Davao

So I was visiting my friend Megan in Davao the past 2 weeks. Davao in located in the south of the country on the island of Mindanao. She is working with an organization called Peace Builders Community that is heading up peace talks in the conflict plagued island of Mindanao. I learned a lot about the conflict and the issues talking with the team leader Dann Pantoja. Up in Manila we don't hear much about the conflict besides that its the Muslims against the Christians. In which that is no where close to being true (like a lot of the 'religious' tagged wars around the world). Yes there is a large population of Muslims in Mindanao who trace their heritage from Malaysia. The Moro people (this is what they call themselves) did very good in keep most of colonialism out of their land and this where the religious garbage comes in. The Spanish and the American colonizations are called 'Christian', so when they come in and try to take the land from The Moro people is turns into Christian-Muslim conflict.
The root of the conflict comes from land claims (a lot like the issues in North America with the Natives). The Spanish didn't have control of Mindanao when the American beat them in the American-Spanish war but instead of looking bad in a defeat they decided to sell the Philippines to the Americans. This sale also included Mindanao in which they didn't own. Although with the small pockets influence the Spanish had in Mindanao and then what the Americans did later is the exact same as what the Europeans did in North America. They bought some of the land for essentially nothing from the Moros and the Natives because these groups had the thought pattern that 'Allah' owned the land and it could not be bought or sold. So now there are huge land disputes on who is the actual owner. This is at the core but from the land issues comes political, economical, religious, etc. issues that make the situation so much more complex. *
So what Dann and Peace Builders are doing is getting peace talks going between the different groups, there are 4 or 5 including the government. The Peace Theology that they use for the reconciliation is rooted in Anabaptist Theology. Although after they have been accepted into a community they help out with community development that appears in many forms. One of them is Coffee for Peace, in which they help out coffee farmers selling their coffee. They have one store of Coffee for Peace, in which they also sell crafts that are made in the various communities they are a part of, but they are wanting to expand and God willing in the near future they will be exporting to Canada. You can check all of this out at peacebuilderscommunity.org. Dann also has written an incredible paper on what and how he is leading his ministry and that can be found at www.peacebuilderscommunity.org/documents/PeaceBuilding&TransformationPARFramework.pdf

This is going to be my last blog entry because I come home on November 3rd. There are a few things to wrap up and some people I have to see before I make the return home but no other big events are happening before that. If I can I want to ask for your prayers as I transition from Manila to back home, that everything will go smoothly. Thank you so much for your prayers and support that I have received over the past year. May God Bless you all.

Jared

*Disclaimer: This is just a summary or a brief overview of the conflict that I remember. It goes much deeper and has a lot more going on than what I have shared. Please do not quote me in a scholarly essay.

Parties

Sorry it has been a little while since my last entry.

On September 11th John Coffey, the guy that I live with celebrated his 26th Birthday at McDonald's. It was really great because he brought 50 kids from our children ministry to party it up with him. So needless to say it was pretty wild. McDonald's ran some games and had prizes and gifts that they gave out which was really awesome. The meal was spaghetti and fries with a sundae for dessert.

This past Saturday, the 25th we had a graduation for the end of a feeding program that IT Tender has been running for the past 6 months. They held a small program with special numbers, a small message, and some fun and games. Also every child that was involved got a certificate for participating in the feeding program. As for the food, it was celebration so we of course served spaghetti, Filipinos love having spaghetti at parties.

In between there somewhere I got conjunctivitis, also called 'sore eyes' (similar to pink eye) and I was out of commission from the ministries for 4 days. So that really sucked but I'm good now so upward and onward.

A friend of mine, Megan Enns, arrived here in the Philippines on Sept 13 but she is down in Davao City which is in the south of the country. She is here working with Mennonite Church Canada and I have the opportunity to go visit her and see what kind of ministries she is involved with there, in which I am excited about. I will be down there from Oct 7-20.

God Bless you all,

Jared

Visitors

Well I didn't really notice but it has been a little while since my last update. My excuse is that we had too many visitors here. First their was a team of 15 youth from the U.K who came for 10 days. I didn't have much to do with them but I did run into them when they were helping out at the ministries that I am apart of. Like IT Tender Ministries and our Church's children outreach. Then about half way through their stay John's friend Mike came for a week and Kara (my girlfriend) came for 2 weeks. So Kara helped at the ministries with me and I showed her around and city and a little bit of the culture. We also got to spend some time at the beach which was really nice. Then shortly after she left Andy and Mary a couple from Colorado who worked with the YM team 2 years came for a week visit. I actually stayed with them during my 6 week trip here in 2008 so it was really great to reconnect with them.

A few things that we need your prayers for here are for relationship and a way to reach out to the people who are in need and searching for a place to belong. With both the Night Life at IT Tender Ministries and our youth ministry at the Church have really gone down in number. For different reasons though.

For Night life some has to do with the youth hanging out in a different areas so the center is too far for them to come to. Another reason is that they have been told to scavenge for plastic and metal to sell to scrap yards by their parents so they don't have time to come for a free meal and shower. Others aren't allowed to walk the streets at night so their parents don't let them come. Still others can't be bothered because they are too busy sniffing solvent. So we have (mostly Gabby, a worker and friend here at IT Tender) been visiting some of the places they live, which are very horrible living situations, to see what times would work best them. We, especially Gabby, are trying to build better relationships to find ways we can help them best. I ask for prayers of wisdom, knowledge and strength for the IT Tender Team as they are working on this. The Night Life might be change to the afternoon to best fit the schedules of the people we are serving.

Another way you can get involved with IT Tender is through sponsoring a child. They have just started a program in Sucat (the community they are serving) to help kids go to school, and to have a proper diet. It is only $20 a month. If you want to know more please get in contact with me.

For the youth outreach at our Church I feel they just don't want to or just can't be bothered to walk to the church building for an event. So we are feeling we need to go back into the community (streets) to start building better relationships again. So I ask for prayers in wisdom and knowledge about how to do this best. Also prayers for relationship to be built and people lives to be changed and brought to Jesus. We always have to remember that it is not us or the programs we are leading these people to, but Jesus, who is our everything.

Thank you all again for the prayers and support. May God Bless you all richly.

Jared

Untitled

About 2 weeks ago we had our first Typhoon of the Typhoon season here in the Philippines. The season runs till about October. The Typhoon was miscalculated and no one was ready for it. It was suppose to hit north of Metro Manila and miss the city altogether but it ran right through the city. It was also suppose to be a level one but it was a level 3. Due to the miscalculations the President got real angry and yelled at the weather people through the media. The Typhoon was somewhat destructive. It took down some billboards, trees, some tin roofs and even a crane came down. There were about 27 death and we were without power for almost 24 hours and for some it was longer. But in a day everything was back to normal.

One big thing that I have been noticing lately has been that many of the workers and missionary here are in need of support. They work so hard, as hard or harder than I have seen anyway and it is for very little finical help. They will get a great reward from God later but that doesn't mean they have to suffer here and now. Most of them have families to support and they need and deserve much more than they receive. So I am asking if anyone one of you have any spare income to share with these so deserving. 50 dollars a month (or less) would make a huge impact for these missionaries here so they can take care of themselves, so in turn they can take care of their ministries. Some also want/need to go to school and that runs for about 500-600 hundred dollars for a semester if you would be interested in supporting that. Also they all have facebook and e-mail so they can keep you informed and updated on their lives and ministries.

This coming weekend I am going on a small missions trip to a small town about 3 hours away. We will be doing repair work on the church and will be doing some children and youth programs. Pray for safety as we are out of the city. Also on Monday Kara (a very special friend) will be visiting me for 2 weeks which I'm excited about. I will be showing her the ministries that I am involved with but also going to be taking some vacation time.

Thanks again for all of your prayers. May God Bless all of you.

Jared Peter Redekop

Camp

This past week I had the opportunity to be an assistant counselor at a youth camp for 4 days. The camp was put on by the organization Action International and they have a partnership with IT Tender Ministries (that is the drop-in center that I help out at on Tuesdays and Thursdays) and that is how I got the chance to go.

There were about 50 campers who were ages 13-19 years old who are out of school (or don't go) and don't have jobs. Most of the youth have very difficult lives. Most of them have had many forms of abuse done to them and there were social workers there at the camp to talk with them. Although the terrible thing is that they only that 4 days to work with the youth. We hope and pray that they keep coming back to their organization that they came to the camp with to work through their issues.

The camp's theme was quite radical but very necessary. It was on purity and the title was 'True Loves Waits', no this is not the radical part just hold on. It was based on the scriptures of 1 Corinthians 6:18-20 and 1 Thessalonians 4:4-7, great passages by the way. The reason it was radical was because they were talking about sex, STDs (with pictures), and unexpected pregnancies and the bad stuff that can happen if you do drugs, drink and smoke while you are pregnant. It was awareness and advocacy in which none of these youth would have never had before. This school year (just started in June) is the first time ever they are teaching sex education in schools here in the Philippines. So these lessons/conversations that the youth were having at camp would have been thier first formal conversation ever to do with these issues. A big reason why they haven't been able to teach it in schools is the huge influence of the Catholic Church here, needless to say some people are really pissed off that these things are getting taught in school now. It is very much needed though because there are extreme amount of teenage pregancies in this country and most of them have no means of supporting their child. Also in many cases the man leaves and gives no support to the girl and she is left all alone to raise the child.

I feel the camp ran very well. For some of these kids it would be the high light of there lives becasue they get 3 square meals, a roof over their head and a bed to sleep in, councelors who care for them, and a relaxed atomsphere for them to be a kid. I could see and feel during the whorship time that they felt the Joy of the Lord. That the spirit of Jesus washed over them and all of their pain was gone. A very powerful and meaning experience for all of us there. Many of them cried when it was time to go home. They all wish they could stay there much, much longer. I hope you will continue in prayer with me for these youth for the Holy spirit to keep working in their lives.

May God Bless you all. Thanks so much for all the prayers and support.

Jared Peter

Some Filipino History

This past month I've gone on 2 field trips with my Tagalog school and went to the history museum when a friend was in town. Through all of it I have found a better understanding of the Philippines.

The Spanish explorer Ferdinand Magellan 'discovered' the Islands in 1521 and the Spanish oppressively ruled here until the Spanish-American war in 1898 (that same year The Philippines declared Independence) in where the Spanish navel was destroyed in 4 hours. The reason was the Spanish were still using their wooden ships and the U.S had steel ships and could shoot their canons about 3 kms further. So needless to say there were no American casualties. During the Spanish rule the Spanish separated themselves from the Filipinos and made themselves the higher class. They actually built a walled city in Manila that was only open the Spanish. Close to the end of the Spanish rule their was a man by the name of Jose Rizal, an incredible man,who was very educated and wrote a few books about the oppressiveness of the Spanish and Filipino pride. Jose became the figure head for the non-violent revolution against the Spanish. Rizal was executed by the Spanish but the revolution lived on, mostly through a group called the KKK who were not non-violent. The biggest impact that the Spanish left here is Catholicism. Although in some areas of the Philippines has turned it into some sort of idle worship with statues of Jesus and Mary, which is very very sad. I touched on it a little in my blog just after Easter. One thing I saw was when we visited a church was that it has a image of Jesus (in a very interested robe I might add) where people line up to touch and rub clothes on it to heal them or heal others or for good luck. So I feel that they are treating the most amazing gift of Jesus dying for our sins like a luck charm, it breaks my heart.

So after the Spanish were beaten by the Americans in the Spanish-American war the Philippines-American War began in 1899 and ended in 1902. After the war the the 2 countries had very good relations and nothing major happened until WWII. The Philippines got bombed by the Japanese the same day that Pearl Harbour did. The Americans and Filipinos didn't have much of a chance because they were using weapons from the WWI so the Japanese took control of the Philippines for 3 years during the war and terrorized the Filipinos people. The Philippines was recaptured by the Americans close to the end of WWII. Many lives were lost here in the Philippines on both sides but isn't talked about much outside the Philippines.

The ministries are going well and was pretty busy this week with randoms things going on. The 15th President of the Philippines, Benigno 'Noynoy' Aquino III was inaugurated on Wednesday so it was a national holiday. On Thursday it was Canada Day of course so John and I went out for dinner with 2 other Canadians we met at languages school and we had a great time. Although there is no hockey, Tim Hortons, back bacon, 24s, or beaver tails but we made the best of what we had.

This past Tuesday I was sharing the Bible story at the drop-in center for the youth. I shared the story of the prodigal son and it was a great refresher for me. Sometimes we forget how much our God loves us. It doesn't matter how much we mess up, our God will always take us back with open arms. He also always has a big party when we do.

May God Bless you all

Jared

Back to School

Things have been a little slow lately because it was the end of the summer. Everyone was preparing to go back to school and this past week was the first week of school. Which meant the Day Care that John and Toph started is back in full swing. It runs in the mornings from Tuesday till Friday. The target was for 10 kids but 16 have showed up and now we are going to try and keep it under 20. We want a small group so we can really invest into them and their families and also to prepare them for school. To get them knowing their alphabet, numbers and other essential things. The kids are ages 3-6 and come from the squatter areas near by. On Tuesday we had the opening ceremonies with an emcee and everything. All the mothers of the kids came and some of the Church workers too. We got everyone excited about the day care and had enough food to feed about 100 people. So many people got take home some food for supper. I will be helping out with this ministry in some areas but it won't be my focus. I am still helping with the drop-in centre, feeding program, children's and youth ministry at our Church, and still attending 2 Tagalog lessons a week but this will be my last month of Tagalog.

Thank you once again for all of your prayers and support of all kinds. It is always appreciated. May God Bless you all.

Jared