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I wrote a few days ago about how this was the season for power outages. Christmas day we had two brownouts, one in the afternoon, and one as we were getting ready to sit down to Christmas dinner with Jesse and Kay and their kids. Chris said it was like a Little House on the Prairie Christmas. Fortunately we had plenty of candles and we cook with gas.  The food was excellent and I was even able to make a fresh pot of coffee using my coffee press. Woke up today, and we had yet another outage that lasted all of five minutes. Maybe someone was flying a kite . The joys of living in the Philippines. Power is back on now (for now).

from our home to yours.

Scholarship Program Christmas party.

Tonight we celebrated the Christmas season at the Sonshine Center with our Second Annual Christmas Fundraiser Banquet. We did the Filipino version of The Best Christmas Pageant Ever . Our very own street kids put on the show. It was a blessed night for the kids and staff, and those who attended.  More pictures of this wonderful evening can be found here .

for power outages (a.k.a brownouts). For some reason we have been having brownouts more often than usual. Tuesday of this week we had three, each lasting around sixty minutes. Maybe it has to do with all the Christmas lights around the city? While the power grid has become more reliable over the passed several years, we still have the occasional outage. Our first Summer here we had an outage every afternoon for two hours. It is the worst when they occur in the middle of the night. You lay in your own sweat trying to sleep, and the bugs start to buzz around your ears. Once we had a city wide outage caused by a kite flying into some wires .  

Another excellent message I heard during my trip to Davao was given by Lisa Cox (pictured), a member of the pastoral team from the States. She challenged us saying that we often would like to have the testimony without the test. Indeed the test must come first before we gain the testimony. Using the example of Abraham offering his song Isaac, she taught that you cannot have one without the other. Trials, challenges, and tests can be an opportunity for a testimony later. It depends on how we react to these challenges and trials.

I am passionate about a few things.  One of the things I am very passionate about is world missions.  As evidenced by recent life choices, missions and the world harvest is one of the greatest (second only to my family) passions and purposes in my life.  I recently had a very wise and more experienced minister give me some really good advice.  Linus LeFever of Acts 29 Ministries  was a member of the pastoral team on my recent trip to Davao.  He told me, "Don't let you passion turn into aggression."  Now what does that mean?  It means don't let something that you believe in so strongly become an aggression that pushes people away.  A person can be humble even though he has great passion for what he is doing.  Someone who has his passion morph into aggression is not so humble, and now we see his passion turning into a prideful arrogance.  This kind of aggression can lead to burnout.  I truly appreciate this piece of advice, and I am sure I will be chewing on this for q...

Posted by Chris One of the Kinder 2 preschoolers leads her classmates as they read together. The privilege to help children learn to read is an honor. I have sat with two of my own children as they wrestled with letter sounds and stringing words together. It is a joy to be a part of such an amazing gift. A BRIGHT student and Ma'am Lily, the teacher, work together to practice reading in Tagalog, the national language of the Philippines. There are 5 BRIGHT students who will take their Elementary Equivalency tests in February. Keep them in prayer as they study for the next few months before the test. Some of the preschoolers enjoying their lunch. At the Sonshine Learning Center, students' spiritual, relational, emotional, mental and physical needs are met daily.