The Widow Might

(The title was my dad's idea - you'll have to read to the end for it to make sense.)

We headed back up into the village for the last stretch.

 The next couple pics are ones I caught of everyday life in the village.  The last day we were up there, they were able to install a cable (donated by the government) to help them in getting their stuff across the river despite the ruined bridge.  I wonder if the government knew that they would send motorcycles across on the cable?

 Much of their life up there revolves around the corn crop.  They have just harvested, so on any sunny day, they are busy drying their corn - wherever they can find space to do so.  The roads in and out of the mountains are covered with drying corn.

 Every family has at least one corn shed for storing the corn that is waiting to be dried or hauled out.

 The kernels also have to be removed from the cob - by hand.  We got to help quite a bit with this process...

 ...but we learned the hard way that your thumbs go numb so you don't notice that you are wearing a hole in your skin until it's too late.  Both Ben & I discovered this fun fact.

 There is more to life in the village than corn processing.  Here is a picture of our little campstove.  Everything had to be cooked from scratch, but we were SO very blessed by a friend in the States sending us bisquick mix, some meal mixes, and canned chicken to help make the cooking more manageable.  We found out that biscuits do pretty well in a skillet, and we were SO thankful for that canned chicken to break up the monotony of canned tuna and corned beef (no refrigerator so canned meat is the only option).

 We also kept going with school.  I love this pic of the boys reading their science book in the hammock - with a headlamp.

 The kids also got lots of play time of course - they made some great friends up there.

 The girls spent a lot of time doing beadwork - making necklaces and bracelets, etc.

 Because of that destroyed bridge, we had to leave the car several miles from the village where we stayed.  So we did a LOT of hiking while we were up there.  In this picture, we are on our way to their conference which was held in another village.

 I would love to know what Zach was thinking here.

 Ben getting a ride across the river.

 Headed down into the village where conference will be held.

 There were about 250 people who gathered for conference; they represented 8 tribal churches spread throughout the mountains.  The focus of the 2-day conference was God's desire for every people group to have a chance to hear the Good News and the opportunity that every believer has to be involved in what HE is doing.

 The 2nd day of the conference was a day of prayer and fasting, asking God to make it clear how each person, each church could be involved.  We spent time in individual prayer, then they gathered as individual churches to spend time in prayer and discussion.

 For nearly everyone, this was their very 1st experience with fasting.  It was a wonderful time of fellowship and seeking His heart; afterwards, dozens of people came and told us how clearly they heard His voice, how He had moved their hearts.

 After a while, Steve & I noticed that one of the churches had finished their prayer time; but this group of young men and separated off from the rest of the group to keep praying.  Watching them moved us to tears; it's not often that you see young men so fervent in prayer.

 After giving each church ample time for prayer and discussion, we asked them to share with the group what God had shown them.  Well, after each church had reported back, a total of 12 units (a unit being either a single or a couple) were standing up front to signify that they were ready to be sent out.  There are a few missing from this picture, but this is the majority of the group.  The 5 young men on the left were part of the ones praying so fervently above.  And see the woman towards the right who is holding the baby?  She is a widow with 5 children and 1 grandbaby, but she has a burning passion to be involved.  We aren't sure yet if it will work for her to go, whether or not her family would thrive in that situation, but our hearts were encouraged by her passion to be involved in spite of so many obstacles.  So we are not sure, but the widow might! :)

 The really exciting part to us is that it is not only the ones who want to "go" who have caught the vision; each of the churches is incredibly excited to do whatever it takes to make this happen.  Here the church gathered around to pray over those who are ready to go out.  Thank you, Heavenly Father, for answering our prayer so mightily!  Thank you for raising up laborers for the harvest!

 After a very emotional celebration with the group - we concluded with almost 2 hours of precious worship time - we all headed home to our respective villages.  Well, it had rained throughout conference, so the river was flooded again.  This time the guys rigged a harness off the bridge, and everyone crossed the flooded river that way.  Steve used to work as a tree trimmer, so he knows ropes, knots, and harnesses; he made sure it was safe, then we went for it.  No problem for Steve - he loves that kind of thing.  Thankfully, we made adrenaline junkies out of our kids early on in life, so they were fine with this too.  Me, on the other hand...let's just say that rappelling 50ft off a bridge is NOT my preferred activity for a Friday afternoon.  But I swallowed my fear, and we all made it just fine.  I wasn't the only one freaked out by this though - several of the other ladies felt the same way, and 1 even passed out from the fear!  This pic is of Ben making the descent onto the rock.

 On our final Sunday in the village, the church honored us with overflowing gratitude and love.  They smothered us with hugs, and hung their special bead necklaces around our necks (see them on Kayla below? also on the boys 2 pics below).  Mikayla also got some last snuggles in with this little sweetie.  Her parents were some of the ones who have decided to come down to Bicol to partner with us, so we are going to get to watch little Mutya grow up.

 After church, we headed back to the bridge.  Thankfully the river was back down, so we were able to just wade across.  :)  Then we loaded up the car and headed out.

 While we are very encouraged in spirit, we are all beyond beat, both physically and emotionally.  We will spend a couple days in Manila getting caught up on life (emails, paperwork, etc), then we are headed to the beach for a couple days of R&R.

 As we drove out of the mountains, our hearts were full to overflowing with thankfulness for all that God did during our time up there, and all that He is continuing to do in hearts.  We praise HIM for the way He is moving amongst the Bogkalot tribe.  To God be the glory!!!