First week in Cambodia

Greetings from Cambodia! It's been almost a week since we have arrived here and the weather has been very bearable so far. Thanks to all your prayers!

This past week, most of us had spent time with the kids at Kontrak village and many of us also had the opportunity to serve at the rainbow school. Yesterday morning, we also got a chance to clean and do a little safety inspection of the facilities at contract village. As you probably expect, there were many cut corners in the building of the facilities (according to Joel... and myself). As of now, we have come up with some temporary solutions for the safety problems. Please pray that the missionaries here will find the right people to provide a more permanent solution and also pray for the safety of these children. In the afternoon, we had the opportunity to spend the entire afternoon fellowshipping with a couple of the missionaries here - Jarune and Wha Youn. They shared with us their testimonies and the visions that God has given them here in Cambodia. It really was a blessing and encouragement to all of us. Today, we finally performed, for the first time, a song in Khmer during their service. I will not expose the title of the song in case we perform it for you guys after we head home (however, this is not a promise of any sort...)

Tomorrow we will be going back to the Kontrak village and rainbow school for our last week of ministry. One thing that has been a great encouragement to all of us so far is how eagerly the kids anticipate our arrival every morning (even for the clean-up yesterday). Most of them would actually run along side or behind our van as we pull into the village. I sincerely hope that it is not for us that they eagerly await, but that it is the seeds that God has planted in their hearts that is eager to be watered and fed.

I have also had an opportunity to hear the testimony from one of the local missionaries (his name is Pinath). He has grown up in a Buddhist home. However, he had always felt unsatisfied by it. There were many questions in his head that Buddhism simply could not answer. When he finally heard the Gospel for the first time seven years ago, he finally found what was missing in his life. I was deeply moved by his testimony. It seemed as if God has prepared his heart fully and all he was waiting for is someone to come and tell him of the Good News. I wonder how many others here are like that, just waiting for us to come and share our faith with them. I wonder how many we will meet during our stay...

Praise God for all that He has shown us so far! Please continue to pray for us, the missionaries here, and the children of Cambodia!