Friday, August 17, 2001

Car trouble

Just thought I would drop a short note and tell everybody that the Lord does work in awesome ways. Here is what happened today. Today is Admissions day in Hawaii- the day Hawaii sets aside for becoming a state. Anyway we got the day off from school, so Jenn (my roommate) and I set off for the beach. We were driving up to the west end of the island when our car blew a tire and threw pieces of rubber. (I wasn't kidding when I said this car was on its last tire :) !) Thank the Lord that I was able to pull the car off to the side of the road without hitting anything. The truck behind us pulled over to make sure we were okay. The lady offered her cell phone and I called one of the teachers at MCA. His wife said that Tom wasn't home but a guy that they have living in their basement who also teaches at the school was there. I spoke to Dan, told him the situation and where we were. He was on his way. While we were waiting, we had 7 people stop to offer assistance. The people of Molokai are so friendly. Dan got there and as soon as he pulled up, Tom was coming the opposite direction. He also stopped. Anyway to make a long story short, our spare tire would not hold air so we ran to the church to see if we could get a spare out of another car. We found one to put on until we could get it into town. Dan let us use his truck to go to the beach, so the day turned out to have a happy ending.

We have so much to be thankful for. Thank you for all of the prayers that are sent up with my name attached. I really appreciate them!






Saturday, August 11, 2001

Week 2 of teaching career finished!


I just finished teaching my second week at Molokai Christian Academy. It has definitely been an adventure. I only have 6 children in my 5th grade class and 10 in my 6th grade class. For the most part all of my students are well behaved. Overall school is going very well. The entire teaching staff (all 10 of us) meet together every morning at 7:15 for prayer time. It is a time to pray for our students, their parents, and ourselves as the teachers to follow God's will. The class day then starts at 7:45 with devotion. For the 5th graders we start out the day with math and science/health, have a 15 minute recess, come in and do spelling and English, have lunch and recess, then have story time, Bible and history. I then leave my 5th graders to go and teach New World History to the 6th graders. It is entirely different then what I have been used to but it is a lot of fun. Fifth grade is a great age. They enjoy learning and doing activities but they know most of the basic skills.

Well I have heard from several of you and questions keep popping up... I am going to try to answer the ones that I can remember and if you still would like further information please let me know.

What is the summer team? The summer team is a group from Liberty University in Virginia that comes to Hawaii every summer to spread the gospel of Jesus Christ through Good News Clubs, Sports Activities, and lots of other events. This is how I came to find out about Molokai Christian Academy (MCA).

What church am I apart of? Since I work through MCA and that is a ministry of Molokai Independent Baptist Church, I attend this church. Pastor Manley is the preacher and he does a really good job of teaching the Bible. Right now we are studying about Abraham in the book of Genesis. Last summer when I came on the summer team, we were studying out of Genesis and we still are.

How do you get around? Even though Molokai is a small island it is mostly hill (rather large hills). I have a car (a gold reliant named Goldie) through the school that is on its last leg. The power steering is almost out so you get a good arm work out. I try to car pool as much as possible with gas being $2.26 a gallon for regular unleaded.

What do you do in your spare time? Several evenings a week we normally spend the evening with a family on the island. It is so nice to be invited over for dinner and to visit. There are also several beaches near us so it is nice to go and swim, layout, and sometimes watch the sunset. Life on Molokai is very simple. Not a lot of stuff to go out and do. There is one movie theater on the island.

How can we support you? MCA is supported almost entirely by donations. The teachers get paid by these donations. This basically means that if there are no donations coming in then the teachers do not get paid. If you would like to send support, you can send it to my address. If you need any more information please let me know.

Well that is about all of the things that I can think of at the moment. I enjoy hearing from each of you. I pray for you guys and if you have nay prayer concerns please let me know. I can feel the prayers that are sent up for me. Thanks a bunch.