good news

good news! my boxers are fixed so i am now running at full capacity of underwear!!!

We sing a song called Unify Us and the chorus goes like this Unify us, purify us, so that we will change the world, so that we will change the world....

And the thing is...it's not just a song that we sing, but it's something that i really believe. gross how cliche is that. But i have witnessed in communities here in the Philippines, Brazil, Malawi, and in the United States the spreading of the love of Christ. The quote from Mother Theresa keeps coming up that says something like it doesn't matter how much you do, but how much love you put into what you do. I am thoroughly convinced that the body of Christ has within its capacity to rise up together and to change things. If people didn't htink that, we wouldn't have had the end of slavery or the Civil Rights movement. The church was huge in those things. but why can the church not rise up together and change things in the world. Wouldn't it be great if churches were known for how many fresh water wells they were able to provide in the world instead of how many new church furnishings they were able to buy in the last year. If you go back and look at the history of the church, the money that was offered and tithed was supposed to go to the poor and the ones in need. If you were to look at the majority of churches budgets you would see that most of the budget is spent on itself...maybe not to unsimilar to how our nation's budget is spent on mostly defense and not on aide and helping others.... what if the churches began to spend their money on the poor. Now...i'm not advocating that we should ONLY be helping those in need. I thing as long as their are poor than that is a definite role of the church. But to also advocate for changes in the systems to prevent that poverty. it's a two headed thing. But the fact of the matter is that the church as a whole is not doing what it can. We are comfortable where we are. But Jesus is not a person that offered us comfort. He offered us a radical way to approach things, putting others before us and taking care of our needs last.

so that's what I've been thinking lately. It's been good being in the Philippines. Besides thought provoking thoughts we also have had some fun conversations taht dont have much to do with anything. the one this morning was why do we take pills with water. the argument was either that it was just to help get the pills down or that it was to help dissolve the pills and ease the pain on ur stomahc. i took my pills this morning with coffee..that's what stemmed this debate...so when i'm done typing this i'm going to google it to find out. we are going to cook a meal for the pastors tonight so we are trying to come up with something new for them. so far we've come up with mashed potatoes. ok, next time i will post some pictures. i think that carly is posting pictures that show the python we got to eat. That probably wins for most exotic thign that we've eaten! but life is good! prayers for Sharon Johnsrud and her continual recover, and for safety and good health for the team, and for discernment for things to come!! ok peace

davepeet

two quick stories from warm places

It's very warm here...we are abouit 7 degrees from the equator. i sweat a lot.
Yesterday was a busy day. I woke up and i discovered that my boxers were ripped all along the back side!! like from the top all the way to the bottom. now that was weird. and then i was playing frisbee and i bent to get the frisbee and i ripped another pair!!! that was two pairs in like 12 hrs!! that's half my stock of boxers!! Pastor Mercado's wife, Chai, is going to try to repair them. but what are the odds!!

things are going well. we ate this thing called Jack Fruit. because I don't have a lot of time, I"m going to post this link... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jackfruit u should check it out. they're probably the largest fruit I have ever seen!! one hting that i hope to see is that kid's catch spiders and then they fight each other! so i hoipe to see some of that and we may also get to try anaconda later!! like eating it! ok bye for now!!!

davpeeet

Hong Kong and food

We arrived safely in Hong Kong two nights ago. It's been busy busy busy since than. We visited the camp site that we will be back at in July and this morning we planned out the camp and all the activities that we will be doing. Between those things, it has been a lot of traveling around Hong Kong and eating lots of different foods. As Ua put it, we've tried more new foods in the last two days than probably in our life times. Just today I had chicken feet, octopus, crab eggs and white carrots. We've also eaten pig skin, squid, various new mushrooms, and had lots of tea. It's been great to be back with the Hong Kong camp people of the past. We are also looking forward to starting our overseas programs when we get to the Philippines. We will fly to Manila on Monday and will stay there until we fly to Mindinau on the 17th. Hope life is good back home! peace!

outta here and into the green pudding from the sun

Well, we're less than four hours away from heading to the Youth Encounter office to finish up stuff and then head to the airport! Our flight leaves at 6:30 and will head to Denver, than to San Francisco, and then to Hong Kong! It's exciting! I'll try to blog regularly so you know what's going on. But life's good and it's exciting to be out and about. Maybe someday I'll settle down and stay in one spot for a while. alright, catch ya from the other side of the world!

peace,
davepeet