Warm greetings from the rainy and flooding land of Anlongveng!
With heavy rains pouring on red clay-like dirt almost everyday, all paths and streets are filled with mud.Yet in spite of dirty roads and muddy paths, there is great joy and excitement written on over children’s faces every time it rains! With nearly 100% humidity and constant heat waves, rain waters are refreshing to the body. People, children and adults alike would rush out to soak themselves under the cooling rain waters every chance they get. Because Anlongveng is located near the Dong Raek Mountain range, and because the areas still have a lot of tall tree remains, we‘ve seen more rains here than in any other parts of Cambodia. The famous local lake, Boeng Taa Mok Lake, is always full and often times over flows with rain water. We just had another major rain shower on the Sunday afternoon of August 27th, which flooded most parts of the town again. Fortunately, the floods remained for only a few hours.
With all the traveling we had these past few weeks, it seemed like the entire month of August just vanished off the calendar! But a lot of events took place during these times and we want to share that with you as well.
September 4th:
I, Syna, returned to Cambodia after dropping off Jonathan and another Alliance missionary kid (MK) at Dalat International School in Penang, Malaysia. The original plan was for me to remain in the capital city, Phnom Penh, until September 9th for a Field Leadership Team (FLT) meeting. But on the late afternoon of September 4th, Soeuth was sick and home alone in Anlongveng! He was experiencing severe stomach pains followed by repeated cycles of high fever, chills and sweats. Because he was getting worse throughout that night, I had to make a trip home to Anlongveng, the next day; and it took me over 10 hours of road trips because there was no direct route for public transportations. Immediately after arriving home, I took him to a local clinic. Although his blood test showed no sign of malaria (which is very common for this town) his white blood count was very high. Since the Khmer doctor couldn’t specifically identify any cause of infection, the doctor just prescribed some antibiotics for Soeuth. The next day, Soeuth’s skin was breaking out with rashes and blisters! Later on after we saw a dermatologist in Bangkok, we discovered that Soeuth contracted a skin disease called Impetigo. Doctor said that this kind of illness is very common among small children who like to play in dirty waters. But Soeuth, liking children by nature, had no recollections holding any small dirty child from our recent arrival. We traced back to July 18th when we first moved from Poipet to Anlongveng. During this time, we had to collect water in bottles from ponds and rice fields off the main roads to feed the overheated truck, the Pajero. This explained why Soeuth contacted this skin disease that was typically rare in adults. Needless to say, we were very grateful that Soeuth was seen by a professional and received proper treatments for his sickness. All is well now. Praise God!
August 23- 26:
We went to Phnom Penh for a national youth committee meeting and had opportunities to reconnect with other national Alliance church leaders of that area. We had a great meeting with the youth committees. The committees decided on dates for our next annual national youth camp, which would be April 6-8, 2018. We appreciate your prayers as the committees are doing research on locations that would accommodate a youth camp for up to 600+ people!
Even with all the traveling we had, we try getting back to Anlongveng for Sunday church services. Although that means we have to travel late in the night, we make sure we have time to go to church on Sundays. So far, we had four church meetings with local people in a village called Toul Prich, about 17 kilometers away from the central location of Anlongveng.
There are a number of ladies in their late 20’s to early 40s, mostly with small children, who have been faithfully coming to “church." They seemed to be seeking the Way, but have not been formally or properly introduced. Many of them are illiterate. The “church” consists of mostly women and children, but no men except a few teenage boys and girls.
The more we spent time with them, the more we learned that these people, although they have been coming to “church," still lack basic knowledge of why they are coming or who they believe in and follow. To them, all religions teach people to do good things; therefore, the more gods you have the better.
As requested by the church leaders from the Poipet region, starting September 16, we will begin a monthly class for the church leaders of the areas. Due to long distant traveling, we will plan to spend the night at Poipet for every time we go to teach. We look forward to have rich fellowship with our dear brothers and sisters in Christ of that region. Pray for safe trips on the roads.
August 29th:
All the mothers also brought along their nursing babies! It was quite a challenge to teach class with all the kids playing and talking loudly nearby and the little babies crying out for their mother’s attentions! And the end of the “teaching session," I spent some time reading/ telling Bible stories to them.
Praise God, the kids seemed to quiet down a bit when it was story time. After an hour or so of “class," the ladies asked, “Could you come back again, do this class more often?” As their request, we plan to go there three times a week.
Pray for open and receptive hearts as they listen to Bible stories. And PLEASE pray for creative ideas on how to calm those busy and noisy kids. While I taught an adult literacy class underneath a Khmer’s style house (typically built on stilts), Soeuth, underneath another house, also started another group for school-aged kids and teenagers in a class called Living Water, using a discipleship booklet designed for new believers.
I began this literacy class and also taught two others, “DL” and “S." The reason for this is that in the near future, I hope they will take over this class as I will begin another. DL & S, a young couple, both strong believers with three small kids, had willingly moved from Poipet to live and work with us in the church ministries in Anlongveng. Having worked closely with DL & S, we grew to admire their courage to walk in faith and their obedience to God’s calling. To them, DL & S are “missionaries” to their own people. When they decided to come and follow us to Anlongveng, they knew about the nature and of the sad historical and tragic events involved in this town; and even their close family members had warned them about all the dangers involved in or related to this place. Yet, DL and S declared to their concerning family that, “If teachers Soeuth & Syna are willing to come to work in Anlongveng, then we are willing to come as well” (as translated from their own words in Khmer). We appreciate your prayers for this young family.
Although we still have ways to go in terms of fundraising for a ministry center for Anlongveng as indicated in an Approve Special (account #: 1-47200-46-64-01030), we began asking around and searching for a potential central location with hopes of purchasing a piece of property for the Anlongveng Ministry Center.
Please join us in prayers in this quest. If God is leading you to financially support this project, please send your donations to:
Christian & Missionary Alliance (The C&MA) National Office
8595 Explorer Drive, Colorado Springs, CO 80920
Also, enter the account number: 1-47200-46-64-01030.
Here are some events coming up that need your prayers:
1. September 4th -6th: Family retreat for the Alliance church leaders at National as well as Regional levels along with their families at Sihanoukville.
2. September 16th: Monthly leadership class for all church leaders in the Poipet region.
3. September 20th: Church dedication service at Bethlehem KEC in Battambang province.
4. September 21st to 26th: A personal trip to visit Jonathan at Dalat School and meeting with some of his teachers.
Thank you for your prayers concerning the Cambodian ministries. We are grateful for your faithful financial support to the Great Commission Fund (GCF), which enables us to keep on serving the King here, shining the Light of Jesus to lost people in this dark place.
Please share with us on what God is doing in your lives. We want to invite YOU to consider coming to visit us in Anlongveng for a short-term team trip to partner with us and see what God is doing in the lives of the Khmer people here.
Blessings,
Soeuth & Syna
Praise God for your faithfulness.
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