Monday, September 28, 2015

Vances View September 28

*The First Few Days*

We arrived back in the Philippines at about Monday, September 14 at 10:30 PM Manila time (that is about 7:30 AM Monday morning on the west coast of the United States). We had an uneventful flight from Seattle to Inchon, Korea and then onward to Manila. At the Manila airport we took the “free” shuttle to the terminal which serves the airline we flew on to Cebu. There, we sat inside for four hours to fly one hour south to Cebu, our home away from home for the past thirty years.

Jet-lag has effected us more than in the past. Of course, you need to combine that with a lot of humidity and heat and we were finding it hard to stay awake during the day until just recently

Even though we have felt sleepy, we have gotten a number of things checked off on the To-do list:

  • haircut ($1.75 and that includes a generous tip)
  • battery for car ($85.00, ouch)
  • air-conditioning recharged ($20.00) in the car
  • grocery shopping (thank you Carol)
  • two trips to the bank
  • three trips to immigration (40 minutes one way). Why three? Don’t ask. . . The government now wants to see our marriage certificate which needs to be certified by their embassy, even though it is the original. See, you shouldn’t have asked. This means we are well on our way to a one year extension of our visa. Yes, praise the Lord.
  • went to a couple of malls, ate out twice and enjoyed taking some walks.
  • went to Tacloban (30 minute flight) for two days to spend time with a family that is opening a restaurant.

I did find out that I will be teaching three very interesting subjects in November:

  1. Contemporary Theology. I have taught this several times, and enjoy it very much. The students will read several short articles on about thirteen topics and then prepare a reaction essay which they will summarize in class. Then the whole class will discuss and I will give some further comments and talk about further resources.
  2. Preaching Contemporary Issues. This is a new topic for me and I am still putting together ideas about how to proceed. Basically it will be a preaching (homiletics) class which will, by nature, be more topically focused, rather than a book study.
  3. Church History 2. This is about the history from the Reformation (1500’s) until the present. It is an excellent chance to show the students their spiritual roots.

Carol and I enjoyed worship yesterday with our home church here in Cebu, Harvest Community Church. They are just a small church but are seeking to plant four additional churches. It is truly humbling to be with these people.

Well, I should close for now but before I do I just want to say thank you to everyone for praying and giving so that we can finish the course that is set before us. This month has been one of the best months of giving we have experienced in the past thirty-three years!

In His service and yours,

Vance and Carol Johnson

Reachglobal, Philippines