Last day in Chhuk

The day started with a man of over 80 talking about how he uses the story of being raised from the dead (yes, you read that correctly) to tell people about his faith. It seems that he had a massive stroke, was taken the the main hospital in Phnom Phen where he was pronounced dead and put in the morgue.

This was a totally unexpected story. We made the decision to film it and it will be translated and texted into English and will also be made available in Norwegian. We also interviewed and filmed Madam Kung Yoo who is the pastor who prayed for him and the man's grandaughter who was part of it all too.

Madam Kung Yoo

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The elderly man and his grandaughter

Sharing what has happened to him with the other pastors

 

With the translator as she talks about it with them.

Filming

 

 

 

 

 

The only reason we heard about this was as a result of us asking if there was anybody present who has used their testimony to tell people about their faith. He came forward and what he had to share was dynamite! The film will be made widely available and we will certainly be showing it in Norkirken.

After that everything else appeared insignificant. When we were holding a session on healing we saw someone healed. It really has been a day of miracles.

Teaching about the power of sharing our testimony.

Group work preparing the plans the church groups will work on for the next six months.

Praying for each team after they have presented their plan to the other church leaders.

A bit of shopping on the way to the airport.

We are now in Bangkok airport waiting for our overnight flight to Oslo and on to Stavanger

Chhuk

Today has been a hot, hot, hot day in Chuuk. I had the after lunch session and it was 36 degrees in the church. The power kept going off so the fans would stop. The fans don't seem to do a lot until they stop!

Every centimeter of me was running with sweat and my cloaths were saturated, here's a picture of my back after 20 minutes.

The day began at 8am with prayer and worship. Every time we have been here the worship has been fantastic and today did not disappoint. The teenagers who live at the on-site children's home have led it each time.  One of the values in this home is that every child shall have the change to learn to play a musical instrument. The drummer is very talented. There are currently 22 children in the home. Here are some pictures of the worship, notice the boy who is jumping up and down as he is singing!

Lunch was served under a tree and we enjoyed rice, fish and a type of meat soup.

 After lunch one of the local boys invited Tom Kenneth to play volley ball with him. Here is a sequence of pictures. Note the huge smile on Tom Kenneth's face!

Then it was my teaching which was ok but the temperature was a challenge. It really is important to drink water constantly.

Tbung Khmum and Chhuk

We started the day with breakfast then straight to the church for the next three teaching sessions.

The snacks between sessions here are fruit or a something, I write something because I have no idea what to call it. See the picture below. It is rice with some sort of fruit for flavour which has been steamed while wrapped in a palm leaf. The leaf is not to be eaten but the inside is.

More teaching, then making plans to present to the other groups. We finish with prayer for each church team. After that it was lunchtime. The food here tastes good if you just close your eyes to what you are eating. On the picture below you see fish soup, green beans with pork and chicken with noodles and ginger strands. All is fine but every part of the animal is eaten, even the toes of a chicken and the entrails too which means every mouthful is potentially an unexpected texture or flavour.

After we finished lunch it was home time for the participants while we had a review of the two days with the local organizers. Here is a team or two heading home in a motorbike trailer.

The village shop was just by the church gate.

Before leaving the area we stopped to buy a durian fruit to taste. For more about it follow this link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Durian Neither I nor Anne Kate liked it but Steve and Tom Kenneth thought it was nice.

The next thing today was the journey down to Chhuk which meant 6 hours bouncing along in a minibus. We went over the famous Mekong river, for more about it see here:   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mekong

We crossed it on this impressive new bridge.

 As a snack on the journey south we were able to try roasted crickets. Tom Kenneth wants to try everything which is new, we ladies are not so brave! He said they were nice, we believed him but weren't tempted to try.







Now you see it... now you don't!






Although the drive has been long there has been lots to see, here is a taste of Cambodia:

But now it's bed time what a lovely bed too. It's a shame I will have to destroy the towel swan when I take a shower.

Tboug Khmum day 1

We set off at 7am in search of breakfast which we found at a street cafe we have eaten in before. I had marinated chicken leg and rice, the others had a variety of things including noodle soup, meat filled dumpling. There was no bread or breakfast cereal, such things are not eaten here.










We are in a part of the country which is rich and fertile, farming communities abound here. It is however not a place visited by tourists, in fact very few westerners venture this far into the country.

The church is not on a highway but an orange sand road.

We started the day with worship, some songs are translated from English and familiar to me while others are not. 









The next hour and a half was spent revisiting the previous teaching from last November when we were here and asking hearing feedback from the eighty or so people who were gathered there about how their action plans have gone.

Steve had the first session of new teaching based on Matthew 28 verses 18-20. As the morning progressed the temperature climbed up the thermometer. By lunch time the feels like temperature was 44 degrees centigrade! We were struggling, all our clothing was completely wet through with sweat and our skin was shiny with it. At times like this it is reassuring to notice that the Cambodians were also struggling.

Lunch was outside under colourful tents. We ate rice with two different meat and vegetable sauces.

After lunch was nap time. It really was too hot and humid to do anything else!









Isn't the teaching session after lunch known as the "graveyard slot?" That was the one I got but somewhat surprisingly everyone stayed awake and engaged, some even taking notes. I had a session on "We are sent" based on Luke 10:1-12.

Then a bit of fun, a game called robots and penguins. 

Tom Kenneth rounded off the afternoon with a session on "Acts of kindness" acts of kindness done in love can change the world. In the group feedback we saw that many of the churches represented here are engaged in this and they enthusiastically shared testimony about what they are doing.






The day was good but the heat was exhausting. We came back to the guest house
to have a cold shower; had we wanted a hot one we wouldn't have been able to have one as there is only cold water. The we went out for supper, some had fruit smoothie, others had dumpling filled with meat and vegetables.









As I write I am sitting under a mosquito net on my bed, Anne Kate who I share  room with thinks I ought to share with you what I look like.