Last Days

FROM BOHOL

January 28, 2013

Today is Monday and we just have one more day here. We hope you received our video from the church service yesterday. It’s always wonderful to worship with our neighbors here in the barrio. After church we visited with Christian Acain, one of the barrio students studying in a vocational college. Christian is studying auto mechanics, first year, and really loving it. He’s a shy boy but we encouraged him to press on and strive for good grades and be the best mechanic he can possibly be. We really like Christian.

Saturday night we had a meeting here at the house with the high school scholarship students. One of the boys refused to attend, but his mother came. We tried to impress on her the need for her son to really strive to do his best. It was important for her to understand that the money given for her son’s scholarship be well spent. The other three boys, whose parents attended with them, are a delight. We impressed on them the need to diligently apply themselves to their studies, watch that they don’t have absenteeism, and that they stay out of the internet cafe! They all agreed to strive harder – each understanding that they are really priveledged to have a scholarship. The meeting ended on a happy note and we really believe the boys understand that their future depends on them doing well in school.

Friday night we had a dinner here with the church board of Family Christian Fellowship Loboc. We are so blessed to have Pastor Felix Bernaldez as an interim pastor. Please remember to pray for a permanent pastor for this tiny fellowship.

Tomorrow Denny, Along and Laarni have business down in Tagbilarin so they will be gone much of the day. I will stay here and pack our bags since we are leaving Wednesday morning for Manila and on to Singapore. Tomorrow afternoon the teachers have invited us back to the school for a good-bye get together. They are always feeding us! We love them – they are so dear to us.

Wednesday after we leave Along will will be taking a specialist from the Federation for the Handicapped here in Bohol to our three dear angels in the barrio of Balilihan to measure them for wheelchairs. We hope this is the beginning of many things we can do to improve their lives. We also are hoping that the parents of these children will agree that we can build them a new house (small, simple) in the “One for One” Project that our son Joshua sponsors. To briefly explain, he is a developer in Seattle, and when he builds and sells a house he offers the lender and the buyer an opportunity to “build a small house for the poor in the Philippines”. So far 4 have been built!

That’s it from here. Blessings to all. Denny and Ellen