I’ll be in the PHX area from October 17 to November 10. I’d love to speak to groups of any size about our mission, or missions in general. Also, if you have a spare room for me to stay in for all or some of those days, please let me know. jgapinoy@gmail.com Sorry, my sweetheart Gina has to stay in the Philippines.
We’re excited that our brand-new Bible study had so many visitors! Only six people shown here are church members. Interestingly, the owner of the home is not a church member (though two of her kids are). She doesn’t seem to be born again… yet. But this is by far the biggest living room in the neighborhood that I know of. So I asked if we could meet weekly here. So far, so good!
This is our third weekly Bible study in Gem Village, each one well attended. God is doing great things there!
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When you pray for and/or support Filipinos Reaching Nations, you are blessing the several Filipino missionaries whom we financially support every month. (One of them is in these photos, shepherding former Muslims.) All those missionaries are in difficult places, doing amazing work.
We would love to support more like them. Many Filipino missionaries are very under-funded, because churches here don’t have the wealth that American churches have. Would you please consider helping us to help them?
Or, if you would like to support any of these missionaries directly, I would love to introduce you!
We are a very small ministry, but in just the past three years, we have sent more than $11,000 to support Filipino missionaries in unreached cultures.
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Our island has nine Muslim tribes that are 1.0% or fewer evangelicals. The red dots show where they are. One tribe is only about a three hour drive from us. But it’s not as easy as simply driving to these places and preaching. Overcoming hundreds of years of hatred and/or suspicion of Christianity, plus language and cultural hurdles, means the potential laborer has to be well-trained and filled with the Holy Spirit. The Muslim tribes on our island:
–Negrito, Mamanwa 0.3% evangelical
–Manobo, Umayamnon 0.5%
–Mandaya, Karaga 1.0%
–Kalagan 0.3%
–Maranao, Lanao 0.2%
–Iranun 0.0%
–Subanen, Tuboy 0.2%
–Maguindanao 0.04%
–Manobo, Cotobato 0.8%
The red dots are “unreached” tribes, while the orange dots represent “least-reached” tribes, where the number of evangelicals is only slightly higher.
The map and the statistics are from JoshuaProject.
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The pandamic restrictions ended here much later than in the USA, and even after they ended, many were hesitant to attend church in our Buhangin congregation*… especially parents of small kids. So we opted for a small, cheaper one-room facility because of the lower attendance then. We have had no kids’ ministry for years… until a few weeks ago. Even now, we don’t have a room for the kids, but we had to do something—kids were coming to church anyway. And our room is always packed. So we’re having kids’ ministry on the stairs. Thankfully we’ll move into a bigger building in a few weeks.
*Our Pequeño congregation meets in a neighborhood, so kids aren’t an issue there. Long story. 🙂
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Literally standing room only in one of the two Sunday services at our Buhangin location. We usually have young men standing in the back during the service.
We have almost as many people in the 1:00 PM service.
The air conditioning is overwhelmed with that many people–so hot.
I’m sure our numbers will go up as soon as we get that bigger building. More room, a kids’ ministry, and it will be cooler.
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These young men were first-time visitors at a Bible study I recently taught. But the one on the right didn’t want to enter the home during the study, because he was not wearing a shirt. We insisted repeatedly, “It’s OK, please come in.” But he remained sitting outside the door… and he listened to every word. Then, when we said “amen,” he entered.
I appreciate that he was trying to respect the teaching of the Scriptures.
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I thank God for Prescy. When I asked her to teach one hour for our evangelistic parenting seminar weeks ago, she could’ve easily said, “Sorry, I’m working all day.” (She teaches English to Vietnamese adults online.) But she squeezed her seminar teaching during a 90-minute break in between online classes. So here’s where Prescy taught English before and after her seminar teaching. It’s the best place she could find within walking distance to the seminar.
It was hot, but she was required to wear the jacket.
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The evangelistic parenting seminar I mentioned filled the house we met in. The many kids of these parents were outside participating in a kids’ ministry.
Most of those who attended never go to an evangelical church, and many expressed a desire to follow Jesus. So far, some are attending church and/or our new Bible study there.
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It’s my delight to teach again at FIRE School of Ministry, a mission-oriented seminary here in Davao City. Even better, for the first time I’m teaching my favorite topic there: Missions! This is my sixth semester with Fire. It’s one of various ways in which we are preparing Filipinos to reap the Lord’s harvest among the nations.
Pictured: 14 of my 17 students.
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This was the second time JR has been miraculously, instantly healed right before church.* He had hurt himself on the job and was wearing the Ace bandage on his wrist to facilitate eventual healing. But God wanted to hurry the process along!
Child of God, you too can lay hands on the sick and believe for miracles.
If you–like me–see nothing happen 90 or 95% of the time, trust me, the 5 or 10% will make all the prayers worth it!
*About three years ago, he was limping badly into the meeting. I laid hands on his ankle three times. After the third, he was completely healed! I made him jump up and down on his formerly-hurt foot. After church, he played basketball!
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Gina and I met Ban (black shirt) during our very first week here in Davao City (over ten years ago). He was nine years old. We’ve watched him grow in the Lord despite very difficult circumstances. He had already lost his dad (who was murdered at a political rally) when we met him, and then his mom was very sick for years until she passed away months ago. But Ban has remained faithful. Marc (bright red shirt) has been especially helpful in discipling the young man. Whenever Marc or I teach a Bible study, Ban wants to join, even if he’s already heard the teaching. And Ban is in various kinds of ministry, including leading teen boys’ group discussions after the sermon on Sundays. We all love Ban!
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I was honored to preach twice at the Mission Motivator conference on Samal Island in August.
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At REBUILD Youth Camp, with seven churches participating, we had about 40 baptisms! Seven were visitors invited by our church members! I love doing baptisms! It makes me feel like a doctor delivering babies! New lives in Christ!
Along with those seven, our mission has had three other baptisms since our last report.
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Jayr, Chona, and April are doing excellent work every Saturday in Ma-a. Their kids’ ministry has already led to a home Bible study through building relationships with parents. Jayr and Chona also do kids’ ministries in other areas. God, give us more families in your Kingdom!
Here are the ways you can donate:
https://nations.ph/donations/
We so appreciate our sponsors!
To those who give, thank you so much!
We could never repay you for your generosity to Filipinos Reaching Nations, but certainly “you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.” (Luke 14:14)
Please forward this website to others who might be interested.
Please pray that God will send more laborers into his harvest field.
Please do not write to me here. Your message would get buried in the 1000s of spam messages. Please contact me via jgapinoy@gmail.com. Thank you!
