Semester break

Didn't think I'd have much to post about the break because I planned on doing nothing but it ended up being a very eventful week. My original plan was to take a road trip up island on my bike and see some things but my bike broke and my license expired both at an inconvenient time. Instead I went home with one of the students here and stayed with his family. His dad is a very active pastor so we ended up having a lot of ministry opportunities with him.

We left after our Sunday morning church service here in Tagaytay and we arrived in time for the Sunday evening church service at his fathers church. I was asked to speak at his church just to introduce myself and tell them about me, give my testimony and some encouragement.

The next day we had a youth service which I got the chance to lead while the pastor translated for me. Most of the people here speak at least a bit of English but not enough to follow a study.

After the youth service we went out and did some street evangelism.

Tuesday we took a rest day and job, the student I was with showed my around his home town. I helped him fix his motorcycle although I let him do the welding since apparently proper attire for welding is flip flops shorts and sunglasses.

We also went to a nearby river where I had the opportunity to baptize someone, with job my personal translator.

Wednesday we drove out the Manila because the pastor is friends with the principal of a school there and could get us into the classrooms. We split up into groups and Job and I were able to speak to three of the classrooms.

After our time at the schools the pastor had to be in a meeting somewhere so he left us at a jollybee, which is like a McDonald's. We had a couple hours to kill while we waited so job took me to a nearby park to walk around. This park was in dedication to the Philippine national hero Jose Rizal who stood against the Spanish who originally colonized the Philippines for over three hundred years. Rizal was executed by the Spanish there at where the park is now.

I still had to teach my midweek bible study and we were running out of time and the pastor wasn't back. The plan was to be back to the pastors house for the study because that's were our recording equipment was and my Bible with my notes. We decided we weren't making it back so we got access to an apartment room of a friend so we could do the study from there. It actually went pretty decent for an impromptu message.

The next couple days we spent mostly hanging out with the youth there and working on Jobs bike. The kids there showed me one of the more annoying toys if seen, so I learned how to use it and brought a bunch back for the rest of the students so we could see how long it takes for me to be sent home. I hope the video can play but if not it's called lato lato so you can look it up and see. Also the video doesn't even do it justice

Sunday was our last day and we'd head back to school after church. In the morning we went to a baptist church where the pastor I was staying with first started. Definitely way different than the churches I've been in. I got to speak here aswell and then we had lunch with them.

Lastly we finished our break at the Sunday evening service where we first were at the begging of the break. Ended up getting a lot of photos taken because non of them had seen an American before. Definitely odd being the center of attention since I generally avoid it like the plague. All the parents wanted pictures as well as pictures of me holding their kids. The church also blessed job and I paying for our fare to and from for our trip.

Overall a very eventful week with lots of ministry opportunities.