October 2005 Archives

A week ago I came home, after being in Taipei for the weekend to find out that some very small bugs had moved in while I was absent. No, these bugs do not bit me, or at least it has not happened so far. These bugs fly, which means I can’t just leave a little poison for them to crawl across and they will forever be gone.

I know God created bugs and that there is a purpose for each kind of bugs and I defiantly know he did not create these bugs so that they may invade our cute little kitchen. The moment I saw them, I declared war on them and did everything in my power get rid of them. I took the garbage out, I washed the floor, the counters, every single dish, the walls, the sink, and I sealed and resealed all the food. Half of them died from lack of food, but the other half decide that there were also two more stories to the house they were abiding in and so traveled upstairs to our living room and today they moved to the third floor. I can handle a lot of things that are horrible, but fruit flies are not one of the things I can handle. I have just decided that no matter what the cost those bugs will be removed from my house.

It is so easy for us to get caught up in things that can distract us from the real work at hand. Pray for us that we may stay focused on Christ, and not get distracted and irritated by the flies that come into our lives.

His child,

Josephine Papp
Serving in Yuli, Hualien

"Jinmen xu yao ni..."

"Kinmen needs you..."

Sometimes the burden gets heavy to bear. There are times watching the elderly people making their daily trek to the ocean bed to dig clams that I look at them and wonder if my kids are going to grow up and be like them...living day to day with no more purpose in life than digging oysters and clams to feed their families. At times I think if I have to see one more child going through sickness, depression, or the normal struggles and pressures of growing up without the guidance of loving parents, my heart will surely break in two.

As I go about my life here, teaching, sharing, listening, loving, I try always to keep before my eyes the real purpose of my being here; being Jesus hands, feet, lips and heart to those He gives me to love. Lately it has not been a difficult task to remember this, as it seems every day brings a new prayer request, another chance to talk to someone about Jesus, another one of my kids asking for advice or sharing their problems. Though I know where to take the burdens when they seem to overwhelm me, I seem to be much more inclined to struggle along on my own forgetting that Jesus walks beside me and wants to help me bear the load I cannot bear alone. My times with the Lord bring intense joy and gratefulness that He knows my name and I am His very own...then a sharp pang of grief for my beloved friends who do not know Him as Father and Friend.

It is in times like this when I begin to question, not my God, but His plans and purposes. It is so prideful and sinful of me, but I still fall into the trap of thinking surely I know better than He who should be saved and when is the right time. I ask Him why I am here giving myself to these people, serving my heart out, loving my very life away with every passing day and not seeing Him working to bring them to Himself. I see the heart-wrenching needs around me, acknowlege His soverignty and wisdom in bringing me here, and with the next breath beg Him to start working on my time table.

Then He lets me talk with someone and I see the seriousness in their eyes that says they are searching...or I see a friend come to trust Him as Savior and I realize that He has been working all along, even when I did not see His hand...or I see Him give an immediate answer to a desperate prayer and I know He is ever watching, ever loving, ever listening to me, full of pride as I am...or, after sharing and crying with a student who is facing a difficult situation, he looks at me and says, "God knew that Kinmen needs you, so He sent you here to us."

And I hold back the tears of repentance and of gratefulness, look up at my Father's face, repeat the words again in my heart of hearts, "Kinmen needs me..." thank Him for bringing me to this island, and press on with new trust, new hope, new strength to face the task He has set before me.

And I remember my Savior, "Who, for the joy that was set before Him, endured..." Hebrews 12:2

From Kinmen,

Rebekah
Phil. 1:20

October 21, 2005

Here's our newest "YOU KNOW YOU'RE NOT IN AMERICAN WHEN..." line,

You know you're not in America, when the government gives alcoholic wine to 20 year-old young people (as a "gift"), and the young people give the wine to the church...

They say Kinmen is the "happiest place" in Taiwan. Whether that is because of all the Kinmen wine, I don't really know. But I do know that Kinmen is a place full of people that God loves!

This morning I was struck by what Paul said about his calling in Ephesians 3:7-8, and 20. "Whereof I was made a minister, according to the gift of the grace of God given unto me by the effectual working of his power. Unto me, who am the least all saints, is this grace given, that I should preach....(7-8) ...according to the power that worketh in us." (20)

God's grace is certainly the only thing that can sustain me in being a disciple, a witness, and even an English teacher. It's by God's grace that I have these opportunities and I can only plead for His grace to be the power working in me. I am so grateful for God's grace!

~Lucas Stewart, Kinmen

God is awesome. My favorite thing about living here is that, no matter how busy my week is, I seem to spend it just watching Him work. I ask him to give me respect in one class, and the students pay attention; I tell him I'm lonely, and then I look down to find four sets of hands grasping my arms and two or more kids that decided I'm as much fun to hang on as a jungle-gym. We need a break, and He sends a typhoon (that meant a day off). We pray for our friends, and watch as He makes himself evident in their lives, bringing them closer to Himself. I watch as close calls get even closer- and watch the power of prayer and God's promises protect us and others we've prayed for.

I know God is real wherever you are. Here, unlike America, we're surrounded by little to no Christian influence at all. Temples are everywhere, and you watch as people walk into them like you walk into church, believing their god offers protection, fulfillment, and provision. They believe it the same way we know and believe our God will protect, fulfill, and provide for us. Except they don't know..

That whatever is not of God, is of Satan. God's purpose for having a personal relationship with Him is to give us Life- abundant Life. Satan's purpose is to kill, steal, and destroy. Can you picture placing yourself before something like that, offering obeisance and expecting to be protected or secure?

So tell me, what does your god offer?

"I am the way, the truth, and the life.." ~Jn.14:6

"The thief cometh not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.." ~Jn.10:10

From an island you've probably never heard of (before looking at this website),

Ginger Jernigan

Wow, have things been busy!!
I just got back from a trip to Haulien with Namio and Kristen. Monday was Double Ten(Taiwan’s independence day) so we all had the day off. We left for Haulien Thursday evening and returned Monday night. We went on many adventures while we were there and had a great time visiting friends. One of the exciting things we did was go whale watching. We didn’t see any whales, but we sure got seasick!!!! The ocean was very wavy because it was windy and raining. It was an experience I will never forget!! The scenery in Haulien was amazing. What a beautiful creation God has made for us to enjoy!!!!!!! From the huge things like mountains and oceans right on down to the tiny things, like pebbles on the beach, it’s all so incredibly beautiful!! So many people here don’t know of Jesus, the Son of God who created the earth. That reminds me of why God has me here, to show God’s love, to serve, and share the gospel of Jesus Christ with the people here!! What a huge task!! What an amazing opportunity!!
Today we(the Nantou team) taught a teachers conference. It went pretty well, PTL!!! There were many different sessions. Two of the sessions we did were on Christmas and Easter which was an awesome opportunity to share the story of Jesus birth, death and resurrection with many teachers. Please pray that God would be working on the hearts of those teachers to draw them to Himself.
Thank you for all your prayers. We are grateful for the time you invest into our lives.

In Nantou,
Amanda

On Sunday mornings I teach a small Sunday school class at our church.
Most Sundays, I ask one of the teammates to come along and help
out...telling the story or singing songs or whatever. But this last
week I kinda put things off until the last moment. Saturday night
came and everybody was in their rooms (and some already asleep) and I
had no lesson plan and nobody to ask for advice. So I sit in my room
for what seems like forever trying to come up with some sort of a
lesson plan.

And nothing comes. For hours. Not that I actually did anything but
think about it for hours, but it was running through my head all
night. Finally I went to bed (at a very ungodly hour!) and decided I
would figure something out in the morning.

Morning came, but it didn't bring a lesson plan. I sat in my room
trying to figure something out until I finally had to go up to church.
Still nothing. Five minutes until class starts. What am I teaching?
No idea.

So I sit down outside the class room and open my Bible. Four minutes.
I find the story of Blind Bartimaeus. For some reason it
catches my eye and I read it over three times. And within two minutes
God gave me one of the best Sunday school lesson plans I've ever had.

Why didn't God give that to me on Saturday night? Why not Sunday
morning in my room? I'm not sure...but I think it has something to do
with credit. Because when I went in that room and taught that lesson
and the kids were all so attentive, I knew it wasn't me. I knew that
I had come to church with no clue what I was going to do, and that it
was only through God that I was having success with the class.

Actually, everything is like that. Even the lessons I plan out weeks
ahead of time (ok...so that's only happened once) are not something I
should take credit for. We are nothing without God.

The key sentance God gave me for the class was "God is our helper and
Saviour." Most of us know him as our Saviour...but are you allowing
him to be your helper?

From Kinmen,
Samuel

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A lot has happened in just a month! However, in this update I'd like to share something that has happened in just the last 8 days.

Last week when I went to the school that I have had opportunities to share about Christ, I got another suprise. During the break, the former English teacher- now Art teacher, took me aside to show me something. As she was showing me some of her little creations, she told me that I can use them when I teach about the days of creation! I guess sometime earlier she and the English teacher got together and thought that for this semester, the students that I teach (3rd through 6th grade), could learn more about the Bible! They are going to learn three Old Teastament Bible stories and possibly even act them out. Before I left, the art teacher, who pretty much had an outline already made for all three stories, got together with me and the English teacher to finalize everything.

I feel pretty spoiled. I knew that getting opportunities to share the gospel in class would be totally worth all the extra work, but now I don't even have to do that much because my (as far as I know) unsaved teachers are so excited about God's Word that they did almost all the work! Who says God doesn't give the desires of the heart!

Kinmen Team Leader,

Andrew Stewart

1 Chr. 28:10

Ps. The three Bible stories are Creation, Noah, and Moses. As a teammate told me, those are pretty powerful lessons. You get that God is the Creator, just but loving Judge, and Lawmaker. Put that with the Resurection story that they already heard, and we have the gospel!

So another update has dawned upon our great website…

Hmm…seems I’m having some trouble motivating people to do their updates. I’m going to have to work on that. I’m sure that people don’t want to only hear from me all the time.

I’ll start off by saying that this update was supposed to be really cool with pictures and everything but I left the power adapter for my computer in Taipei and won’t get it back until Friday or so. Meaning I’m working on another computer for now and when I work on a foreign machine it’s like having my teeth pulled by a pair of rusty pliers. Needless to say I’m not going to be doing anything overly deep computer wise for at least a week.

Yesterday was the double 10 holiday. October 10th is for Taiwan the equivalent of USA’s July 4th. We didn’t have school on Monday and so Mai, Joel and I figured we’d take a trip up to Taipei and hang out. Megan and Ginger from Jimen also decided to take some time in Taipei as well.

So, Saturday morning we get up nice and early to catch our bus and head out. We arrived in Taipei around noon and by the time we got our bags dropped off at the Chen’s and hooked up with Ginger it was pushing 1:30. Joel and I were seeing grand visions of Chili’s everywhere we looked and so he and I heeded the call and trekked through the rain down to Taipei 101 and got ourselves some lunch. The servers there have the coolest shirts and I am so going to get one sometime. I tried to talk the manager into selling us one but she said that they were waiting for new ones to come in stock and couldn’t sell us one quite yet. Oh well, you win some you lose some. After eating and stopping by Page One we headed over to Starbucks where we were going to meet a bunch of the Chinese teachers we worked with during camps. That was a load of fun as we went over to a hot pot place for supper and hung out afterwards at the Xiling night market. I think the girls all shopped for clothes while us guys all ran over to the arcade and fired our brains on air hockey, foosball, driving games and whatever else we could find.

After the night market it was back to the Chen’s where we slept much blessed sleep…of course after Joel and I chased down, and killed the banshees screaming in our window. But that’s another story.

Church the next morning was um…shall we say…interesting? We went over to a building where we thought a church was that we had been to before. However the church had moved and I their place another church had started meeting. I felt like I should have bought a ticket or something the way they ran their singing. Also the flags were quite the touch as you could dance and wave one if you really wanted. The message was ok but I found myself thinking during the rest of the time “if I have to touch one more person or of they touch me I’m going to puke”…I’m not really all that touchy with people I don’t know.

After church we hooked up with some lunch…MEXICAN FOOD!!!! This is why I love Taipei. Then took a nap, went out to eat with the Chen’s for supper, went shopping at the night market again where I got a cool shirt…and then came back, killed more Banshees…and went to bed.

The next morning we went and hung out at the King Car office where they were having interview time for the TAs who are helping with winter camps and for some who are hoping to travel to America for an international exchange program. It was great to see them again and to hang out. Lunch wasn’t bad even if it was Mr. Brown :-)

Then we mad the “run across town sweat like a pig but you have to go faster because if you don’t you’ll be late for the bus” sprint and managed to catch our bus right in time to come back to Nantou. It was a good weekend and was a nice break. Now it’s time for teaching again….I must prepare…

Well, ladies and gentlemen the time has again come for update!! Can we all say YEA!!!! I’ve been trying to get my head on right over these past few weeks and thus haven’t been doing a very good job of getting things organized for the webpage but fear not my faithful following, it is getting organized again and soon you shall have a plethora of photos, an amazing gaggle of updates, maybe even some cool things to download…all meant for you. Yes, you the faithful who pray for us here in Taiwan because without you and your prayers our jobs here would be much more difficult and so very lonely…so we thank you and look forward to spending this next year with you.

So, what exactly has been happening over the past several weeks? A lot actually. We’ve had moon festival with all the BBQs that entails, starting school again with new students and teachers, traveling, seeing old friends, making new ones and pretty much anything else you could think of. For me I have to say that these past few weeks have been a ton of fun. I’m really getting stoked about this year. I have several of my old schools back from last year along with a lot of students that I got to know last year. I have a few new schools as well as teaching Jr. High for the first time this year. I’m really excited about working with the Jr. High students. That’s going to be a blast. I love that age group. My new elementary schools are turning out to be a ton of fun as well. I have this really cool 6th grade class at Ji Ji elementary and I know we’re going to have more fun this year than a group of people should be allowed to have. All in all I think with the school situations this year the Lord has been really good.

Here in Nantou we’re going to be spending every other Friday traveling around the county visiting a two different schools every trip. We did the same thing last year and it was a great experience to see some of the smaller mountain schools with their Aboriginal students and their bright, warm, smiles. Last year however, we traveled every week where as this year we only travel every other week. This will allow us some time for traveling and seeing more of the island because we’ll have a long weekend twice a month. I also plan on using some of those days to visit a few Jr. Highs around the area. I’m kind of hoping to keep up with some of the 6th graders from last year. Even this past weekend I got a chance to head out to a Jr. High in Ming Jien where I have several students from last year. It was a blast to see them again.

We’re also going to be teaching at two different Jr, High schools in the next two semesters. This will be a change for me personally as I was in Ji Ji last year and didn’t join the Nantou team in teaching at the Jr. Highs. So, all this to say that we’re going to be really busy this year. But that’s ok because the more people we get to know the better chance we’re going to have of helping improve the English ability of students in Nantou and also sharing Christ’s love with them. That’s the real goal anyway so I say….BRING ON THE KIDS!! Or in the words of a man in history…”**** the torpedoes!!! Full speed ahead!” Yesser…

Please pray that we’d be able to iron out some final details in the next few weeks as we work with new teachers and authority figures. Pray for our health and safety. Right now we’re sitting in the middle of a level 4typhoon so pray for Taiwan that the damage wouldn’t be to bad. The wind is really loud…wow… Pray that God would love these people through us and that he would make himself known to the people of Taiwan.

Pray for Naomi that she would recover from being insane….

From Nantou,

Daniel Neu