Sunday Worship

June 5, 2016

This morning we woke to get ready for church.  Again the kids were all about doing their chores, the speaker was projecting Buddhist chants, the birds were chirping and the rooster was crowing.

As the kids greeted us they asked as usual if we slept well.  We also asked if they slept well and many said they had sore shoulders and arms from all the rock climbing.

We headed out to church about 8:15am.  When we arrived we sat down to wait with everyone else who was already there.  The guys sit on the right and the ladies sit on the left.  There wasn't much chit-chat and no milling around socializing.

As a side note, when walking to church we got to hear "Achey Breaky Heart" blaring from someones yard and it was in Khmer :)  Very funny!

The picture above was at offering time.  They pass a sewn pouch around to collect the money in.  I love even just sitting and seeing how things are done here.  In the middle of service an older lady took out a leaf, put some small red/tan thing in it and spread it out of the leaf.  Then she folded the leaf and ate it.  Caleb said it's a type of pain killer that is used for tooth pain.  There is not a lot of oral hygiene in the remote poor of the village.

The kids from the Orphanage take lots of leadership roles in the church.  The kids do the praise team and band with singing and another group does the Kids Service about half way through the worship time.

I kept thinking of that old hymn "Redeemed how I love to proclaim it, Redeemed by the blood of the Lamb, Redeemed by His infinite mercy..."  These kids have come from some very broken and rough home lives.  Yet, their love of Jesus has changed them from the inside.  They have been redeemed!

Ream's father is the pastor and he is always working, greeting, meeting with people trying to share Jesus.  He and his family were the first Christians in the village.  The service sermon was out of Genesis 37 & 39 and about Joseph and how the Lord blessed Joseph's faithfulness through times of hardship.   There were two testimonies before the sermon.  One was from a gentleman who teaches preschool here.  He said that the Lord has grown the preschool class.  When the kids came they were not well behaved but after learning they have become very well behaved.  The second was from a lady who teaches at the preschool.  She said that she was very poor and trusted Jesus.  She began teaching but they didn't have a salary for her.  She said lots of teachers ran away because they weren't getting paid but she chose to stay.  Then the Lord provided a salary for her and she is so blessed because of His provision.

After service we chatted for a minute then came back to the Orphanage.  Today will be our last full day at the Orphanage and it's already becoming sad to think of leaving again.  I think we are leaving pieces of our heart here over the time we come and leave.

Wut caught us after lunch, she and several girls walked us to the market to pick up the skirts we had made.  They turned out lovely and Anna wanted to wear her's out of the store.

The guys stayed back helping Sothee try to upload a program on the Orphanage computer that will make videos.

After the girls and I got back, Wut, Soryia, Vanack and Mangju went into the country side to do a children's church club.  I wanted to go and see what they do so I tagged along for a beautiful bike ride!

We got to the little church building and across the street was rest spot with a wooden cover.  There were two women waiting there for us.  They were part of the women's Bible study group that meets when the children meet.  We talked for a while and one of the ladies had a question about the seven lamp stands in Revelation 1.  It was a fun conversation!  Then the other lady asked for prayer for her ear that is hurting and her back that is hurting her.  We laid hands on her and prayed.  Please pray for her healing.  When we got back I was telling Alfven and he said she was the house visit they had done on Friday and she was super nice.

Some of the kids showed up, mostly on bikes.  I was told this was a smaller group than normal but there were still about 10.  First they went inside for a Bible lesson and then they came out for games.

You can see the boy in the air on the right side jumping and holding a shoe.  That's the game they would play.  They would jump into the jump-rope and try to pick up a shoe while jumping.  If they did get the shoe without stopping another child would would jump in, the one with the shoe would jump out and then the new jumper would try to pick up a shoe.

After children's club we headed home.

If you look at the picture below, the lady had made a tool to scoop water from the pond there into her rice field on the other side of the berm.  It swings back and forth on the sticks so that she can scoop and fill easily.

When we got back a bunch of the guys had pulled out some games.

The girls were hanging with Ream looking at the pictures from her trip.  The little ones were working on the top toys that had been given to us.  They loved those!

Kit broke open a new game of Munchkins and the guys played for hours.

At chore time, this reminded me of helping to clear and level the back lot by hand last trip :)  

This is a brick oven for pizza and a grill that one of the mission teams built for the Orphanage.  Chenda's chore was to clean it.

This is the swimming pool that the kids hand dug.  It has three steps for depth and is also used for baptisms by the church.

After chores, we went with a bunch of the kids to go berry picking.  We went over to some more rural streets to pick Pring-Pring.  It is like a small grape but not as sweet and it has a big pit.  It was what one of the ladies served to Joseph and I at a home visit.

The kids loved climbing the trees to the top as well as jumping over barbed wire fences to get the berries.

And the berries turn your tongue purple/blue :)

These kids are amazing!  They know what to eat and when it comes out.  When walking home they grabbed some leaf tops off of a vine growing in a lane and had me try it.  Many of them have had to survive in some very tough circumstances.  When I came out of the room a little bit later one of the small girls was eating berries off the tree right outside our door.  These were my favorite wild taste of the day!

Below is a picture of a hand dug water holding pond.  These are in many of the fields so that in the rainy season they get filled for water when it's not raining.

When we got back it was time for dinner.  We had another delicious meal and hung out visiting for the evening.  We are sad that the end of this time in Cambodia has come.  The kids are asking when we are coming back.  We answer that we are praying that the Lord will allow us to come back soon :)

"As for me, I know that my Redeemer lives, And at the last He will take His stand on the earth."
Job 19:25