Wednesday, November 30, 2016

Thanksgiving

I thank my God in all my remembrance of you Philippians 1:3

I'll be honest. The only reason why I knew the Thanksgiving holiday was coming up is because it said so on the calendar. It is so warm here and so weird to think that now Christmas is right around the corner. I feel like I am forever stuck in the month of August. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE the weather!! It is just so strange from what I am used to. 

We trust that  you all had a fantastic thanksgiving with friends and family. While ours was anything but "normal", we sure did have a great time celebrating with our new family here at CSC and then again with new friends in their home :) We were able to enjoy turkey and all of the fixings twice! One of the highlights was having some of the kids from the shelter join us. There was a coloring contest and the winner in each grade level was able to come and enjoy dinner with us. This is the first time they had many of the things we served. My favorite was watching them try pickles  Pickles of all thing lol. They had no idea what it was and they thought they were very salty and sour. I have posted a few photos of their reactions below :) Another thing that was fun was to go up to the shelter and watch as they put on a little Thanksgiving Day assembly. Obviously Thanksgiving is not a holiday that is celebrated here by everyone so they had school but they did learn about the American history with the pilgrims and the indians and were also able to enjoy a few games. Our kids are starting to fit in really well and joined in on the festivities as well. We are very grateful that they are included in many of the extra actives. What a blessing! 

We did take some time to stop and remember a lot of you and thank our God for the beautiful blessing you all are in our lives. We are so grateful to you, our friends and family, for your continued support both prayerfully and financially. Without you we would not be able to do what we are doing here. We have been blessed by all of you. Thank you from the bottom of our hearts for your love. We love you all so much! Enjoy a few Thanksgiving day pictures below!! 


The toddlers came to watch the Thanksgiving program at school too

Games at the Children of Hope School






A fun visitor on Thanksgiving



The coloring contest winners

Thanksgiving Day selfie

Not a fan of pickles

Pickles are sour

The whole gang



Not a fan of pickles

Eating turkey is so exhausting 

Tuesday, November 22, 2016

Game Delay

We were able to experience the coolest thing on Sunday afternoon. The boys are involved in a soccer program that meets every Sunday at a Filipino army base here in Cebu. This last Sunday we arrived at soccer and were informed that our game might be interrupted by a couple of helicopters who will be landing on the field. Sure enough we were informed again that yes indeed we will need to clear the field because 2 helicopters carrying the Secretary of Defense and his team will be landing on the soccer field. It was one of the coolest things to see these gigantic helicopters fly in and land, drop off their people, and leave again. We were surprised they actually let us stay and watch in amazement as this happened. No way we would have been able to stay and watch in the states :) Here are a few pictures that I was able to snap with my phone. The video cut out just as it was turning to land because I ran out of space on my phone and the dirt was kicking up in my face anyway so I had to shield myself from the flying dust and dirt :) Enjoy!










Thursday, November 17, 2016

Just a quick Hi

Hello everyone! I know we have some faithful followers so I wanted to jump on quick and say HI!!! We have had a very busy few weeks so I haven't taken the time to sit down and do a blog entry in awhile. I was going to upload some pictures here of the things we see on a regular basis outside our house and down our street to the shelter so you can see what we see everyday. Unfortunately my phone (where all my pictures were) died and it doesn't look like I will get those pictures back :(  (I will try to take the pictures again when I have a chance) The Phillipines doesn't have an apple store so we had to send my phone to Singapore to see if it can be salvaged or to see if I need a new one. Good thing for warranties!! Anyway, I hope you are all well! Look forward to another "real" entry next week! We love you all! *Pam

Prayer Requests:
*We have had a lot of visitors lately! It is wonderful to meet so many new people and to be able to show off all of the wonderful work God is doing at CSC. With that being said, it is also exhausting. Pray for endurance for all of us.
*Pray for the kiddos. They are ROCK STARS!! With the visitors here, our schedule has not been very "normal". They take it all in like pros and have been very flexible and accommodating to even the not-so-fun adult things they tag along to.
*Pray for the CSC children. We have had  a lot of sickies lately. Pray we can all be healthy again.
*As always, pray for our safety.

Thanks guys!!

“Then you will call on me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.” Jeremiah 29:12-13 (NIV)

Sunday, November 6, 2016

Support Update/Prayer Requests

Many have asked where we are on financial support. Since arriving here, not much has changed but then again a lot has changed. We are at 89% as far as committed donations for both years. That is amazing!! We are SO incredibly thankful for each one of you who have come along side of us and have been able to bless us financially so we can be a blessing here in Cebu. We feel your love and generosity every time we get an update. We would love to be fully supported by the end of the year. We are not going to worry about that though because it is all in God's hands so we are going to leave it there. If you feel so led to give you can do so here, be sure to put Jake and Pam Schulz in the comment box (PS while you are there, check out CSC's brand new beautiful website!!). Please know that your donations are all tax deductible. Thank you! We also feel the love through your prayers. Many have also asked how you can pray specifically for us, so here are a few prayer requests.

  1. Continued transition. I know we keep asking you to pray for that and you might be thinking, for crying out loud you have been there for 8  weeks you should be good by now. Well, that is somewhat true in getting settled but not for the Culture Shock. I (Pam) especially, am having  a hard time with the shock of everything we see around us. I was not prepared enough emotionally to process all of the children living on the streets and the people around them (seemingly) not giving a hoot about any of it (there will be more on that in an upcoming blog post). Also the shock of how Americans are treated here. We are treated like celebrities and we get followed and our picture taken everywhere we go. We have people scream and point at us and say LOOK at the white people. For those of you who know me well know that I am a big behind the scenes kind of gal. I hate the attention and we bring attention wherever we go. We are constantly being watched and that is hard for me. The kids love it :) They say they feel famous lol. I have been told it is something that I will get used to. I guess I just need to keep praying and figure out how to emotionally handle everything around me. We have met some other American missionaries here who I have been able to chat with about all of this. She has been a lot of help and a huge encouragement to me because she has gone through all of it too and understands exactly how I am feeling. I have also had some good chats with some of you about it all. It helps to be able to process it out loud as well.
  2. School: While school is going well and the kids are really liking learning at home we still have our daily struggles. Sometimes it is really hard to focus on school work when it is so bright and sunshiny outside and all the kids want to do is go play. Also sometimes it can be hard to balance getting things done like I would like to when we are busy with stuff at the shelter. Although all good things and we want to be at the shelter and help out and be apart of anything we can, we also need to find balance and discipline to get the school stuff done too. For the most part we can have a balanced schedule in the morning and then do the fun stuff in the afternoons and evenings, but continued pray is always appreciated :)
  3. Safety: Although we have never felt unsafe anywhere we have gone, we also would love the continued prayers for safety. Because we are foreigners living here we are easy targets for ransom type activity. We know God is in control and He has us here for a reason and we are grateful that we are in the palm of His hand. 
  4. Continued Comfort: The kiddos are continuing to branch out and make friends. That is great to see. Mady, especially, has had a harder time feeling comfortable talking to people new to her. She is taking the longest to get comfortable, but she is getting there!
  5. Health: So far we have been pretty healthy, praise the Lord! We have all had a few G.I issues at times but beyond that nothing major. It is Dengue Fever (a mosquito born illness) season and it has been a big deal around us this season. Please pray for us,the staff, and children at CSC that we will all stay healthy especially during this season.
  6. Church: We have found a couple of churches that we like. Nothing like "home" but 2 churches that we think would be a good fit for our family. Pray that we will see clearly where it is that God wants us to serve.
Thank you so so much for your continues prayers. We appreciate it more then you know. Have a great week! We love you all, God bless!! *Pam