Going to the Provinces

Sophearea (pronounced - Supeerria) - is the young lady on the right. She is a Pastor's daughter from the Kampong Thom Province - north of the city. She is a Pre-school teacher, university student, night English teacher, and one of our favorite translators, along with being our joyful friend!

We leave right after this morning's devotions to celebrate Christmas with her family this weekend. There is no Christmas holiday in this country. Khmer believers celebrate it at any convenient time in December. She was so excited at our coming that she nearly exploded. We did not quite expect such a reaction. We will not be taking our computer with us - I really doubt there will be any wifi service where we are going. We are taking our own TP as over 90% of the Khmer homes do not use such a wasteful and expensive product.

To go meant we had to miss the city-wide youth outreach event, with several of our friends dancing in it. The believers rented the largest theater in the city. There will be 3 dances (1 to a Toby Mac song, another is a rendition of one our previous mission teams have used so often - "Every Move I Make"). There will be a gospel presentation, and there are 50 trained young people ready to counsel responders. Hundreds of tickets have been given out. Kori and I settled for watching the practices - held here at New Life in Christ Church.

We will take with us today, the rest of the donated clothing provided by the members of Mililani Community Church. Here is a picture of the 50 pound bag of clothing.

Sashimi Steve - A kid tried to take a large bite out of my belly a few hours ago! I mean, I know that the kids here are often ravenously hungry - but, come on. Maybe he was buying into Obama's share the wealth plan. My wife said that he simply wanted to see if I would POP!

KEAT & SALLY KOVE + daughter HANNAH

CAN YOU IMAGINE ?

What it would be like to have to act stupidly, but work hard in the rice fields - just to stay alive? Scavenging for roots, plants, bugs, lizards, whatever - just to get enough food to survive? To have earned enough "brownie points" with your captors, to be granted the privilege to pick from the girls in the work camp (all strangers) which one you would marry - - today?
19 year old Keat in the late 1970's.

Can you imagine from birth - being abused in many ways by members of your own family, then captured & transported to a new area to become a laborer in the fields? Can you imagine as a teenager, being given over to a strange man of a different race & culture, as a bride - with no say what-so-ever in the matter? A marriage not even arranged by those who have your best interests at heart. Your wedding ceremony is with several other forced couples, with vows, not to God, but to the Communist Party of Kampuchea. It is a sealed with a simple handshake. Khmer Rouge law is summarized by the maxim; obey or die.
Sally Kove

In this very "sanitized account", can you imagine dashing over land, avoiding enemy soldiers, escaping into Thailand and and being placed in a refugee camp? Where were you in 1979?

Can you imagine wandering around, with open sores, in your "home area" - the city dump? Where is your mom? Plying the so-called "oldest profession of women." The year is 2002, and a couple takes pity and arranges to adopt you as a undernourished child of 4 years. Can you imagine being frightened to death during your very first bath - having never been so close to so much water before?
Hannah Kove, 13

As we serve our Lord, Kori and I labor in prayer, example, and whatever other means available, to serve this family. Pastor Keat and family know and love the Lord. Life has its different challenges as we go through the stages of life. In many ways, success is more difficult to handle than adversity. Feel free to read between these lines. We need God to do miracle, and He is quite capable of doing so.

Matthew 19:26 "with God all things are possible."

Random Pictures - Dec. 5th

CAMBODIAN DELICACIES - Crickets,
spiders, locusts, small frogs,
beetles, and "every creeping thing"

Kori says this is the Khmer
version of popcorn

Enjoy








This young lady was on her way to a formal gathering - dressed with hi-heels, nylons, evening formal wear & shawl - accessorized - dressed to the max!

Kori wanted to see her hair -
after helmet removal!

Beautiful purple flowers


Grown for food


Very healthy!




We passed

Making lemonade out of lemons.

Kevin Kove's entire eggplant crop was lost in the recent flooding - leaving only the skeletons of the plants. They have planted cucumbers, which will use the dead plants as a latice for the plants to grow up as a vine - naturally.

Ingenious.

Where's the beef?

Typical Cambodian cow - not grain-fed,
under nourished.


This is not Angus beef!

This structure, so I'm told, is a "Ground Termite Home."

We went no closer to investigate.









Blessings to all of our blog readers! Please let us know who you are.
Thank you, Mahalo, Gracias, Arigato, Salamat, Dunka, Akun!

DISCIPLING YOUNG ADULTS - Dec. 4

The joy of our hearts is to see young people enter into joyful and productive lives of trust in and obedience with the Lord Jesus Christ. Unlike the summertime, when we came previously, the youth are extremely busy with school, English studies and work. It has been hard for them to carve out time for Bible study and mentoring.

Early in the week I had asked about a half dozen guys if we could meet together for a sharing, encouragement and prayer time. They set up Saturday afternoon at 3. The time came and only one showed up. I was disappointed, but decided to do the best I could with him. Later on the other guys gave the same old tired excuses I have come to hear over the years.

But what a time I had with Sombat! I poured it all out on him - for about an hour & 1/2! Poor guy! He is 26 - single and interested in a beautiful girl in the church named Mei Mei (pronounced MY MY - she likes him too :). His parents are Buddhist and he lives at home. The retirement system for Southeast Asia is your kids - particularly the first born son. There is no government plan.

He has taken the commandment of obeying his parents to heart. They even have a nice Buddhist girl picked out for him. Pastor Keat has encouraged him to move out - so that he can more freely and openly serve God. I spoke to him about walking with God - trusting Him and obeying Him - one step at a time. I encouraged him to get baptized, as a simple sign of identifying obedience. I also showed him Jesus' words in Matthew 10 about loving God more than family. I spoke to him about the difficulty of balance in life, and how every Christian wrestles with it. He asked me to pray for him, that he will hear God, trust Him and obey. Will you pray for him?

But there is more. Sombat is employed as a Bible translator. He and a team of folks are working hard on a 10 year plan to re-translate the Bible for the Khmer people. They do not have theological training. They do not have training in Hebrew and Greek. They do use lexicons and English translations. (I encouraged him to include the NASB in his work!). The Bible they use now is over 80 years old and contains omissions, errors and has other problems associated with it - as I have been told.

What an awesome responsibility! I can hardly fathom it. I introduced him to the Bible Gateway website for free English and foreign Bible translations. When I showed him my MacArthur Study Bible his eyes misted up, "We have no cross-references, we have no concordance. We have no explanatory notes."

SECOND SUNDAY - Kori takes a spill

Today (Saturday the 2nd) Kori and I ventured out on our own. We decided to walk to the new shopping area which featured one of the "Lucky Store" grocery markets - catering to westerners. It must have been about 3 miles round trip. (Ewa folks - imagine walking from our home to Foodland and back with about $20 worth of groceries).

Anyway, less than 2 blocks from home, a motorcycle pulling a trailer with a protruding-out center where the axle is, came up from behind and hit Kori behind the knee , knocking her to the ground. All heads turned and gasped - including mine (I was walking ahead, trying to create space in that direction). She struggled to get up, and as soon as the driver saw that - he took off.

After some dusting off, reclaiming her hat, and damage assessment, she determined to go on. We older folks show and feel our bruises later on. She did have scrapes and swelling and some soreness - even on into Monday.

We did make it - we crossed the busy boulevard twice, and lived to tell about it (no right of way, no lights, no nothin' to help!). We thank God for His protection and your prayers. We seem to sense angels more here than in America, and the bad ones as well.

The picture is of a typical Cambodian pineapple and a Honeydew Melon (they were all softball sized) yet too pricey for us.

TEACHING GOD'S WORD - - -DEC. 2

WHAT AN ENORMOUS PRIVILEGE! To share the eternal things of God - His Person, His character, His love and work on our behalf!

I have been given the opportunity to teach morning staff devotions 3 times a week.
When I arrived, they were in Genesis 29 - going chapter by chapter. My first day, I was asked to teach chapter 30 with no prep time - "Be ready in season and out out of season." I have previous studies from Saturday Night Youth Bible Study - based around the stories themselves, but I am adding detail and application for each individual chapter.

The believers here know nothing of the Old Testament. I am limited in my illustrations, and you know how illustration driven I am! Can't use OT stories, can't use sports, TV or movie references, can't use many US or even world events. It's a challenge to get the meaning across.

Friday I talked about Jacob wresting with the Lord and getting his named changed to Israel. It took about 4 minutes to explain wrestling. They also had to be convinced (including the Pastor translator) that this was an actual event and not a vision.

But oh how responsive they are. You can see the light come on and their faces light up when understanding dawns upon them. They are so grateful. I included the gospel, as I know some are not believers.

One is the school's 6th grade teacher Sokthun. I taught in his class on the earlier trip. He speaks no English, but he always comes to staff devotions. Pray for him.

Teaching English - December 1st

Can you imagine teaching students English, who have no concept of the ocean? Who have never seen mountains - in person? Who have never taken subject matter related to world geography? Who have never even heard of Hawaii? Whoa . . .

Can you imagine trying to teach English with a fellow Khmer teacher, whose own English you can barely understand? Such is the task, but most students are very eager to learn. To learn English is the USA equivalent of earning a Bachelor's degree, in terms of landing a good job.

Last night we brought in our blow up globe (think beach ball). Their assignment was to think of places in the world that they would like to go on a vacation to, and activities they would like to do. This was hard for them - they could only think of spots in their own home country of Cambodia. Kori and I are expanding (or blowing?)
their minds.

The kids get some of the tuition expense dropped if they come to Saturday night Youth Worship & Bible study. This really helps them, so they do - about 120 of them currently.

The worship part is lead by half a dozen pretty girls, with choreographed moves, and accompanied by a couple of professional nightclub musicians, along with the Pastor's daughter Hannah... Later they break into groups based upon age - college, high school, or middle school - for Bible teaching. The topic for the last 2 weeks has been Hell.