Dear family, brethren, and friends,

By God’s good grace I arrived in Manila about 10:45 PM on Friday, April 6, some 32 hours after leaving home. After getting through the immigration process and getting checked into my hotel, I got to bed at 1:30 AM. It was a long and tiring trip, but what would the Apostle Paul have given for the privilege to travel this way to preach the gospel!And, for those who help me watch the moon, I’ve already seen a full moon a couple of times. So, we are off to a very good start!

Saturday I flew from Manila to Tuguegarao, Cagayan Province to help Rody Gumpad conduct preacher training classes. It is always a joy to be with Rody, Tessie, their family, and so many gracious saints here in this area. After Tessie provided a wonderful lunch, I rested and then walked about three miles at a sports stadium near the hotel. This helps work out aches and pains from traveling and aids the body to sleep well in spite of the 12 hour time change (12:00 noon in the KY is 12:00 midnight in the Philippines).

On our first night here in February, we taught the gospel in the yard of Cilia Lim, a wealthy widow (with whom we conducted a home study a few years ago). After our return to the U.S. we learned she was baptized through the followup efforts of Jimmy Battung (who lives in Manila but was originally from this area) and Elijah Sikat. One of her visitors during the yard study was Rody de Asis, a former mayor of Solana, a municipality of 70,000 people. He called Saturday afternoon to invite us to supper at his beautiful house. This gave us an opportunity to meet his family and to have a good visit. In addition, he had invited councilors and other community leaders to eat “come and go” style, and we met many of them. I was asked to lead a prayer of thanksgiving.  This man acknowledges that he was impressed by what he heard in our preaching and wants to learn more.

Sunday morning I worshiped with the saints at the Metro church of Christ where Rody preaches. I presented a study of “The Great Commission” (Matt. 28:18‑20) in two parts at the Bible class and worship periods. Our attendance at the worship hour was 125. In the afternoon we worshiped with about 30 saints at Lingu, Solana where Robert Pader labors. He is recovering from serious back trouble but was with us. My topic was “Ask for the Old Paths” (Jer. 6:16). One young lady was baptized.

Rody has been studying with 25 men in preacher training classes for the past week and Lordy Salunga and I joined him in teaching them for this week. They range in age from 14 to 71. The classes went exceptionally well today. The students are well disciplined and very attentive, ready to participate. We will cover Robert Harkrider’s four‑volume workbook series on Basic Bible Doctrine including the Bible’s theme, undenominational Christianity, New Testament worship, how to study the Bible, the Holy Spirit, baptism, Calvinism, premillennialism, Catholicism, and the cults. Each student receives a Strong’s Concordance, Zondervan’s Pictorial Bible Dictionary, and a reference Bible. At the day’s end I teach class on using these tools. It is a struggle for some of the men, most of whom attended elementary school but did not graduate from high school. Yet, they are anxious to learn.