Cebu

We arrived in Cebu on Saturday and have had a great time meeting up with people from the church here. The last time I had seen them was 5 years ago, we came to stay here for 2 months, Alexander was only 2 years old... Matthew has been back 3 times with out me but it was really great to now be here all together again. During our time I made friends with many of the young girls that were 9 and 10, and now its been a pleasure to see them grown up into teenagers. It has been a real encouragement to meet up with all the people in the church that we know, they are so hospitable and serve their community with passion...but their love for Jesus shines out bright, you can see their trust and hope in God for their lives, its wonderful.

I went with some of the ladies in the church to the local hospital, they've been doing this for 8 years now, every 3 months. The hospital is less than the standard we are used to, so for me to go in it was hard, but then realised that at least they have somewhere to come to be cared for. We went around praying for people, many shed tears as we would pray for them or their loved ones. It was a very moving experience for me.

Yesterday we were excited to be able to visit Armie and her family... 4 years ago Matt and Rob met her family and saw that her son Jason was ill with a leaky heart valve. Through the help of Children's First Foundation we were able to get the help for Jason (he was nine at that time)...so he came to Melbourne with his mum and was operated at the Children's Hospital. Many of our family and friends contributed to supporting them while they were here. Jason was very sick and was actually close to death...but yesterday it was hard to imagine that it was the same boy, now 13 running around and playing with his cousins. While we were in the same area, Matt shared at a local church, the one that Armie attends, again we were encouraged by the leaders there, we know their difficult circumstances and love the way they talk about God being by their side.

We are now looking forward to our next adventure, we leave for South Korea on Sunday. We are very excited to be visiting the birth place of our children, we will try to travel around the country, as in the past we have only seen Seoul the capital, but now we will try to go south to a place called Busan.

Thank you every one for the response to the pig project on Talim, please keep this in mind, please email us if you would like any more information...or if you would like to know about any other ways you can help.

Thank you for your thoughts and prayers as we travel, we really feel them.