessna and Sean, our Palawan pilot, and Dwayne did some supply drops into the mountains. We flew on to Mindanao where we officially began work on the next airbase which will be at the old MVC (Mountain View College) airstrip. After doing all we could in Mindanao, we headed back “home” to north Luzon where the guys built a fuel shed and a “chipper” machine for recycling branches into mulch for the fruit trees and garden. Katie helped Wendy finish a big project preparing 29 nights of crafts for a children’s program.
New Missionaries to Dark Provinces
We took another journey last month to the “Mountain Province” in northern Luzon, which is one of the most beautiful and also least reached with the Seventh-day Adventist last-day message. In this area English is preferred over Tagalog, but many of the tribal groups are isolated with different languages and strange customs. The Ifugao tribes are known worldwide for their hard work and incredible skills in rice-terracing. They are lesser known for their not-so-long ago rituals such as hanging their dead in coffins on the sides of rock cliffs and even cannibalism! Just a few months ago we were praying with our district pastor for more missionaries for these neglected areas. God answered our prayers and helped us place three more missionaries in the field! Though we realize it is a drop in the bucket, we know God specializes in doing much with little! Please pray for these missionaries and the great work God has given them. We also ask for your continued prayers for Heaven’s resources to be opened in providing helicopters to speed this work!
A broken heart and the heart of missions
The joys and the heart of missions is in the personal friendships made and in seeing lives changed. All around us in this world there are people in crisis - people longing for relief from emotional and physical pain that money cannot fix. These pictures are just a few of the stories of lives we’ve had the privilege of touching recently. Another story not pictured is a young man in his late 30’s that we, our district pastor, and some SDA youth started visiting lately. His wife left him 3 years ago and his health has declined rapidly ever since, seemingly from a broken heart. June lives in a rural village in a small, dark house where he spends most of his time sitting and staring at his wasted, useless legs. In our visits we focus on hope and joy with plenty of songs, smiles, and praises to God. During our last visit we saw the first smile on June’s face, and though it’s hard for him to read, he now spends a few moments a day reading a Bible study guide we gave him. He and his mother thanked us for our visits and pleaded with us to please keep coming!
A Children's Church
The Banuar Seventh-day Adventist Church (located just in front of the PAMAS airbase in Quirino, Luzon) is becoming a point of interest lately. Though it is a comparatively big church for it’s rural location, it’s attendance has never been high until lately when an interesting phenomenon began to take place. Last year after the usual summer VBS program, children of all ages (5 to 15 years old) began attending the regular church services 3 times a week. The prayer meeting and vespers programs that usually consisted of 4 or 5 people began to grow to 20 plus! We began to tailor the programs more and more for the children, and after some time we saw the need for a more structured program. So we started a child evangelism series two nights a week that included scripture songs and crafts. The children loved it! Before long there were close to 40 children attending every Wednesday, Friday and even Sabbaths. Until now the children outnumber the adults and make up the bulk of the congregation! They love to sing out of the hymnal and take part in the services. On Sabbaths they stay most of the day, joining us for a simple vegetarian lunch. The parents are pleased to have their children doing something safe and uplifting and we invite them to special programs and pray for them often!
It’s an ongoing challenge to keep the children engaged, but it’s amazing how they come early to the church, rain or shine, craft or no craft. We are just finishing the series so please pray for ideas and more help! The future of the church may already be sitting in the pews of the “Banuar Children’s Church!” We cannot let this opportunity pass by!
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