July 1st was the National Day of Prayer. It's a major event for the churches of Cambodia. Several leading churches hosted an all-day prayer event in a local theater. Among the invited guests were government leaders who graciously allowed the permit for the churches to meet.
The format was a time of worship and then individuals would present a topic for prayer; say a little about the subject and lead everyone in prayer. This was repeated all day. Neth's church and worship team were responsible for the morning session and our church and worship team was responsible for the last section of the day. (Below is the worship and dance team from our local church.)
Pastor Barnabas and his wife, Boury, led everyone in an 'on your knees' prayer to close the day.

The day covered the topics from the 18 Pillars of Prayer for Society, a guide book that was given to all who attended.

1. The Pillar of Truth
2. The Pillar of Justice
3. The Pillar of Righteousness
4. The Pillar of Authority
5. The Pillar of Government
6. The Pillar of Welfare
7. The Pillar of Royalty
8. The Pillar of Prayer
9. The Pillar of Family
10. The Pillar of Fatherhood
11. The Pillar of Children
12. The Pillar of Youth
13. The Pillar of Elders
14. The Pillar of Education
15. The Pillar of Recreation
16. The Pillar of Culture
17. The Pillar of Honor
18. The Pillar of Dignity

One extra treat was the performance of a traditional Khmer dance.

Last Friday, I visited the new Village Learning Program in Takeo Province. This is the one that the team from AZ helped to build in March. When I entered the doorway, I was immediately and pleasantly surprised by the teacher, Chovy. She seemed quite in control of the group of nearly 20 9-12 year olds. She seemed confident and well trained. She spoke clearly and loudly. I was surprised because she has always been very quiet and reserved. I was unsure of how she would do on the job. My fears were quickly put to rest. I'm sure she will only improve over time. I'm very happy that our training program worked so well. Sina deserves much credit for training her so well.
As of now there are about 30+ children in the program. I expect it to increase over the coming weeks to our typical 60ish.

I'm excited that most of the children are unchurched. It's a great opportunity to see how well our program reaches out to them.   At First, the parents were afraid to send their children because they feared the children would be ridiculed and beaten like the public school. But now they are seeing that our program is different. We even have a few kids that come twice per day. And others want to stop attending the public school; although we encourage them to attend. 
Please remember to pray for the host church. It is small and has been small for many years, but the group is well grounded and committed. One reason it remains small is the prevalence of rice Christians in the area. Our hope is the program will cause the church to grow over time.

Sina took it upon herself the other day to take all the kids (64 in all) from two of the village schools to the zoo.

As I was visiting our Village School in Jeung Prey, teacher Kim Huang told me a little story about one of her students that was sick and had to stay home and miss class one day. It made the student cry because she couldn't come to class that day. Wow! I love to hear stories that show that what we are doing is having a significant impact on our students.

 
(Adults-left to right: Aileen, Darcy, Dondi and Mary Jane)
We had a special treat this morning. Mai arranged for our Filipino colleagues from northern Cambodia (Battambang) to come down to have a special worship service for the kids today. They dressed like clowns; led some simple English worship songs; shared a couple brief puppet dramas (Mai and Paul helped translate one); and taught a memory verse, 1John 4:7-8. It was a lot of fun and a nice change of pace. We're discussing the idea of them doing some training along these lines in the future.

First, this is an excellent article which you can read here. It's one of the best articles I've read written on the subject.

For some reason, CNN International has gotten interested in the Khmer Rouge war crimes trial. These trials are about 20 years in the making and fraught with corruption. So the outcome is likely to be just a waste of $100 million dollars.

The short article tries to shed some light on WHY the Khmer Rouge came to power and how the USA is tangibly linked in culpability through its activities during the Vietnam War.

It sheds a little light on Cambodia's reluctance to find justice and their preference to simply "let sleeping dogs lie".

In February, we opened Village School House #2 in a village quite close the the first one. The name of the village is translated something like "at the base of the forest". However, the forests have long been replaced by rice fields.

It was a bit of a slow start. On the first day we had only 5 students show up from the 20 that had pre-registered. Everyday the number increased and by the next week, we had over 60 kids and more say they want to attend. Of these, only 7 currently believe in Jesus. What a tremendous opportunity we have to teach them how to read and write and learn of the wonders of salvation using the literacy books developed by the Bible Society of Cambodia!

For one hour a day, as a supplement to regular school (if they get regular school), they learn to read the Bible, sing praise songs, pray and some other practical things like hygiene and manners on a daily basis. We are also adding in additional subjects such as math and geography. On Sundays, they have the opportunity to attend the church that meets in the same place.

(Below) Ages 7-14. When asked none of these children said they could read prior to attending our program, although they all attend a local school. Paul told them that now they make their teacher at the school look good because they will be the smartest students in their class. One girl (middle row, left) said that she recently got the highest marks in her class.

 
With great excitement (and a little lingering frustration) I'm pleased to announce that the BGC has been granted NGO (non-government organization) status by the Royal Government of Cambodia. It's just the end of the beginning as there is much more ahead for us.

Thank you very much for your faithful prayers that have finally come to fruition.

 
It is the end of a great week for Allan, Mike and Tom from the USA. They came to help build a new Village School House and worship center in a village loosely translated "Jungle Pond Village".

On their last day, the church held a brief celebration to dedicate the new facility to God and ask his blessings on the new school house and church. The church has been meeting at the pastor's house on the same property for the past 10 years. It will be a great blessing for them to have a place of worship like this.

Here the pastor prays for a safe return trip to America.

 
Tom, Allan and Mike from Cornerstone Christian Fellowship in AZ arrived to join in the construction of our new Village School House (and church) located in Takeo Province about 1-1/2 hours south of Phnom Penh. 

Boy they work fast! Not. Construction had already begun last week.

After many months of nothing, I got a call this morning about 11 to go to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs at 3pm to sign some documents. So I went and signed the documents.

Now we have to wait for the Secretary of State to also sign them to make the NGO formal and legal. I don't know when this will happen.

Please pray that all proceeds smoothly.

We've started construction this week of the new school/church in Takeo Province. The first phase is building the foundation in preparation for a team that will come from Cornerstone Christian Fellowship in AZ to help with the final building phase later this month. The building will be a copy of the one Sina currently teaches in.

After the Khmer New Year in mid-April we will open our third Village School. These are exciting times indeed!

Wow! On day 1 we had only 5 students show up from the 20 that had pre-registered. The next day there were 16, not bad. The day after there were 40 - now we're talking. This week, (10 days later) we have 64 kids and more say they want to attend.

Of the 64 only 7 currently believe in Jesus. We fully expect that many of those, perhaps all, will trust in Jesus in the coming months and years. Please pray for these children (and their families) as they learn to read and write and learn of the wonders of salvation.

Also, we are in contact with the Bible Society of Cambodia about providing text books as they have done in the past. It's a bit slow going with them. Please pray that it won't be long before we can acquire the books and tapes.

Attendance at the new village school reached 40 students on the second day. Praise God. We only had 20 pre-register. We can handle up to 80 students without the classes getting too big. 

Recently all of the teachers gathered with Paul, Mai and Neth (7 in all) to have a time of encouragement and team building. It was important because it's not often that we are all together since we work in different provinces. Paul shared a short message from Prov. 22:6 encouraging the teachers to train up children in the ways of the Lord and how important their role is. And also to enjoy what they do.

We are still waiting............

Please pray.

Village School #2 opened today. It was a modest start. We had 20 students pre-registered. The first morning class had 5 attend with another class scheduled for the afternoon. Many families are afraid of the church. Our program aims to change that and we fully expect our enrollment to grow rapidly.

There are also scheduling challenges with the local school. Apparently they frequently change their morning/afternoon schedule which is confusing for students. We try to schedule our program to coincide with the local school so they students can come regularly.

2009 brings a new uncertainty to ministry here. The USA leadership of the new Converge Worldwide has mutually agreed with Tri Truong to go their separate ways. It is unclear how many things that have existed for several years will work out. Some of this will fall upon us to help sort out. We believe it is in everyone's best interest for the long-term. Pray that we will have wisdom, strength and courage throughout. Pray for new clarity and overall purpose for Converge to minister in Cambodia. We wish Tri many blessings as he carries on his work through World Agape.

A member of the host church for the new Village School House has donated some land to the church that is waiting for God to provide the means to build a new church/Village School House. Depending upon the type of construction, a nice functional structure can be built for as little as $5,000. Please pray for God's provision.

We've set the date for the opening of one of two new Village School Houses. The teacher Kim Huong is now training with Sina and two other new teachers. I think they like the camaraderie, but soon they will be on their own.

Below (left to right) is a picture of Paul with the pastor of the new host church, home owner of the church and program location, and Kim Huong and Sina.

Please pray that registration on Jan. 22 goes smoothly. Our target is 50-80 children. There may be more, but that's too difficult for one teacher to manage. We are also hoping the Bible Society of Cambodia will get involved and help provide literacy books and tapes like they did last time.