Life Getting Back to Normal

Life is back to normal.  I am in class, we are all very busy, and again I am figuring out how to manage it all.  It is nice to have some routine again after the semester break, but I also did enjoy the time I could spend at the church.  I am very excited for this semester since I have more classes that I will be enjoying, and one class that is a huge blessing.  It is Urban Evangelism and Church Planting!  When I saw it I knew I had to take it, and after a few classes, I am really enjoying it!  I have a great teacher, and my mind is really being expanded as well as, getting so many new ideas about the city, church, evangelism and more!

Though next year is really the beginning of my Bible subjects, right now the focus is on getting the general education classes out of the way, and I am happy with my classes this semester.  It was very interesting when I got my grades back to see that almost all are in the 90's!  I then asked a foreign teacher how it was possible (since in my whole life I have never got a 90% other then in gym class), and she said the marking system is very inflated here, as well as the fact that the passing grade is 75%.  So I have basically all 90's so far (except for that thorn in my flesh, math!)

December is a very very exciting time in the Philippines, and the church is ramping up for all the parties and programs!  We have had quite a pain trying to set a date for our children's Christmas party,  because of the previous flooding, the children missed a whole week of school so they have to catch up by having Saturday classes, so we have decided not to have a early party, but to do it on the 23rd of December.  I am very excited since we are planning on having 300 children!  We are going to use a basketball court and invite all the kids in our neighborhood.  Our plan is to do a carnival-style party and share the gospel and the truth about Christmas through a puppet show.  We have gift bags packed and ready and are fixing up our carnival games and adding some new ones this year.

Some wonderful news is that having the new missionaries here is a huge blessing!  Since they arrived our youth ministry has improved so much and it has lifted a huge burden off my back.  It's so nice to have more people around to help out and, some fun roommates!

I also forgot to mention in my last update that we started a daycare in the church.  It has been something we have been wanting to do for sometime, so I said "let's just go for it" and see how it goes.  I am happy to report it has been going well, but we are seeing that there are some real needs!  Everything hinges on having a great teacher, and one of our missionaries is a teacher, but he does not speak Tagalog so it makes it very challenging.  We will continue to pursue it and work hard at getting a great program started since there is a deep need for this kind of ministry.  I am going to have to make a tough decision soon about it, but I hope and, ask you to pray as well, that we could be able to continue.  We have been able to reach out to a lot of new mothers in our community, so we really desire to continue.

Please pray with me as there is a lot of work to do this month and I need to manage a lot.  It will be an exciting time as well as a challenging one so I would deeply appreciate your commitment to prayer for what probably will be a wild time!