Last Video Update for the trip :)

Soon to leave

Hi Everyone,

Just a quick update.

Today, Ping is arriving from Shanghai to spend the last week in Taiwan with us. He will be here in YuChih for 5 days before heading back to Taipei with us on Sunday night. (We come back on Wed night).

Lots of people want to see Ping so lots of meals planned with different people. Some visits to the school - we were able to go to some classes yesterday to say bye to students and tell them how blessed we've been and to invite them to Church this Saturday for our last weekend here.

Saturday will be a busy day for us -we are running the youth in the morning with some games, a song perhaps and sharing time - testimonies and encouragement. Then the afternoon will be our last bible study with the senior high school students. Then those students will be cooking us dinner that night at Jasmine's house.

Then that's basically last of our events here in YuChih. In the meantime, we have lots of letters and cards to write (in both English and Chinese) and there will be lots of tears and hugs as we say goodbye. We will continue to be seeing students from the junior high school often each day - usually after school. So please keep praying for them and for our witnessing to them.

Please pray for our health - we've both recovered from our colds but still coughing and a bit of congestion - feel a LOT better though. Ping we hear is sick though.

Please pray for Saturday's activities. Pray for translation - I think we as well as Ping will be speaking a lot of Chinese that morning.

Please pray for our bible study group on Saturday arvo and for their commitment to the Church here.

We've been so encouraged and greatly touched by so many people here. God has really blessed us. We've had a couple of people even share with us how they want to step up more and do more and they want to help after we leave. So that is an encouragement for sure.

We can only trust God that He will continue to grow His Church and His people.

Thanks everyone for your loving support.

- Mikey

Blessed to be a blessing

We had a really good time studying the Bible together this afternoon. Praise God we had 12 students come along to learn. We talked about why we go to Church and a lot about encouragement (Heb 10:24-25). It was so good to see so many faces there and for them even though they were a bit quiet and tired, to share with them our experiences and we fully encouraged them and used this opportunity to I guess tell them that they are the older students in the Church, we are passing on the responsibility of evangelism and discipleship to them - that it is them that has to set an example to the younger ones and to invite their friends to come to Church. I always get excited when leading Bible studies so I talked a fair bit (in chinese too) but I got the message across and we can only pray that they'll go away thinking about it, praying, encouraging one another and take on the responsibility of serving YuChih Church.

Please keep praying for this group of young people - they are a very cool bunch and some of our closest friends here in YuChih - we can only pray that God will really convict them and change them, that they'll want to serve God wholeheartedly and His kingdom. We were encouraged this morning by hearing a lot of the older students speak about that they are Christians and in their classes at school they are the only ones so it's hard for them to share the Gospel or invite ppl to church but just to hear that they think about it and share in front of others that they trust Jesus was really something to praise God about.

We basically have one more week left in YuChih then our mission will be basically over.

Thanks everyone for your continuous support and prayer - we hope and pray that God will use us even more this last week especially with Ping arriving on Wednesday.

YuChih Village/Town

Thought we'd give you a birds eye view on how big the village is we're staying in. If you zoom in, you'll see a shopping trolley in the middle of the town - that's 7eleven - we are about a block away from there I think.

Quick Prayer Requests

Due to unforeseen circumstances, a few people at our church (including Mikey and myself) have fallen ill to the common flu. Please pray for our quick recovery!

Thanks!

Only a few more days to go!

In sickness and in health.

Ivan is sick again with a bit of a cold.

Please pray for his health (and that I won't get sick too)!

Janice and Lily

So Janice and Lily invited us out to dinner tonight. This church is so blessed to have them. These two women are missionaries who started this Church in YuChih 15 years ago. They are originally from Taipei. They have now moved on (Janice is teaching at a Bible College and Lily will be moving away from YuChih soon too) but Janice came down to visit for the weekend and they invited us out to dinner to talk about stuff.

We talked a lot about how things are in the Church and other issues that the Church is currently facing. Lots to pray about with leadership and unity in the Church. We spent time praying for them afterwards and for the Church here as well. We have really become another member and seen as a church worker here - our other family and second home. We will really miss this place and the people.

These two women are so inspirational coz they use their singleness and their gifts and pour it all into God's Church. They both can speak English from studying in the States and it was Janice who was my first contact 4 years ago and allowed us to come and do work here. What a blessing for us, receiving so much grace from God over the years that both sides, us and the Church in Yuchih, can have this relationship and encourage one another.

Please pray for issues the future of this Church and also pray that we will all trust God with whatever happens because it is ultimately His Church and He will take care of it.

Mikey

Bible Study 5 - Prayer

So encouraging to see these senior high kids wanting to study the Bible with us. So our 'English bible studies' have been going well and today's was about prayer. After 5 weeks a lot of these kids are still attending and participating and it's encouraging to see their willingness to learn - albeit quiet at times. Praise God though. Studies have been going well - hopefully they've been learning a lot and have the desire to want to apply it in their life. Something to pray about :)

ps. we saw Taiwan's President in YuChih today. Cool hey.

Fear of Earthquake

We have been told to run out of the building if there is an earthquake tonight.

We had two earthquakes already today - one around 5:30pm, and another around 8pm. They were both of about 5 magnitude. The first was the biggest Taiwan has had since the huge gigantic one in 99 that destroyed so many cities and took so many lives (but that magnitude was about double the size).

At 5:30pm - I was in the bedroom lying down while Ivan was out in the streets.

Ivan's experience: "I was with some kids. I saw the bus shaking. I also saw the lamp post shaking. Then we laughed"

My experience: "Everything was shaking under my butt, I thought Ivan was trying to come through the door but then realised noone was there and it wasn't just the door shaking, it was the walls as well. I waited for about 7 seconds, then thought to myself, I should get up and get out of the building before the roof falls on me. But then, as I was JUST about to get up, the shaking subsided. "Meh" I thought. Last time there was an earthquake I slept through it - it can't be that much of a big deal."

Now tonight we sleep in paranoia.

Video Update #3

Sorry didn't realise I rambled on for 5mins30secs...

Imagine how much I could type.

3 weeks left!!!

Enjoy :)

- Mikey

A big weekend.

We haven't updated you guys for a while. But things have been quite busy for myself in the past week. Once again praise God that Ivan's visa extension was granted!

The weekend was a busy one. The youth threw a small surprise birthday thing for me on Saturday morning (I was so touched - they were so sweet), we had our bible study in the afternoon with the older kids, we went out to dinner with Church people that night and Sunday morning I was preaching.

I actually fell very ill in the middle of the night at 2am on Sunday. It was very very bad. I wanted to go to the toilet but nothing came out but then I vomited up a little bit as well. It was the most horrible feeling. I took some buscopan pills and felt a bit better but the feeling was still there in the morning. I took some more in the morning and prayed and rested before the service started. I felt a lot better by the time I had to go on stage.

The sermon went well - the message was translated well too. Problems I faced though:

1) Old people only speak the native language Taiwanese. So even though translated into Mandarin - most of the old people were falling asleep.

2) The sermon itself only went for about 25 mins right. But because of translation it went for double the time at least. So I know a fair few ppl were dozing off - youth don't usually come on Sunday mornings.

3) Not many youth came - probably too shy to come into Church or just piked out. The senior high school kids came to listen to the message though. So that was encouraging.

Not sure about conviction or if challenged - but overall, people were attentive and understood the message. I can't say much else except that I leave the work up to God. It was a good morning, and I thank God He provided healing for me.

For a more detailed weekend summary you can read my own personal blogsite:

http://doj-y.blogspot.com/2009/11/gods-goodness.html

Praise God though for all those who did attend the Sunday morning service and pray that they will go away thinking about what they heard and about the choice they need to make for eternal life.

Pray also for the students we do bible study with - they enjoy the time together but Saturday arvo's are quite tiring coz they also attend the youth in the morning as well - so it's a long day for them. Pray that they will want to follow Jesus with their whole lives.

Pray also for our health - Saturday night's episode was very scary - dont know if I want to conclude it was a spiritual attack but it came out of nowhere. I woke Ivan up at the time and I was like "Ivan...this is killing me..I feel like I'm dying." But that's probably coz I'm a drama queen. (it was REALLY painful though) Both Lily and Grace believe it to be so, especially being in Taiwan and doing God's work - there is lots of spiritual warfare in this area.

Thanks everyone for your continuous support and prayers. We appreciate it :)