A look back

This is Sunday morning youth group. Some of these pictures have been included in newsletters, however I wanted to have them also in a central location, so that they can be viewed easily.A recent picture of my gorgeous wife. We're only 2 months out from meeting our baby boy Caleb!!Our new ministry partner!!! Rachael is looking to come back and start doing ministry with us in March. Please be praying for her, this is a big step to take.A few weeks ago my brother in law led a youth concert in whihc we combined the youth of 2 churches to worship God together. One of the biggest problems we have in Cambodia is there is no church unity. So to see 2 different Christian churches from 2 different denominations come together was wonderful.A Picture of our introduction to English class with the short term missions team we had back in September.I was trying to imitate the monkey, but I think I offended him....yea, I wonder the same thing, why did she marry you? (another picture of the zoo trip)Back in September my wife and I arranged a giant venturewith many of the youth to go play at the zoo. We had a great time.The cutest thing ever, begging otters.......A fellowship time we hosted at our house with some of the students.A typical Sunday service. Please if anyone fill led, we have run out of Bibles in the Cambodian language and need to purchase more. One full Bible (Old & New Testament) is $5, just under the average daily salary for a Cambodian....far too expensive.This is my wife's sunday evening bible study. Please be praying for our newer Christians, all of their families are Buddhist and their families are not accepting of this new relationship with Jesus their children have found.Back in September we had VES (Vacation English School). The students had summer vacation so we had English full time. We used many tools to try and teach them; dance, art, bible studies, games, small group conversation and many more. It was a great sucess and I think I will run it every year.Our youth learning to praise God through dance.My wife and I made baptism certificates for each person who got baptized. Somthing to hang and remind them of their relationship with Jesus in their parent's house which is full of Buddhist idols.All of our members at a baptism ceremony a few months back.One of the baptisms we had a few months back. There is not much greater than getting the honor of baptizing someone.

The youth who got baptized last time. Be praying for the next batch as we will soon be having another baptismal ceremony.Our finished outdoor baptismal. If we tried this in Oregon, not many people would get baptized... :)Preparing, cleaning and painting the baptismal for all the use it's going to get :)

Khemi New Year and more

These two pictures are of my wife and I translating for the medical mission's team

It was so amazing to have the Holy Spirit working through me.

For the Cambodian New Year we had a big "Pot luck" lunch. My wife made spaghetti and the Cambodians loved it.

The short-term medical mission's team attended the pot luck.

Mmm, Fooood.

My wife and her brother leading worship on Sunday. Hillsong in Khemi sounds sooo cool.

These are the students who regularly attend youth group on Saturday.

During the Cambodian New Year the Cambodians love to play games. One of those games you can see in this picture. You have a bowl of flour with candies in it. then two people need to blow all the flour out before they can have the candies. In the end both people end up covered in flour.

These two pictures are of another game. In this game the students make a circle to contain two people in. then both people are blind folded and one tries to catch the other. The person running has a spoon and a bowl and he hits it as he is running away. Notice in the picture how the students are looking outside of the circle.....they did not contain me and I ran straight into the wall...ouch!

A lot of Cambodian New Year games involve pain...I am not sure why. This is like "evil duck duck goose". The goose chases the duck hitting him with a towl until the duck sits down.

One Sunday my wife and I invited all our conversation level students over to our house for food and games. They really liked playing Sequence (Thanks Jon & Christina!).

New pics, September 16th

This is our Introduction class. This is our largest class. On an average night now we have about 30 students in this class. Our other two classes run at about 10, so altogether we have about 50 students.

This is a more recent picture. Because the Introduction class was getting so big we moved them upstairs to the church sanctuary. In the forefront of the picture you can see "sri-leak" in yellow. She is my most difficult student becuase she is just a little too playful.

This is "sri-jew" The girl I wrote about in the newsletter.

Becuase of a wonderful donation from my Grandma we were able to get Chairs, tables and a water pump to stop our class from flooding. My Khemi Dad was so overjoyed to be blessed with all of these things.

This is the water pump we got. We were able to use it the first day we got it and it worked like a charm. Some of our neighbors got mad however, since the water was not all going to the church property but being sent back out to the street it ended up in other peoples property.... water runs downhill.... :)

My wife joined a Pastor's wives conference and also translated for the other lady in the picture who was teaching at the conferance. Channy worked so hard to fully understand what she was going to translate. She did a truly wondeful job and I was very proud of her.

This is just a picture of my wife "showing off" her beauty... I am such a lucky man!

This is a picture of my sermon a few weeks ago. The handsome man on my right is Yuka, my bestfriend. He was translating for me. Eventhough I have learned so much Khemi I am still not to the point to be able to preach for 30min in Khemi. This sermon was really special for me, because Yuka has now gone into missions full time and lives in another town so I don't get to see him. this was like a last chance to spend time with a close friend.

My wife plays the keyboard every sunday at church. Her brother who you cant really see in the picture plays the guitar.

My wife and her two sisters eating barbecued frogs and snails....gross. I always tell her no kissing after she eats snail, but the snail always wins out. :)

I thought you might like to see a picture of a khemi "spirit house" This is a place where Cambodians sacrifice food and fake money to their ancestors so the ancestors will not curse them. This particular spirit house is just outside the door to my house. It belongs to the landlord who lives above me.

This is a picture at the foot of the alter.

Extreme Makeover gone Cambodia

So after cleaning all the mud off the floor and walls we got to painting. the little Girl behind me is sri-mow, she is our niece. The three of us did all the painting (Channy, Sri-Mow and me)

My lovely wife did the corners while I hit the big areas.

That old dry erase board was so coverd in old dried marker and dirt, I probably spent over a half hour rubbing it down with alchool. I praying that I can still wright on it.

So my Khemi father, Channy and I all chipped in to get some temporary desks until enough money comes in to get some real student desks.

This is the before picture that I showed you earlier.... this picture does not do justice to the stench or the enormous amount of mosquitoes flying around.

And this would be the after. Sorry I wish I knew how to upload a bus infront of the picture that would drive away but I don't :). We still need to decorate it to make it look like a classroom but we have made some serious progress. Please let me know any ideas for decorating you have. We want the students to feel like they are walking into America when they walk into the class. So one thing we are going to do is put up a big American flag above the white board and write Welcome to America. We are also thinking pictures of family, friends and American landmarks. Again please do email me if you have any suggestions.

A Picture of "Pah" preaching on his first Sunday back.

First Church leadership meeting. All in Khemi, so I had to really focus to keep up with what everyone was saying

The fish from the Mekong river get get bigger every year. (my nephew Isaac)

So just two days after painting the classroom it started to rain hard. I can't remember if i mentioned this already or not but when it rains hard the church parking lot floods. Then when it is full the classrooms will all flood. So I went out and started to hurl water into the chruch baptismal (to the left of me) the only place big enough to store that much water.

after hurling that water for more than an hour I wanted to see if me pecks got any bigger....nope

Some kids playing soccer next to where our cell group (church in a house) meets.

I just had to put this picture in because my wife was looking especially gorgeous that day. My wife went with some other missionaries to a province near the city to visit a church.

This is the street where we go for cell group (church in a house). I cant wait to see it in September because the entire area floods during the rainy season (thus the houses on stilts). about 8ft water. people have to use small boats to get to and from there houses.

This is the (church in a house) or cell group as we call it. We meet in this house every Wednesday. This is a poorer part of town, most of the houses are made of miscellaneous pieces of metal and some wood.

Cell group. this is inside the house of the picture above.

My wife rock'n out, leading worship on the guitar. I wish you could hear "How great is our God" or "Mighty to save" sung in Khemi. I tell the Cambodians the reason I am learning Khemi is so when I go to heavan I will be able to sing also; because in heavan they don't sing in English they sing in Khemi :)