Preparing

Here are some images of the Philippines. They are the squatter camps in Manila, Philippines.

The past few months, a team of 17 Moodies have been preparing for a missions trip to Manila, PHilippines. I've really enjoyed meeting every week, sometimes once or twice. I like the interaction and preparation we've gone through and getting to know the team members even more. Yesterday we got the team assignments for each VBS and squatter camp ministries that we'll be in. I'm really excited about the team I'll have the privilege of serving with - everyone's really pumped and compliant and are VERY active and enthusiastic. They're really good at brainstorming and communicating what they think too. I'll have Darice, Butler, Elizabeth Powell, Kelly, Melody, and Eric Strand. 

In the morning two teams will be doing Vacation Bible Schools in squatter camps, and the in the afternoons, we'll be at dumps and squatter camps, distributing milk and vitamins to the families that live there. At night we'll be preparing for the next day. The other team will be at a brothel house, working with prostitute women-which is probably going to be the hardest and most heartbreaking ministries there. The Night outreaches will involve going out in the late evenings and seeing the women lined up ready to be picked up, and using those times to reach out to them.

The second week we're splitting into two teams, one to a bario and the other to a camp. I"ll be joining a group under Liz Bierlein, the team's camping girl:) I'm pretty pumped about that, we'll be working with teenagers and having chapels and Bible studies. Kinda like the camp i went to back in jr and sr high. 

I'm getting my heart prepared for this trip. I know that I'm going to be broken in ways I've neve been broken before, seeing poverty in ways I'd never seen or known, and coming in contact people who have been completely abused in every way known. 

At the meeting last night, Ate Michelle shared her testimony to us. She's a grad student at Moody, and she's Filipina. Growing up she was a Compassion child, one that was sponsered and supported by Americans so that she could receive food, clothing and food. Her family never had food, often at times, having to share one single egg for a family of five. Her testimony consisted of just one heart ache after another, and heartbreak, and abuse, and terrible things that no one could begin to imagine.

These are the children we'll be working with. Ones that live in homes that are hardly bigger than a houghton dorm room with seventeen people. Ones that have only ever told they meant nothing, nor will they ever be anything or anyone. Ones that have constantly been beat on, and unloved, sexually and physically abused, not to mention exploited. The testimony last nightmade my heart hurt, and now I'm preparing for seeing all this in person and witnessing the disgrace of sin. 

Please pray for me and the team. Please pray for the hearts of the children, men, and women and teenagers that we'll be serving. that their hearts will be ready to hear the gospel, and receive it. My financial support hasn't been coming in, and the rest of the team as well...if you could pray for that as well, that'd be a blessing to us. and Praise the Lord with us for this opportunity to work with kids that don't have any hope in their lives from anyone. Pray that we can give them that hope.