flippin islands!

hey everyone! things are pretty good here in the philippian islands. we are about to leave tomorrow, so we had to cram a couple of cultural things in before we went.

first things first, we just came back from being on a small island, in a "town" called Cawilan (which had electricity, amazingly enough!). it was awesome. we stayed with a couple (Arnel and his wife Dandan) and their 2 children (Davie and Daniel). we helped them with ministry times that they had, which included going to a neighboring town (on a different island) called Opong. here they are trying to reach out to the town as they do not have any biblical base. they actually have a lot in the area for a church eventually. they have been reaching to the Opong town for 2 years now, making significant progress. there is a lot of spritual warfare in the area, and this was probably the most challenging time spiritually so far.

the time in the islands was very challenging, but amazing to experience. the first day i was there i became rather sick, and i am almost back up to par now. there was no running water in the house, and also no fans. we were in the heat of the day, and the heat of the night. i slept on the ground (on my sleeping mat)... it was just really different then the other places we have been now. but, we were really able to become apart of the culture through the family experience as well as the food and such. it was really an amazing time.

anyways, back to our recent cultural experiences... i ate balut yesturday. if you don't know what balut is, i will try to explain without almost puking! it is a baby duck or chicken (duck in this case) which, in filipino culture, is cooked before hatched and eaten like this. i ate half of it... but i did it! it was so intense. that's about as far as i can go culturally man! we also had some halahala today which is some type of crushed ice with jellys and other fruit and vegetables and powdered milk... it's a filipino dessert, which is very different... but good to experience.

the time here was very good, but hard at the same time. it was spritually challenging and physically challenging, but very productive. thank-you all so much for your prayers.