At 21 years old, with a college degree, Ronnie says goodbye to his family and girlfriend and boards a plane from the Philippines to Dubai where he will work selling gourmet chocolate at a high-end mall in Dubai City where tourism abounds.  He hopes to make enough within the next year to return and marry his girlfriend and stay at home in Olongapo City.

We continue to support the education of our Filipino friend Rina Escosura who will utilize her Social Work degree to help meet needs in her local community.

Ronnie’s situation is not unique among the Filipino population.  In fact, it has for the past decade become the most common story in the Filipino labor market.  Thousands of professionals and college graduates seek job opportunities each year in North America and Europe, some utilizing high-level educational achievements simply to get a job as a maidservant or nursing assistant.

As for Ronnie, he must now bear living in a one-room apartment with no air conditioner in a country where temperatures regularly climb over 100 F.  He shares his apartment with 4 other Filipino migrant workers, all doing their best to cut down their rent cost in a country where the cost of living is significantly higher than what they are accustomed to in the Philippines.

Our organization’s time in the Philippines has given us the opportunity to observe the ill-effects that such massive human export is having on an already underdeveloped nation. When ambitious minds like Ronnie’s seek employment elsewhere in a more developed nation, there is less ambition spent towards the development of health care, government infrastructure, education, economic development, and the many other facets of Filipino culture that desperately need transformed.

As is the case with Ronnie, the intention is often to return home to the Philippines after a short time.  However, case after case demonstrates quite the opposite – people stay for years, often missing out on their children growing up.  Beyond simply removing the most capable workers from the workforce, the widespread move towards human exports is tearing away at the traditionally revered family unit.

Filipino sociologist Randolf David observes, “the clannishness and the intense familism of the Filipino are being belied by the frequency with which one reads funeral notices announcing that so many of the children of the deceased are abroad and are therefore unable to attend the old man’s burial.”

As a development organization, we are eager to maintain the cohesiveness of the family unit so that fathers and mothers are able to be present as their children grow up.  Nevertheless, we recognize the complicated realities that cause people to make the decision to leave their family to go to a place where they can send money back to help pay the bills.  It’s not as easy as simply finding an equivalent job at home.

Continue in prayer with us as we work towards opportunities to come alongside people like Ronnie and envision alternative ways to overcome the hardships of an impoverished world.  Currently, we are excited that we have been able to come alongside Rina Escosura (pictured above) and help invest in her education that will, in turn, empower her to meet needs within her own local community surrounding Olongapo City.

By Brett Madron

Our intent as an organization is to carry the good news of Jesus into the world.  We recognize that this is not an easy task. In fact, we have recognized the need for our families to live among marginalized communities in the developing world, cooperating with them to meet complex needs.  This need motivates us to form teams of families committed to working together in specific regions.  In order to develop a shared value system and a biblically-based approach to third world development, the Southeast Asia team has been engaging in educational and experiential training together for six years.

Joel Olson shares during a gathering at Old Hickory United Methodist Church

This month, the Southeast Asia team, consisting of 25 adults and 11 children, has coordinated with 5 local churches in the Nashville area to share about the history of our work in the region and what we are doing as a team to prepare for full-time deployment to the Philippines.  Our intent in partnering with the local church is to benefit them as they support us.  While sharing with the church provides them with the opportunity to pray for and contribute to our work abroad, we are also able to introduce the young people in these congregations to needs in the local Nashville area that we have encountered. Offering this awareness often opens the door for us to facilitate projects that enable them to meet the needs of the marginalized right in their own neighborhoods.

We do a lot as an organization to prepare for the work we will do on the field one day.  This does not mean we overlook the opportunities for service and partnership in ministry here and now.  We are thankful for the opportunity to work alongside local communities of believers to carry out the message of Jesus both here and abroad.

Written by: Jason Carpenter

Clockwise from top left: Rose Andaya, Sarah Mascaro, Alison Loope, Rina Escosura

Since arriving in the Philippines this past June 14th, Sarah Mascaro and Alison Loope have been living with Rose Andaya in Talaan, Sariaya in the province of Quezon, Philippines. Rose serves not only as their host but also their personal Tagalog language and Filipino culture tutor.  Learning the serene, simple life of the rural areas of the Philippines has been a fresh experience for Alison and Sarah.

With a focus in nutrition, Sarah studied and interned at Sariaya’s Rural Health Clinic.  She has travelled to 20 barangays (villages) throughout Sariaya, performing supervisory visits with the Public Health Director and local nutrition experts, midwives, and health workers.  During the month of September, Sarah participated in a nutrition workshop conducted by the Department of Health for all barangay nutrition scholars in Sariaya.  She also taught and co-facilitated a portion of the seminars.

Alison’s desire to work with impoverished children has been met by many opportunities to visit schools and learn from educators all around the Quezon province.  She spent her first two months in Sariaya tutoring a child with a learning disability at Talaan Elementary and  visiting Special Education classrooms and Alternative Learning Programs in the province.  Alison is currently teaching Kindergarten at Talaan Elementary each afternoon and tutoring several of her students each morning.

Currently, Sarah and Alison are travelling with friend and ministry partner, Rina Escosura, to Leyte (an island in the east of the country) for a short visit with her family.  The final two weeks of their mission will be spent in Olongapo City, Luzon where Sarah will train under the midwives at Mercy in Action and Alison will be volunteering at the Yokubari Foundation, an organization that works with neglected children. They will continue to focus on language learning amidst all their various opportunities and responsibilities.

By Alison Loope