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12-MEMBER TEAM BRINGS JOY TO KIDS

On May 24, a dozen high-spirited, short-term mission participants left for a two-week ministry in the Philippines. Their goal was to bring the message of hope, joy, and love to the street children in the poor areas of Laguna, Makati, and Quezon City. In collaboration with GFA glocal partners, our team had opportunities to share the gospel, distribute Bibles and children’s Bible storybooks, teach in a VBS-type program, go on a house-to-house visitation, play games with the street children, give gifts of clothing, toys and school supplies, feed them and even bathe them. 

Following are some highlights of their ministry:

• Ms. Jade Mundiz of Bestow Shekinah Foundation in Laguna reported:
      The first day attracted about 534 kids who eagerly and cheerfully participated in all the programs.  The impact was godliness in their lives.  The second day recorded about 555 kids in attendance; and, on the third day 570 kids attended. This also attracted parents who were touched by God.
           The GFA team spent a night in the homes of BSF staff which allowed them to experience the  Filipino lifestyle and which gave them a deep sense of the need to bring the Good News to the people in this area.  This also created a very close tie between BSF and the GFA teams who worked in unprecedented unity throughout the three tiresome, but very fulfilling and exciting days.In the evaluation and debriefing that climaxed the mission activities, everyone was both emotionally and spiritually touched which resulted in relay race of tears. The Holy Spirit gripped everyone and His presence was strongly felt.

• Mike Uyboco (team leader) reported:      Elly has been a WONDERFUL example to us all. She went on the trip even though she would have preferred to simply sponsor someone else to go. But the Lord said- "Elly, you are going!" And so she LISTENED and she has been an absolute role model to us all. She is always aggressively seeking out "targets of opportunity" (pardon my military jargon), she was witnessing to people at the airport on the way out! While at BSF, she took advantage of the visitations to people's houses and prayed with several people to accept the Lord. She also used her "wordless" book to teach young kids about the gospel. Although she is 84, she is not sitting around moping about life, she is on the battlefield! 
  
      Monica and Stephen took a big step in their Christian walk as they were able to openly witness and lead someone to Christ for the first time--- HOW EXCITING. Monica described the event to us with tears in her eyes. During the visitation with BSF, the two of them were initially working with Elly & Jim and playing more of a supporting role. But they soon broke off in order to cover more ground and found themselves in a situation in which the particular individual seemed opened to the gospel. They obviously tell the story much better but the bottom line is that person accepted Christ into their life. The celebration of ushering another Christian into the kingdom is awesome and the personal growth that Monica and Stephen experienced (something the whole team is experiencing in fact) is another added benefit to getting people from Glendora out of their comfort zone and into the mission field for a Glocal trip.

• Jacob Bishop, team member, reported:     In Makati, some kids were bathed and given new clothes. Some of the street children were like "Dennis the Menace" which presented challenges to teaching, but none that weren't overcome.  We had to pull teeth to get any output from them. The kids didn't seem interested in being there. It was a challenging yet growing experience for all of us.  Pastor Don noted that those kids have improved drastically since the first time they started to attend the program, little by little they get better and hopefully they will gravitate towards Christ. 
  
      We praise God that we were able to push through and use the Lord as our strength. Many of the children live on the streets and do not have the love of mothers and fathers to discipline them. We had to work hard to get them to behave.  By the end of VBS, we saw lives changed - kids smiling and the love of the Lord was shared.   
  
      At the time of printing, our team was on their third and final site in Quezon City.  Mike shares, “Like the infamous movie, this was the wave we were waiting for.  It was the penultimate wave. And it was a big one. 200 kids showed up for the first of our final (two day) VBS. We shuttled into the barrios along the most narrow and crowded passages to date. Somehow the vans emerged into a junction unscathed and we were all able to disembark and arrive at our destination. There were pathways spider-webbing throughout the complex with makeshift water pipes threading and weaving from house to house. Stagnant water pooled in places and created a stench that propelled us to the safety of the church.  Thankfully God carried us throughout and we sang, shouted, ran, acted, and competed all day.”