FSM Day of Prayer

Last Saturday I was privileged to be one of the speakers for the Federated States of Micronesia Day of Prayer sponsored by the President of FSM, Emanuel Mori. It was quite a large gathering of Micronesians and friends of FSM that took place at the Astumbo gymnasium on Guam. There were several speakers including President Mori, Dr. Robert Underwood from the University of Guam, Guam legislators and PIU faculty member Iotaka Choram. There was also a singing contest in which several choirs and groups from all over Micronesia participated. The theme of the Day of Prayer was “Loving God will all your heart, soul, mind and strength,  and loving your neighbor as yourself.” I had a good opportunity to present a biblical view of the mission of leadership under God. I also had a good time seeing many old friends from all over Micronesia and meeting many new friends.

This was my view from the stage (left) as I prepared to address the group. President Mori (right) gave an excellent speech about the need for biblical values in leadership. I had a nice opportunity to chat with him at lunch the day before the meeting and I was impressed with the depth of faith he expressed to me and his desire to serve the islands as a leader under God.

End of Semester at PIU

The Fall 2012 semester at PIU has almost come to an end, yes already! The last day of the semester is Friday the 14th. With the end of the semester comes final exams, projects and papers and that was true for Mike’s history classes and my Theological Research class. I got to be one of the judges of the final projects for Mike’s classes (left). The projects involved an elaborate model of a historic place and a cake depicting a historic personage with a group presentation explaining the model and the cake. My class was team taught by Jim Sawyer, Lisa Collins, Bill Wood, Mike and I in which the students were guided in writing papers in the areas of exegesis, systematic theology, historical theology and a summative paper. The summative papers were presented in the final class meeting at my house over a nice dinner (Right).

 

On the left Mary Lou explains the significance of the All Saints Church at Wittenberg and the cake which depicted Luther’s 95 Theses. On the right Rommel presents his research paper explaining “The Nature of Worship” as his wife Joy listens.

Ransome and Mike tell us about the subject of their cake, Cleopatra. On the right another group put together a model of Herod’s Temple.

On the left is a model of Solomonic Jerusalem. That group also made a tasty ziggurat out of orange cake. My favorite was the model of Constantinople (right) made entirely out of candy, cake and blue jello. Their cake depicted an icon of Constantine. Sweet!

Advent Chapel

Last Friday was the final chapel of the semester. As is our custom, the final chapel of the Fall semester is the PIU Advent Chapel. The chapel (well kind of!) begins the Christmas season at PIU. Mike and the chapel worship team, as usual, put together a very creative, worshipful and fun Christmas chapel. Almost everyone got to participate in some way. I know I went out feeling like we had been in God’s presence. I am still learning about doing video with my phone, but thought I would mix in a few short videos of the chapel too.

The chapel band plays an upbeat version of Joy to the World

Percy and Josh lead us in some Bible readings.

Neena leads us in a Gospel reading

The chapel band did several different styles of songs. Jesse even got out his banjo for “I Saw Three Ships”

Jessie and Jonie light the peace candle

The band leads us in “What Child is This?”

God bless us all, everyone!

Staff Barbecue

As we get to the beginning of December and the end of the semester it is time for celebrations. On Thursday the operations staff at PIU had an end of semester barbecue to thank them for a good done during the semester. As usual any party here escalates and there were quite a few people there, including me. I rarely miss a barbecue. We are really blessed to have a maintenance and office staff, including our many student workers, who work hard to keep everything clean and running at PIU. We can always use some volunteer help, so if you would like to join the PIU family…

Mo, our faithful maintenance man for the last 8 years, led us in prayer, Greg gave some encouragement, and Nino and Gwen enjoyed the festivities.

PIU Staff and Faculty Christmas Party

Last Sunday night we held our PIU Staff-faculty Christmas party. We decided to keep things low-key and simple this year and so the party was a potluck held at Mary Lou Carruthers’ house with a pretty minimal program. Everybody had to bring a food item that began with the letter “C” (Joyce doubled it by bringing caramel corn) and a small gift for exchange. It was a fun and relaxing evening. Here are a few pictures from the event.

 

We had some good “sit around and talk” time

Since it was also Mike’s birthday we celebrated that too, with ice cream and cake

The ladies pose for Christmas pictures. Do Samantha and Lisa look like they are at the prom?

Yotaka enjoys the gift exchange. I made a very short speech.

There was some serious relaxation going on.

National Car Rental Guam 25th Anniversary

National Car Rental on Guam and its CEO, Cita Tomada who is on the PIU advisory board, has been a faithful corporate sponsor of PIU over the last few years. So we were happy to be invited to be one of the participants in National Car Rental’s 25th anniversary celebration last Saturday. PIU had an information table at the venue and had an opportunity to present what we are doing to the community. It was a lot of fun to see so many friends who joined in the celebration. Thank you Cita and National Car Rental for what you do for Guam and for PIU.

The day started off with a Zumba fitness workout. Yes I danced…. a little. There were also several great prizes donated and raffled off including these little electric cars and, much desired, PIU T-shirts

Cita, left, oversaw all the celebration activities. PIU English teacher, Joey Charles, provided some of the musical entertainment.

Titus, Courage and Serenity enjoyed the bounce house

The PIU banner hung proudly among those of other Guam businesses, non-profits and ministries.

The Guam Ministerial Association

The Guam Ministerial Association held its last meeting of 2012 (we will have a Christmas party at the Royal Orchid Hotel next Tuesday night) at the Island Hope Four Square Church last Friday. I have been a member of GMA pretty much since we arrived on Guam in February of 1993 and have been an officer for several years. The GMA has a regular meeting at one of the member ministries on the first Friday of each month and meets for prayer on the morning of the 2nd and 4th Thursdays of each month. In addition PIU hosts the GMA theological discussion at lunch time on the 3rd Thursday of each month. Through the years my fellow GMA members have been a source of encouragement, support, accountability and ministry partnership to me personally and to PIU. There has been some conflict in the past but that has been very, very rare. This year I have been praying for deeper connection to Christ through the Spirit in my personal life and the GMA prayer meeting has been one way God has been answering that prayer. My brothers and sisters in the GMA have been a real blessing to me and I am thankful that the ministers in the group have such a good relationship with one another. This is a real witness to the community. The picture above is from the last meeting.