Friday, May 14, 2010: Marikina

After some flight delays that led to an arrival 14 hours later than expected. Our visiting players arrived in Manila, Philippines, ready to spend a week serving Christ and sharing the Gospel with countless lost souls. We are so excited to have them here, and help them experience the joy of working for His Kingdom.

Please keep them in your prayers as they adjust to a new climate, new culture and the many other factors that can make going overseas a challenge. We know that God has brought each of them here for a reason and are excited to see how he uses each of them to change the lives of Filipinos, and how he uses Filipinos to change each of their lives.

After getting everyone back home from the airport and going over some need to know information regarding living in the Philippines, everyone headed up to Josh's place for a fabulous meal of Bicol Express. There are a lot of fun things to do in the Philippines, but if you leave the country without trying Bicol Express, you have missed out on a major cultural treasure. There is also a restaurant in Mindanao that serves another variety of the dish, that we will most definitely visit during a later part of our trip.

After dinner, we loaded up and headed to the game. Here is the recap:

In 2005 when our family first arrived on the mission field in the Philippines, we met Eddie. He had recently been led to Christ by another First Love International missionary who was also discipling him in his Christian walk. Throughout the last few years we have watched Eddie grow in his faith and currently, in the absence of a church in his area, Eddie leads a Bible study in his home and has a men's fellowship Bible study once a week with another First Love International missionary. It has been exciting to see Eddie develop as a Christian man of God.

As we were canvassing areas where we would take our short term missions team to play games, we were excited to partner with Eddie in an effort to evangelize and help recruit new members to join the different Bibles studies that Eddie holds in his home.

Tonight, we tipped off the first game of our current ministry trip in Marikina, at a court that is just outside the back wall of Eddie's home.

The game went well. We had over 100 people from the small community courtside to see what all the fuss was about. As the 3 new guys (Evan, Ben and Craig) were introduced to Filipino basketball, we were able to share the gospel, hand out tracts and invite everyone to join one of the Bible studies that Eddie hosts.

It was a fun game, and in the end, we pulled off a win 104-100. Everyone watching was excited to see a few dunks and some long range three pointers. As a team, we were excited for an opportunity to share the Gospel. With God's blessing, Eddie will have a few more people at the Bible Study this week asking questions and learning how they can have their own, personal relationship with Jesus Christ.

Thanks for joining us in praying for the people in Marikina who were at the game tonight. That the Holy Spirit would touch their hearts and they would take advantage of the life changing information that was given to them.

Tomorrow we will be playing 2 games, 1 in Pasig City, and 1 in Tanza.

BALL HOG RUNNING COUNT: 104

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