To and Through: The Beginning of My Mongolian Adventures

(A note from Gladys: Hello, everyone. Scribbles and Everday Miracles welcomes aboard Anthony, who will be sharing in this blog how God is leading him in his most recent missionary assignment. The following is only a first. We hope you are blessed by it and the others that will follow.)

On the morning that I received the confirmation of my travel to Mongolia, I was preparing to make an eleven-hour journey by bus to my parents’ home. It has been months since I first received the call to be a missionary in Mongolia, and for a while there it seemed that it would never happen. But it’s true that God does not think as man does.

It was a Wednesday, and I had planned to stay with my parents until the weekend. However, I was informed that I was booked for a flight out of the country on Saturday night. All plans of a nice and fuzzy weekend with family dissolved, and thus began a series of seemingly unfortunate events that turned out to be a story of grace.

I made the trip home to say goodbye to my parents (I’d be gone two full years!). The journey was supposed to be smooth, if not for the typhoon that raged almost all night and really slowed the bus down. As we reached the next province, a major part of the bus got broken and almost sent us rolling off the cliff. By God’s grace, no one was hurt.

From Better Way Foundation in Nueva Era, Ilocos Norte to my hometown in Echgue, Isabela, and back.

I arrived home Thursday morning. That same night I needed to travel back to the missionary campus. My parents sent me off with tight hugs and many tears. Two years would not go by so fast.

During the trip back came yet another typhoon. The stronger the winds blew and the heavier the rain poured, the more the bus shook, and the more intense the prayers.

Friday morning I was back in campus with only enough time to finish packing my things and say goodbye to my friends and fellow missionaries. If I were to make it to my Saturday evening flight, I had to make another night trip by bus.

The rain poured the entire day and flooded the creek that crossed the path to the campus, completely washing away the footbridge. But I and some friends, wet from the rain and wading in the creek, still managed to attend the vespers meeting and the simple farewell program prepared for me. My missionary friends sang “God Will Take Care of You.” I was moved and motivated.

After the program, my closest friends braved the still-pouring rain with me, crossing the flooded creek to bring me by jeepney to the city two hours away, where I could take the bus for another 12-hour trip to the airport in Manila. I would then have 16 hours in Manila before my flight, a safe enough margin – if the typhoon wasn’t there.

But it was.

As the rain kept pouring heavily, the flood water rose until the roads looked like a huge river. My friend drove carefully and slowly. Still one of the tires fell off the road and we found ourselves stuck in the mud. There was no way to move in any direction.

The scene brought to mind an incident about three days back. I had a truck bring my things down from our mountain campus. One tire slid into a ditch and got us stuck there. After hours of trying, my two friends and I could not get the truck out. One phone call later, our friends arrived from the campus, with two carabaos (water buffalos) to pull the poor truck out of the ditch and get us back on the road. Praise God!

But this time was different. We were in the middle of nowhere, too far for our carabaos to come pull us out; and it was literally the middle of the night, too late for phone calls (phone services and electricity were down anyway, due to the typhoon). We spent hours pushing, pulling, doing everything we could, and finally we got through.

Still, the night’s challenge was far from over.

It turned out that all the bridges that led out of our little town were either broken or covered entirely with water. We went this way and that, tried all the routes we knew, all to no avail. We were left with no choice but to wait for the water to subside. Our clothes still wet, we slept in the jeepney for two or three more hours – each minute eating away the precious time allowance before my flight – before the water was shallow enough for us to safely cross the bridge.

By then, dawn was already breaking.

As we drove, we could see roadblocks and fallen trees everywhere, landslides, once-dry riverbeds filled to overflowing, rice fields turned to seemingly endless expanses of water. We could only be thankful.

Two hours to the city. Twelve hours to the airport. Now I just had enough time to make it to my flight.

At the bus terminal, I bid my friends goodbye. What a night we had! I took the bus, and the trip proved so much better this time. But this calm, it turned out, was only as the passing of the eye of a storm.

From Nueva Era to Laoag City to the airport in Manila, to Tagaytay, and back to Manila.

True enough, I arrived in time at the airport and breezed through checking in. But a tint of anxiety grew on me as I went through Immigration.

As it happened, I didn’t have all the needed documents to travel abroad, and I was held in Immigration for interviews.

One hour before the flight. I sent frantic emails to the office in our mountain campus (where there has been no electricity for days), the LIGHT office, and the hosting organization in Mongolia. No reply. Tick tock, tick tock.

“Lord, is it really Your will for me to go?” I have spent the last three nights on one vehicle or another, the last three days saying goodbye to loved ones; I have been through storm and flood, I have prayed and used up the best of my strength. “Is it really Your will for me to go?”

Tick tock, tick tock.

The plane left without me. I went to a friend’s house for a place to stay. The following day, they were leaving for their new house and invited me to come along. We got lost along the way, and they wondered why – but not me. Not anymore.

A couple of days later, the documents were prepared, another flight booked, and Immigration passed.

Mongolia. Finally.

At the Mongolian airport, I was met by my first Mongolian friend who was shaking when I first saw her. I understood why when she told me later that they met a little accident on their way to the airport. Wow.

Baaska, the girl who came to meet me at the Mongolian airport - but not without meeting a challenge first.

The following morning, we prepared to make the eight-hour trip to Starting Point Life University, where I would be serving God for the next two years. But as we were leaving the city, a car suddenly hit the back of our car. Oh, when will this end?

From Manila to Ulaanbaatar (via Incheon) to the SPLU Campus in Bugat, Bulgan, Mongolia.

Still, gratitude and praises to God filled my heart and my prayers as we reached the SPLU campus in Bulgan Province. It was the Lord’s will for me to be here, after all.

The Philippine flag I presented to Academic Dean Cathie  and Khisgee (John), the School President (right). 

In the campus, as I met fellow foreigners who will also be working with SPLU, I learned that they too had their own versions of the long and bumpy ride that brought us together in one mission field. Amazing challenges and miracles filled their joyful stories.

Their experiences and mine helped me understand more clearly the Lord’s ways of preparing a soul for bigger challenges in life. It may be a typhoon, a flood, a ditch, a bump in the road, or getting lost in the dark – all of these remind me that if it is God who has called me, it will be God who will carry me through; If He brings me TO it, it only means that He will bring me THROUGH it.

Now just thinking of what the next challenges will be completely thrills my heart. Anyway, I know that God will take care of me. Like it says in the song my friends sang,

“Be not afraid whate’er betide,

God will take care you.

Beneath His wings of love abide,

God will take care of you.

God will take care of you
Through every day, all o'er the way.
He will take care of you;
God will take care of you."

Do stay tuned for more Mongolian Adventures with the greatest Guide ever.

Back from the Mountains

Now that training's over and I'm off the boondocks, there's so much I can't wait to do: upload photos and vids, get my computer back to shape, update my blog, get home, do the laundry, see everyone, cook (yes, cook), research stuff, organize my files, share the things i've learned, buy clothes na pang Christian Living , and reply to everyone who's been messaging me for the past seven months, among others. I miss the mountains already, but I'm sure that wherever the Lord is taking me will be even more beautiful. I'm still not better than anybody, but I believe that I'm better than who I was. I praise the Lord for His goodness and for His faithfulness in my life. Everyday I learn that He loves me with more love than I could possibly know in this lifetime.

Thoughts from Week 3

Written January 2014

It has been three weeks since I came to LIGHT Missionary Training Center. I notice that it’s a time when students and volunteers feel that they have adjusted to the schedule, to the amount of work and homework, to one another, and to the cold (yes, the cold deserves to be factored in).

Back home, I usually wake up around 5:00 am, all the while thinking that was early. Here, if I want to get anything done, I must wake up at 3:30. That will give me just enough time for my morning devotional, a bit of personal preparation, daily chores, morning worship, a bit of homework, and then work education (which I am loving so far). In the afternoon, there are the classes, supper, and evening worship. I get back to the dorm around 8:30 pm, pray with the girls at my dorm, do my homework, have my evening devotional, and sleep. There is no leisure time at all! But guess what, I love it. I love that my mind is always occupied, that it doesn’t have the time to wander, that it gets taxed and pushed to think constantly about work, study, and worship.

The classes are wonderful. So far, we’ve had classes on the Spirit of Prophecy, Health Talks, Health Expo, How to Study the Bible, the Plan of Salvation (by far my favorite), Gospel in Action, the Sanctuary, Mental Health and Mission Medicine. I am able to put to use the things that I have learned in my personal studies, and learn so much more. The reality of God’s Word is sometimes so moving that I would find myself in tears during classes. Still, all of the studying that I’m currently doing only serves to remind me of just how much I still do not know.

Then there’s Work Education – half the reason why I came here. After breakfast, we students go to work in different areas: Kitchen, Construction, Mushroom, Agriculture, Bakery, and Vermi-composting. I have been assigned to the Bakery, which is just so fun and informative. But I’m also very excited to learn from the other fields, especially Vermi and Agriculture. On one hand, I’m not used to heavy work and kneading bread is – believe me – heavy work. I can just imagine the exhaustion from tending vegetable gardens and digging for construction work. But I’m still really excited because it’s all useful labor and I know that it will help prepare me to fill my place in God’s work. Plus, I get better health while doing it. God really is wise in putting all that together in one package – work education.

Another thing that I love is the prayer atmosphere in this place. I find myself praying at least 20 times each day, and that’s excluding mealtime prayers and personal prayers! The people, too, are always encouraging one another to pray, study, and speak of spiritual things. It’s only been three weeks, but I’ve already found family in people who share my love for reading the Bible and the Spirit of Prophecy. Whenever there’s a chance, like during meals or while waiting for classes or worship to begin, or even while walking to and during work education, I’d share with them what I have been reading. They’d share their devotionals with me, too. We swap books and quotations, pray together, discuss Bible lessons, share experiences. The exchange is so wonderful that it sometimes makes me want to cry. To me, it’s like a dream come true.

They say here that things usually go well the first two months, and then the real challenges begin. People will then tend to relax more, so they become less guarded and the true characters would surface. Add to that the increasing pressures of work, chores, class requirements and deployment, plus being away from home for so long already. To top it all off, there’s the struggle within against discouragement, personal weakness, and old habits. It’s actually the perfect formula for discord, but in my heart, I really do trust that God will bring us through if we only humble ourselves enough to let Him lead. In fact, I also am just realizing that those circumstances put together also make up quite a good formula for change and growth.

I almost can’t wait to get back home to my family and my church and share with them the things I am learning here. But I will wait. I will wait, work, pray, learn, worship, share, and grow, all by God’s grace. I will keep my promise to them and to God that I will endeavor in all my God-given capabilities to make my time here and my seven-month absence from home worth it because God is making a better co-laborer out of me.

True education means more than taking a certain course of study. It is broad. It includes the harmonious development of all the physical powers and the mental faculties. It teaches the love and fear of God, and is a preparation for the faithful discharge of life's duties.-- "Counsels to Teachers, Parents, and Students," p. 64.  {MYP 168.1} 

True education is the preparation of the physical, mental, and moral powers for the performance of every duty; it is the training of body, mind, and soul for divine service. This is the education that will endure unto eternal life.-- "Christ's Object Lessons," p. 330.  {MYP 168.2} 

  

Visiting Mountain Heights Missionary Training School in Valencia

I rarely get the chance to travel. Most of my experience as a missionary consisted of typing away at a laptop computer a few steps away from bed.

So when I got invited to see the Mountain Heights Missionary Training School in Tongantongan, Valencia, Bukidnon, I was more than eager to go.

My friend, Brother Bruce, is one of the supporters of the school while another friend that I met through him, Sister Juliet, was volunteering as a teacher.

The three of us left Davao by bus around three o'clock in the morning and arrived in Valencia five hours later. From there, we took a tricycle (locally called a rela) to the home of Bro. Bruce's uncle where we will be staying for the night.

Bro. Bruce and the motorcycle we borrowed.

In the afternoon, we hopped onto a motorcycle and drove to the foot of the hill where the school is located. The uphill hike took a very exhausting (or was it only me?) fifteen minutes. I thought my heart was going to burst in my ears. haha.

Near the top was the school, itself a simple building which housed fourteen eager and aspiring Bible students.

The school was established a couple of years ago and has grown as far as getting their own electricity, improving the curriculum, establishing farms/gardens, and gaining volunteer teachers.

Sis. Juliet and the school that will be her home for the next four months.

The other side of the school and a view of the vegetable gardens.

Sis. Juliet currently teaches the students Health and English.The students also have classes on the Bible and trade skills like baking and agriculture.

Even without the support of parents and relatives, the students here are determined to continue with their education. Currently, they make bread that they sell to the neighboring village below. The school is also surrounded by vegetable gardens cared for by the students as a source of food and possible income.

Since the arrival of Sis. Juliet, work on installing a better kitchen has been started, an enclosed bath area put up, and students' work schedules implemented. Specific dates have also been set apart for student recreation and for visiting nearby churches on Sabbaths.

Other projects the staff and students will be undertaking include a kiln for better and easier baking, a separate staff house, kitchen sinks and cupboards, writing desks, and improved dormitories. There is also a need for learning materials (textbooks, workbooks, visual aides, etc.) and school supplies. The students do need all the help they can get.

Away from the hustle of the city and immersed in the scenes of nature and in the responsibilities that accompany self-support, the students have come to learn and understand that they need just this experience in order to be drawn closer to God and to be prepared for the ministry that is to be their life-work.

As it began to get dark, we decided to head back down, but took a few moments to marvel at the wonderful extra gift that graces the school at the end of each day - an awe-inspiring sunset.

Leaving Sis. Juliet behind, Bro. Bruce and I traveled back to Davao at two in the morning the following day. It was a physically exhausting trip, but on the inside I felt all light and happy.

Thoughts of eager Bible students and devoted Bible workers all over the world never fail to inspire me to constantly look to God to make me a more efficient worker for Him.

Who knows, He just might ask me to volunteer at Mountain Heights Missionary Training School someday. Just in case, I already got an answer ready. ;-)

Bro. Bruce, myself, and Sis. Juliet

Coming up soon on this blog: my recent trip to a hilltop church in Davao del Sur and our Fourth Anniversary of ministry at the Davao City Jail.