Ha ha! Gottcha! You weren't expecting an update actually on time! Ha!

This one will probably be short though. I've got to go run and then get to bed, because I'm supposed to be in Small Kinmen tomorrow by 9:45 tomorrow, which means taking the 9 o'clock boat. And before that I have to get pizza. We're having a picnic! What fun!

---So we'll make that the first request. It's a picnic for my Wednesday night class. Just keep them in your prayers. All of them are already pretty good friends of mine and I'm really wanting to share more with them about Christ. Meagan talked to them some about it last class and I plan on following up on what she said next week.

---Pray for the dorm kids. There is a real...I don't know...spirit of hostility tonight. They are watching possibly the most disgusting movie I've ever heard of...let's just say it involves cannabilism and abortion. Whenever they watch that kind of stuff it seems to really give place to the devil.

---Pray for Jerry. He's angry at God and extremely homesick. I talked to him for a while the other night. I didn't really know what to say though...pray that God will give me the words to say (or the sense to shut up).

---Pray for our new brother Douglas as he grows in the Lord! The Bible says that by their fruit you shall know them. Well, we are certainly seeing fruit, and I know that the devil is noticing it too.

---A certain team mate is getting on my nerves. Pray that I can resolve certain issues with him/her.

Thanks so much for your prayers! Love you guys!

PS OH! Almost forgot (again!) Pray for Joy's (our pastor's wife) mother. She has terminal cancer and isn't saved. Pray that God would give Joy the words to speak and work in her mothers heart. Also pray that Joy's sisters are not able to stop her from sharing.

Hey guys! Can you believe it? An update that isn't horribly late! Only by about a day and a half! Cool!

Thank you guys so much for praying for working with Kiwi! I talked to him some on Tuesday about the problems with class room control and he basically said there is nothing to be done about it and just forget trying to have class room control or really teaching the kids anything. So I wasn't that hopeful going to school on Thursday. But amazingly, 4 of the five classes I taught with him that day were almost under control. Still some progress could be made, but it was certianly a huge improvement over the way things had been. Praise God!

---It seems our team has been getting an amazing number of chances to share in the past few weeks. Between improving Chinese and developing friendships and a reputation over a year and a half, it seems people are more open with us about their questions about Christianity. Pray that God will give us the words to speak, because we know that God's word "will not return void, but will accomplish that which he wills" (paraphrased...I'm too lazy to look it up!)

---我的姊姊不在! 我的朋友也不在! I miss BJ! I miss Shawn! (that's not quite a prayer request...more of a statement of fact I guess. And it's also a chance to show off the fact that I can write those things in Chinese!)

---Wow, my English conversation class on Wednesday went totally awesome. 8 of the 12 invited came...7 from Small Kinmen. So pray for Stella, Linda, Jessica, Vincent, Summer, Elly, Gloomy and Ivy.

---Pray for the monday night class. It's going pretty good, but I think I need to change my approach a little bit. I've been trying to get people to indiviually talk, but they are so nervous about talking. Pray that God will give me some new ideas for the class.

---Just browsing through some old post, I see that I asked you guys to pray for safe travel from the States to Kinmen. Thanks for your prayers! Our team was the only one that didn't have somebody not make the flight from Seatle to Taiwan. None of our luggage was lost. And on top of that, our lugagge was the first off the plane in Kinmen...how cool is that? It was a very good trip (or at least as a trip of 34 hours can be...)

Dude, I love my team. The other night Ginger, Rebekah, Lucas and me stayed up in the common room for about two hours after the kids had gone to bed just talking. What a hoot!

Somebody asked what religion Douglas was before getting saved...I'm exactly certain, but I'm pretty sure that he did not hold any particular religious beliefs. As a matter of fact, most of those in his generation are much the same. The ancestor worship and serious devotion to religion is seen more in the older generations. I hardly ever see anybody under the age of 30 burning the paper money or at the temples.

BTW, for those of you waiting for an update on the jjf blogger...I honestly, truly, 實在, really do intend to update it soon! Please be patient! I'm just not going to do it now, because it's 3 in the morning and I need to get to bed.

I've been putting off writing this update for a couple days because I haven't been all that sure how to say what I want to. I figured, hey, it's the biggest news this blogger has ever seen, I want to make sure I put it right, correct? Well, I've been thinking about it for about five days and it still seems the best way to say it is

DOUGLAS HAS TRUSTED CHRIST!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Our whole team has been doing back flips for the past several days. Douglas has been our number one prayer request for months.

Ok, here's a quick summery of how it all happened. Douglas first started coming to Bible study at the start of last semester (just when I arrived here in Kinmen) to practice his English. Soon he started coming over to the dorm on Sunday afternoons to visit, play guitar, sing, or whatever. We normally had a fair number of high schoolers over on Sunday afternoon. About halfway through the semester he started showing more and more of an interest in spiritual things. When Dad was here (in April) he told Douglas that he should read some in his Bible some everyday. Douglas took it very seriously and has been reading every day since then. Towards the end of the semester Douglas was hanging out with us more and more. He made plans to spend the summer at Andrew and Lucas' house. When summer camps started he hung around and helped out (and what a great help he was! His English is way better than our TA's!) One week into summer camps his Dad threw a birthday party for him. As is tradition, he made three wishes before blowing out the cake. Normally the third is kept a secret...but he said he wanted to tell us, because he knew that we would want to know. "I know that the Amarica's are Christian's and I hope that one day I can be a Christian too."

Over the summer he asked a lot of questions. He talked to Lucas, Andrew, Meagan, Christine and Joel. Andrew told me several times that he didn't know what was stopping him.

After we got back to Kinmen Douglas spent a lot of time hanging out at the dorm before he left the island to go to college. The night before he left Lucas asked if it would be ok if we prayed over him. We layed hands on him and Andrew prayed that Douglas would become a Christian.

Last thursday he called Rebekah. He told her that he was a Christian and had been since a few days after his birthday, but had not really been sure about it and was afraid to tell anybody. Rebekah asked him a lot of questions about it: was there a certain time he had asked God to forgive his sins? Did he believe that Christ had cleased him? Yes he said.

Since then he has openly to declared his faith. When you see him on MSN his username says "Douglas--I am a Christian". He's going to a church in Taipie. And he's really excited about praying for us and our ministry here in Kinmen. And he's started witnessing to his friends (pray for his (and our!) friend Aluba!)

Ok, so maybe that wasn't such a short summery, but it's basically what's happened.

Here's a couple quick requests:

---Pray for me working with Kiwi, a teacher who I teach 10 (out of 20) classes with every week. This guy has no control whatsoever over his classes. They are totally nuts. If thay are as nuts tomorrow as they where last week I'm going to have to talk to him about it. Pray things go well.

---Pray for a kid named Joe, who's mother is teaching in one of the Jr. high's here. He hardly speaks any Chinese and they've put him in school here. He basically just roams the school as he wants. When I'm there he hangs out in the English classroom ('cause I'm one of the very few people at the school he can talk to) and does nothing. And it's amazing how distracting "nothing" can be to the other students! So Thursday I started him on bu pu mu phu (he's supposed to be learning Chinese right? Never thought I'd find myself teaching Chinese, but if nobody else is going to teach him anything, I might as well). Tomorrow I'm going to have him do some reading and essey writing. I figure it will be Chinese Thursdays and English on Tuesdays (I go to the school twice a week). At any rate, pray that he keeps a good attitude, isn't a distraction in class and doesn't get on my nerves too much (ever gotten half a week worth of talking to in the space of about 6 hours?)

---Wednesday starts my new English conversation class. I can't wait for it. Also pray for my Monday night conversation class. Tonight we taught them "God is so good" and explained a little bit of what the words mean.

---Pray for Jimmy and Jerry, two new kids here at the dorm. They have been asking Rebekah and I a lot of questions about Christianity.

---I am seriously missing Jr. high. And I don't really like teaching elem. Pray that God will help me be content.

Alright, it's 1 in the morning and I still need to take a shower...so I'd better close this. Bye! God bless you guys!
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Hey folks! I'm back in Kinmen! Wow! I'm so happy to be back "home"...I love this island!

We start school on Monday. I'm teaching at three schools and with six teachers. I've met four of the teachers. One has good English and the other three have English ranging from poor to fair. I'm glad I know a little bit of Chinese now, 'cause I had real trouble last semester working with my teachers who had bad English.

---Pray for our team as we rest up from the trip and get ready to teach.

---Pray for Lucas...he is the new leader over all three teams (Andrew is still the Kinmen team leader).

---Pray for me as I try to figure out elementarty school. I have no idea what I'm doing.

Talk to you guys later!