Back on Guam for a couple Days

I am back on Guam for only a few days. I will be going to Pohnpei for a couple days on Friday to try to finalize an agreement with College of Micronesia, visit some alumni and check on opening a new PIBC teaching facility there. A lot has been happening on Guam. The best news is that Route 15 is getting resurfaced. Our bone-shaking drive from our house to PIBC is becoming a smooth ride. There is only a few 100 yards to go and we will be driving on a nice new road all the way to school. Sunday night I enjoyed seeing everybody at the PIBC prayer meeting. It was held on Anderson AFB at the home of Hollie Schaub our campus ministry coordinator. Her husband, Aaron is a helicopter pilot and gave us a tour of his helicopter. Here is Joyce and I with Aaron and Crystaleen Mikel our Librarian's assistant. We are also breathing carefully here as the volcano on an island to the north of us is spewing again and the wind is bringing us a stinky haze. My big project for the week is to get all the board materials to the board members so they can read them carefully before our March 28 meeting.

Video of Titus

I am trying to learn to put video on my blog. This is my first attempt. Here is one of Titus in Palau playing with a ball taken a couple weeks ago.

A Week in Yap

Today is the next to last day of my teaching trip to Yap and Palau. I have enjoyed it but am ready to come home. Sunday I had the opportunity to preach at the Maap Church where former PIBC student Jesse Torwan pastors. That evening I was at the Rumuu Chuch where I addressed the pastors and elders of the Yap Evangelical Church and we had a planning meeting to discuss strategy for the future of PIBC in Yap. They were excited about the idea of distance education and the possibilities it provided for academic education and church training in Yap.

My wisdom literature class has been fun. We have a mostly young group of students including three high school girls who plan to come to the Guam campus in the Fall. Some of the local pastors attend the class as observers and always inject good questions and ideas into the class. We will finish up with discussions of Esther and Ruth tonight and then Daniel tomorrow. I am working with some of the students as I post this to help them with the procedure for the internet assignments.
It was a real treat to be able to see and have lunch with Jonathan Tamag, a 2006 graduate of PIBC Guam. (See pictured with me and missionary Asael Ruda) Jonathan is now working in the hospital as a mental health counselor which gives him many opportunities to minister. He says that he is able to “apply biblical principles” into many of his counseling situations. He will also begin to work with the youth group in the Colonia Church. I was pleased to hear that he believes his PIBC education prepared him well for what he is doing. I have enjoyed Yap, but my next post will be from my home on Guam.

Leaving Palau – On to Yap

Last night I finished up my class in Palau with a 2 ½ hour session on the Book of Daniel. I enjoyed my busy week in Palau. I taught a class session each night and spent the days working with our Teaching Facility Coordinator, Rob Watt and meeting with our Palauan PIBC alumni and church leaders. I also got to spend a little bit of time with Michael, Samantha and Titus. Last night we went out to celebrate Samantha’s birthday with Indian food (yes, there is a great Indian restaurant in Palau!) and the owner brought us a giant “birthday sundae” to share. No, Titus didn’t get any.

I then boarded a 1:15 AM flight to from Palau to Yap. After resting up this morning I am headed into town to buy supplies and post this to my blog. We will begin class tomorrow with two Saturday sessions. Originally we had 9 signed up for the class here in Yap but it looks like we will have even more coming to the class. One of the challenges will be finding a way for all the students to get access to the internet for posting their assignments. The computers from the distance education grant will be very welcome here. We also have some issues to discuss with the Yap Church leadership about expanding our PIBC classroom and finding a coordinator for the work here. We would really like to find a retired pastor with a master’s degree who would be willing to come to Yap for a couple years and teach PIBC courses and work with the church here. I am also looking forward to meeting with our Yapese PIBC alumni. Here is my view from the mission guest apartment.

Saturday was time for me to get to work. I had two 2 ½ hour sessions of my Wisdom Literature class. We spent the first half of the session discussing the meaning of biblical wisdom and then the second half discussing the message of Job. Then in the afternoon we discussed the message of the book of Proverbs for about an hour and spent the rest of the time doing an exercise on how to interpret, apply and teach from the book of Proverbs. With only four students we were able to have a lot of interaction.

Joyce went on an outing with the seniors at Emmaus High School, led by Michael and Samantha to see the stone monoliths on Babeldaop. There are only two seniors in the class so it was pretty much a family outing. Though Babeldaop is much moe developed now than when we lived in Palau there are still some wide open spaces. Joyce made it back just in time for the PIBC Valentine’s Day banquet.

We ended our busy Saturday with the banquet. I got a chance to speak about a biblical view of marriage based on Genesis 2 and the Song of Songs and a little later to share my vision for the future of PIBC. It was also exciting to hear the testimonies of the Palau TF students and the Palauan graduates of the old Micronesian Institute of Biblical Studies about how PIBC has impacted their lives. It was also good to see old friends and of course, there was a lot of good food – and chocolate cake!

Arrival in Palau

We flew into Palau just about at sunset. It was absolutely beautiful. The water was so clear and calm that we could see the reef clearly under the water. The sunset had turned the sky above the horizon pink and purple. Rob Watt our Palau TF coordinator picked us up at the airport and we enjoyed noticing again how green and colorful Palau is. After we dropped off our stuff we went to Michael and Samantha’s apartment at the high school and saw them and shared the Domino’s Pizza we had brought from Guam for them and Rob. Of course, we spent the rest of the evening admiring Titus.

Super Bowl Monday

This year my birthday fell on Super Bowl Monday. The Boydstons, Steve and Jason Stinnette, Melissa Heck and Hiob Ngirachmoi came over to watch the game and eat birthday cake with me. (Joyce had to work - we will celebrate tonight with an evening out for dinner.) The game was exciting with 4 turnovers , 3 touchdowns and 2 power outages in the 1st quarter. We missed the first 5 1/2 minutes of the game waiting for the power to come on and were thankful when everything came back on so we could watch the rest of the game. We were pretty evenly divided between Colts and Bears fans. Melissa and I ate most of the triple chocolate birthday cake that Joyce made for me and Steve ate most of the hot wings. It was nice to take some time off to relax and have a little fun. So much of the island finds some kind of excuse not to work and watch the game, that Super Bowl Monday has become pretty much an unofficial island holiday. Joyce and I will be getting ready for our trip to Palau on Friday. I will go to Palau and Yap the next two weeks to teach my Wisdom Lit class there. She is going to Palau for the weekend to see Titus. I am sure we will have pictures to post of that trip soon.