Its Church, Jim - but not as you know it!

Today was church day. We did church twice, once in the villages and once with the CHO team at Safe Haven.

Ann and Malcolm went to Toul Prasat; Fiona, Martin and Jim went to Sok San. It was very different from church as we're used to it. Both churches are very small, about a dozen at one and 20 at the other. Both churches meet in the space underneath the house of the leader. The service is simple: they sing 3 hymns, pray, read the Bible and listen to the preacher - in Sok San that was Jim - take their offering, sing again, have a closing prayer and then go back to their village. The simplicity of the service means that the gospel shines through; there is no building and we're reminded that the church is the people. 

At Sok San the leader of the church (the man in the white t-shirt) is a farmer and we were treated to a guided tour of his farm. He farms chickens, ducks, fish and frogs - yes, they are huge! He is offering land to build an agriculture technical centre for the village so that others can learn how to farm better. 

In the afternoon we took part in the CHO team's worship. They sang some songs, one of which was "How great Thou art" - they sang in Khmer, we sang in English. How God must be pleased when His people demonstrate their unity in worship. Jim preached and the rhythm of the translator helps us to take in what is said more easily; he preached on Thomas and the strengthening of our faith through times when faith is tested. There is a photo of the CHO team with us and with the Tearfund Gap teams of 6 girls who are here for the next 6 months. The girls have a blog to follow - readysetcho.wordpress.com 

Reflections part 2

We're halfway through our trip. It is time to reflect a little on what we have seen  and done so far. We hope you find these reflections interesting. The picture is a selfie from the van on the way back from Siem Reap - we're probably not as terrified as we look.

The most powerful impression we have is of the people. The Cambodian people are friendly and hospitable and they generally appear to be content despite the fact that they don't have the things we have. The children we have met at School on the Mat are smart: they pick up the stories we tell them, even in a foreign language; they play the games really well and with so much enthusiasm. The children's smiles simply light up their faces. There is a sense of growing wealth here amongst some, but there are many people who are poor. School on the Mat gives children an education when their parents have no money to pay for education in the government school: they are smart, only lacking the opportunity to develop their abilities and fulfil their dreams.

We are also very impressed by CHO. Here are Cambodians helping Cambodians! We are not here as the missionaries who know it all to teach them how to do it. We are here to work alongside a group of people who have a plan to transform their own communities: their strap-line is "helping to create strong independent hope-filled communities". There is a new project called UMOJA which means 'together' and is concerned with health-care, agriculture and church-planting, all at the same time. They have become a more organised, "professional" organisation in the last five years and their focus is clearly on the villages, to bring a new quality of life to these places and people.

We have another week's work to do. Already we have gained so much from being here, being able to see this work for ourselves. By the end of next week, we hope to have given more of ourselves and learned more about CHO, the gospel, and ourselves. 

We are doing church tomorrow. Tell you about that tomorrow evening.

Reflections part 1

First of all, here are some more pictures from the last two days. Angkor Wat, it's wall carvings; Bayon temple and it's massive faces; Ta Prom and it's spong trees growing through and slowly destroying the temples - these images will stay long in the memory.

The road from Poipet to Siem Reap is 146km long. The first bend in the road is 46km along the way!  You have never seen a road so straight. The countryside is dry and brown, with no raj at all in the last 3 months! That's slightly different from your experience in the UK. The pig on the back of the bike is alive, being taken to the market to be sold; ham awaits! 

The other picture is of the dancing at the cultural event we saw last night. The dancing was mostly very Asian, but this dance was more animated and not too dissimilar to Scottish country dancing

Angkor Wat

These are our holiday days. CHO staff work Sunday to Thursday and so there is no programme on Friday and Saturday . We have taken the chance to come to Siem Reap, the centre of the Cambodia tourist trade, to visit the ancient temples of Angkor Wat. There are 13 temples in all, but we only visited 3: Angkor Wat itself, in the pictures; Bayon with it's massive faces, and Ta Prom where you can pretend to be Lara Croft in Tomb Raider, but more seriously see the temples being taken over by the roots of the spong tree.

Angkor Wat now has a code of Conduct in which visitors are asked to respect the place; it is a holy place for Buddhists. This covers the way that you behave and dress. It is a fascinating and fantastic place to visit and deserves the respect that people claim  for it. It was very busy today, so there was not so much time to pause and take in the atmosphere, but you can't avoid beige impressed by the history and quality of the place. We might post more pictures tomorrow.

It was very hot this morning, so we did all the temples in the morning, then went for lunch, relaxing in the hammocks before and after eating. We then retreated indoors to cool down, hit the Old Market for some shopping and had dinner in a restaurant which gave us a show of Cambodian dancing; at one point it was very like the Scottish Highland sword dance, except that  the other dancers kept moving the swords! 

We go back to Poipet tomorrow. Jim has 2 sermons to prepare for Sunday, but for the others there is some time off before we join in again on Sunday. Hope you are enjoying reading this and the Facebook page. Speak to you again soon.

Teaching preaching

Sunrise in Poipet - yes, we were up early enough to see the sun rise. This morning was a repeat of yesterday so today's blog tells the story of Jim's preaching seminar group. There are 8 members of the CHO staff who are beginning to work on a project called UMOJA. This is a community project that develops a number of areas of community life, including church planting. The staff need to understand how churches grow and how to preach the Bible in these villages.

We have looked at 6 Bible passages with a view to helping the CHO staff preach these for themselves. We've started with gospel stories, asking the same question of all of them: 'what is happening in this story?' and have had conversations about these passages. Jim has then given some background to the passage and an outline of a sermon for each. The plan is to leave them with outlines for a lot of sermons by the end of next week, but also to give them the tools by which they can study any passage and preach it.

Today we also talked about whether we sit or stand; how to use notes - if they have no notes people assume they have not prepared and so won't trust what they say, so how do we use notes in the right way?

One of the good things about the group is that they have begun to help each other find answers to their own questions. Yesterday, Bunhan asked 'where was Jesus' spirit between Good Friday and Easter Sunday?' By that stage on a hot afternoon, Jim's mind wasn't working too well and there wasn't much of an answer. Today Bunhan came back with his own answer, from exactly the Bible verses he needed to read! So pleasing to see. There is more of this come, 2 hours, morning and afternoon, Monday to Wednesday. Pray for us, God is at work in these good people.

School on the Mat

Today was day 1 of the schedule. 4 of us were partnered with the 6 girls on the gap team and Jim was training 8 preachers in preaching sermons. The Cambodians were complaining this morning that it was cold - 21 degrees. It's not cold anymore - up to about 30 this afternoon. Hot, hot, hot! 

School on the Mat is exactly what it says. The teacher does basic literacy and numeracy and safe health. We visited 2 villages, O'Beychan in the morning and Tul Pongro in the afternoon. These are on the outskirts of Poipet. By the time we arrived everything was set up and the children were all there.

We told the story of David and Goliath using the doll and home-made pictures. Then we mixed the pictures up and the children had to shout us back into the right order. They did it really quickly! We sang songs with actions - Our God is a great big God - and played games, including some with the parachute! Finally, we re-read the story  and handed out some biscuits and sweets and a prayer. 

Most of all, we were taken by the children: their enthusiasm and excitement, their ability to pick up the songs and the game, and their ability to put the David and Goliath story back into the right order. Some of them having absolutely nothing, but their faces lit up when we started and when they were singing our songs.

Tomorrow's blog will tell you about Jim's preaching seminars; he is also leading devotions tomorrow morning and we are going to Siem Reap in the evening to visit Angkor Wat on Friday. Thanks for reading!

Safe Arrival

We're here in Poipet; we arrived safely after about 24 hours travelling. Etihad looked after us well and we were met at Bangkok by the wonderful Rosa Jump (pictured) He navigated us through traffic, across the border and into our rooms. We've had dinner and Fiona, Martin, Ann and Malcolm are talking to the 6 girls of the gap team about sharing the children's outreach tomorrow. Strains of "Jesus' love is very wonderful" are sounding through the cafe. Jim will be leading 4 hours of sermon preparation and preaching for some CHO staff in the UMOJA project. Tomorrow we will tell you how we get on. Speak to you them.