The Final Day at Neli.

today was the last day of class and the closing ceremony of this week's english camp at neli elementary school. we will be moving to baifu/wudu elementary on saturday to begin our service for the next week. our team devotions today was 2 corinthians, chapter 9. there were a passage that stuck out to me, verses 6-8: "r

emember this: whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows generously will also reap generously. each man should give what he has decided in his heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver. and God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work." it was certainly a good encouragement from God for today, and certainly will be an encouragement everyday for the rest of the trip.

closing prayer/passage for everyone we have met here at neli, from ephesians 3:14-21.

"for this reason i kneel before the Father, from whom his whole family in heaven and on earth derives its name. i pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. and i pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! amen."

team member's thoughts:

bernard & karen:

Bernard Wen: "Alright one week down!" - is something I don't want to think or say. Even though today might have been the most tiring day of the week, I wanted it to keep going because I felt that I had so much more to give to these kids. And so I also felt regret on the last day (and at the end of the other days too...) that I should have done things better, been more organized. Nevertheless, at the closing ceremony, God showed me I had no reason to doubt myself as long as I lean on Him (that would be doubting God's strength anyways). My class sang really well, Jamie gave a great "speech" on stage, and I truly felt sad leaving these kids.

But I want to continue to learn to rely completely on God. Sometimes it's hard with PJosh and Deacon Katy there always to help. Of course, it's a blessing having their continual help, but before arriving here, I had always expected it to be a huge challenge, where I would then be forced to rely on God. While others might have been nervous thinking about the trip, I was not because I knew that by putting myself in a challenging position, I could trust in God to get me through. Now that I'm here though, I feel like I've been relying on myself and others for the most part. After a week of experience, I have a much clearer picture of what I should be doing for the next two weeks.

Karen Ai: I can't believe that the first week here in Neli is already over! I don't even know where to begin to describe how thankful i am.....to my team members, my teaching partners, my kids, GOD. This week definitely had its difficulties and frustrations, but i would go through it all again in a heart beat. I really learned to love these kids. Tonight, we had our closing ceremony....all through the night i kept thinking about how this might be the only time some of these kids will hear the gospel. But i trust God, that He has a plan for all 16 of my kids. God will love them much much much much more than i can and ever will. After the closing ceremony, seeing all the kids scramble to get some last pictures with me and Bernard and to say their last goodbyes really touched me....one kid even cried. These 5 days were not only precious to me, but it was also precious to the kids. Though it's hard to leave these kids -our first batch of kids- and move on to a next location, i trust God....and that makes me willing to move forward to continue to share God's love with our future kids. Tomorrow we will be returning to the place we went last year: Baifu~ One of my favorite place. I'm excited to see all my old kids and friends again. Even though we've only been through one week, a lot of us teachers are already burned out......and we still have two weeks of this. I pray for strength and energy, to continue to sincerely care for these kids and love these kids. It definitely is hard work!...since we are constantly worn out after each day..and on top of that, the weather is terribly hot and we are all terribly sticky and sweating-_- but God is good and one week is done! josh & elean: Elean Yang: It's hard to believe that a week has already gone by O_O I learned a lot in this past week, especially about patience and love. In 1 Corinthians 13:4 it says that "love is patient." I thought that love was one of the only things I had to offer these kids but when they weren't listening to me [being firm is something I need to work on], I began to lose patience and being impatient with them is definitely not loving them. I really had a lot of self-evaluation to do but I know that God does not let us be tried more than we can handle, each trial will help us to build perseverance and knowing that is enough to keep me going~ I'm really thankful for all the work God has been doing through us. This week went pretty well but I know next week will be even better because we have all the lessons from this week to apply. I'm thankful for this team and the encouragement we get from each other; whether it's actual suggestions from others or just a joke to pick up our moods. I'm especially thankful that we have Pastor Josh and my mom to lead us and help us using their experience, that my class had Angela to help us out, that Josh & I had the opportunity to work together & that we worked so well together, and that our kids got so much out of such a short amount of time. I really didn't think I was doing enough for them but amazingly, they retained a lot more than I thought they did. God is so good & it's really incredible seeing how He works~ Please continue praying for us as we head to our next destination & start and new week ^_^ norman & marissa & jacqueline: marissa liu: wow, i can't believe it's over. on tuesday i couldn't wait for the week to be over but after thursday i wished i could of spent more time with the students. after our performance today i was really sad. i am really going to miss these kids. starting next week, i will be with my original partner, jacqueline, but i am SUPER thankful that Norman was my partner this week. i have learned alot from him that i will use for the next few weeks. please pray for the upcoming weeks! thanks. norman ai: and so this first week of our missions trip has come to a close. the last day of camp usually is a hard day, not so much physically, but emotionally. all these doubts come into mind, did i do enough this week? could i have pushed myself harder? could i have been more effective as a missionary to these students and their families? will these kids ever hear the gospel again? teaching and hanging out with the kids, you build a strong and fast bond that is hard to come by. which makes goodbyes even harder. these are the kind of days were i feel certain i want to come again to teach in the summer. where i can come back and start off right where i left the last year and continue to witness to the students of taiwan. in the end, i feel even though i may never see these students again, i earnestly pray that i will be able to meet them one day in heaven. i am really grateful to God for this peace in my heart. i know my confidence in teaching and loving the kids is only a confidence and love that can be found when you fully trust in Him. His grace abounds to us every day. today, we had a small altercation in class, two boys were playing around and accidentally hit each other which led to a small fight/argument. i ended taking both of them outside the classroom and talking to them. praise God for giving me the right words to say... in chinese that is... and after an hour of sitting there talking to them, with the help of pastor josh, they both apologized to each other and reconciled. PTL. i'm extremely grateful for being able to work with marissa, jin ling, and jacqueline for the past week. its been a great pleasure and learning experience. next week, i will be serving as a floating teacher in the morning at wudu elementary, since there are only 5 classes and 6 groups of teachers. in the afternoon, i am scheduled to teach at the middle school by myself, as there is only one class. and nights will hopefully consist of house visitations. so please pray that i have the energy, patience, and love for this coming week, as it will be much more energy consuming than this past week. but, God will make all grace abound to us, so we will keep up the good race with all that we have! chris & esther: Chris Sung: Today was the last day of our first week, and it's been quite a week. I think that for the most part it was really good and I definitely enjoyed being with the kids despite them poking fun at me and being constantly tired. It was sad today because it was our last day to see the kids, and even more so because I don't know if any of them will continue to keep in touch. It's definitely been a unique experience. Please continue to pray for our team's unity and for us to have patience and love for one another and the kids that we meet. Thank God that this week went by fairly smoothly and that the parents and teachers could see Christ's love in us for the kids. Last thing, Deacon Simon bought us freshly baked pineapple cakes. They are delicious. esther wong: we got through the first week... our kids were cute, but it was very tiring. we only had one visitation this week and it was with a christian family, so it felt like we didn;t have as much as an opportunity to spread the gospel. but we were able to bring a lot of encouragement to the family that we visited. please pray that we were able to sow some seeds and that they remember the stories we taught them. it's always difficult to leave a class after five days with them, but i know God will take care of them! shing & si: si chu: our first week has come to an end and it was AWESOME! despite our initial worries, God pulled through. we both have started to see the results of the seeds being sown. in addition to the house visit we mentioned earlier in the week, we were able to share the message with one of our students with the great assistance of our pastor-helper. our student, simon, during lunch mentioned he liked praying (it was actually very cute seeing him putting his hands together and closing his eyes in anticipation) and we were able to take it and run with it. our team was able to share the message with him and we were able to scrounge up a bible to give to him. we marked the story of david so he could read the actually passage from where our lessons came from. it was an awesome moment.

however, at the same time we were very sad to see the kids leaving already. i think we both teared up after we all had to part ways at the ending of our evening event. we hate how it was a crazy swing of emotions.

we wish to end our post with some hilarious/cute/hilariously cute? pictures, but that'll have to wait for another day...

shing chow: i thought i would add that i made a kid cry today...the kid, earl, had a spray bottle to cool down but he wound up using it to spray other kids in the class. in a stern voice, i asked him to stop and stand up-- instantly the tears started to flow. it was just one of those moments where i wasn't sure what to do, lol. but it was all good, because he definitely straightened himself out after that. to be honest, i haven't found too many problems with the kids. they are light-years ahead of my students back in columbus, ohio. i would love to have these kids as my students back at home. granted they take a little prodding, but they accomplish a lot. one just has to realize that kids this age are just a little squirrely and you need to pick your battles. there are two things that i continually fall back on when i really need to get a message across- blowing my whistle or start counting to 3 in a direct tone.

pastor josh:

We ended our first week in Taiwan, and will be moving on towards Keelung. God has been very gracious to us. When we first arrived at Nei Li, the Dean of Student affairs was not very responsive to us, she came in Monday late, and her attitude was not very co-operative. However, last night, she came up to me and told me that her son starting from Wednesday night would hold onto her leg and cry saying "what am I gonna do! the teachers are leaving Friday!". With this reaction, her attitude towards us changed dramatically. She wanted to see how we being with her child for 3 days, could build such a lasting impression. God is good and God is faithful. We merely demonstrated God's love in our lives, and the love overflowed into the children's live and thus the name of God was glorified. Immediately after we had our presentation, the Principal of the school asked us to come back next year. We hope to build a long God glorifying relationship with the Nei Li Area. Please continue to pray for us, as many of us are exhausted and it is only week 1. Spiritually we are doing great, morning devotions at 630 every morning, and we are refreshed in the Lord and thus able to serve God by loving these Children.

deacon katy:

Praise the Lord, we had a pretty good closing program tonight. The principle invited us to come back next year right after the closing program. Although we are exausted physically, we are filled with joy and thanksgiving. It's amazing to see kids memorize all 6 songs in five days. Thank God for providing helpers from local seminary. The class ran smoothly with their help in both Chinese and classroom management. We do need God's help for having more opportunies to share gospel.