YWAM Family Ministries Philippines Team February 2010

Celebrating Febilyn' s Birthday

Today February 16th (my birthday) marks 25 years in YWAM for me.. I arrived in the Philippines on this day way back in 1985 to do a three month summer of service with Youth With A Mission Philippines, serving as a nurse working amidst the poor & needy. Obviously my 3 months was extended as I am still here!! Mel marked his 25 years in YWAM last October 2009 while we were teaching in the Family Ministries School in Taiwan!

For this reason we just want to take this time to thank the Lord and to give him all the glory as he has remained so incredibly faithful to us over all of these years. Many of you also have been very loyal to us throughout this time and we would like to say thank you to you too! We could not do this without our God and your sincere friendship with us, your prayers, and practical support. We are so grateful to each one of you. Blessings to you all!

Well I guess you are beginning to wonder where we are writing from at this time...sometimes we wonder also!

We have now been back in the Philippines for just over a week. It's certainly good to be back here in Baguio. We are staying at the Family Ministries House which happens to be besides the house we rent and on the other side of the house is the Baguio domestic airport runway and the helicopter pad for the Philippine Air Force! Also staying with us here are the Banganan family who served together with us in Thailand.

You may remember that we left the Philippines last September in the middle of 'Typhoon Ondoy' which gave a record rainfall and much devastation and hardship for the people of the Philippines due to severe flooding and massive landslides. Well since that time there has been no rain in this area. Everything is very dry and dusty and we are experiencing a drought in this region. Sad to say but life continues to be difficult for many.


These past few days we have been having our own celebrations of our 52nd birthdays and 23 years of marriage and of course our 25 years in YWAM.

Later this week we will be holding three days of meetings with our Family Ministries Staff here in Baguio for planning and prayer. Please pray for us as we meet that we can hear Gods voice and HIS plan for the coming year.

This Sunday we return to Manila and fly out on Monday the 22nd Feb. to New Zealand for our three month furlough. We will arrive in Auckland on the 23rd of February via Thai Airways. Jonathan is already in Auckland between contracts with NCL and Joanna is at Mt Maunganui so we will celebrate Christmas and all of our birthdays in March this year. Mel hasn't been in NZ for over three years so it will be extra special for him and of course we are so looking forward to catching up with our children. By the way Joanna started studying at Bethlehem College this week, a very exciting move for her.


We also have new updates on the brand new YWAM Family Ministries International website Please visit at www.ywam-fmi.org and go to the news section and you will see our latest items on Family Ministries Thailand and the Philippines.
Well we look forward to seeing many of you in the coming months so until then...
take care and God Bless……