Dear family, brethren, and friends,

My flights on July 26-27 from Louisville to Atlanta to Tokyo to Manila on Luzon in the Philippines were blessed with safety and smooth air currents. Our plane arrived in Manila at 7:30 PM on Wednesday , the earliest ever (usually 10:00-11:00 PM through the years).  This gave me time to check into the hotel and go to the exercise room.  Though the flights are exhausting after 24 hours travel, exercise helps the “paralyzed” body begin to regain some strength as well as to sleep quite well.

On Thursday, July 28, Elias Cruz, Sammy Paet, and Ely Ebuenga met me at the hotel to unpack, sort, and repack five boxes I brought on the plane. The repacked boxes are shipped by Elias by air cargo to places where I will use the teaching material.  Why not just take the boxes myself as checked-in luggage?  That used to work fine, but the airlines now charge an arm and a leg for extra checked-in baggage.  Air cargo travels on the same planes with passengers but at a greatly reduced price.

The rest of the day was used catching up on dozens of emails and several other tasks necessary to prepare for my work in Mindanao.

After another good night’s rest, I felt Friday morning I was recovering from the long travel to the Philippines, though complete recovery takes several days. The morning was spent catching up on a few more details and preparing to fly two hours from Manila to General Santos City in southern Mindanao.

Hundreds of thousands of Muslims live on Mindanao, some of whom have been fighting the government, kidnapping, and causing mayhem for decades – along with Communist rebels and roving bands of bandits in the rural areas of Mindanao where we have many brethren.

In May Filipinos elected by a landslide Rody Duterte as President – a rough-and-tumble candidate considered an outsider and unelectable by the political establishment and press.  He is making new initiatives for peace with the various rebel groups, as have his predecessors.  It remains to be seen whether he can succeed where others have failed.

One reason Duterte was elected is because he promised to crack down hard on drug dealers and crime syndicates.  While he was mayor of Davao City here on Mindanao, he cracked down so hard that now thousands of drug dealers are already turning themselves in nationwide because they fear for their lives.  Over 300 have died since his election, shot by the police and by groups of uncertain origin – whether secret police squads or vigilantes, no one knows.  He has promised to restore the death penalty and a bill is already pending in Congress though the Catholic Church opposes it.

My good friend and brother Jimmy Battung is a retired police chief in Metro Manila.  He urges me to be cautious on Mindanao and he provided the name of a high ranking police officer in General Santos City who is his friend.  The Filipino brethren are very cautious and protective and I will surely stay close to them.  In addition, I have the advantage of many brethren who are praying for my safety, and I am not nearly in the great dangers faced by Paul and other early evangelists who first spread the gospel around the world.

Saturday was the first day of preaching.  We traveled from the hotel for an hour to reach the San Felipi church in Tantangan, South Cotabato Province where Rosalito Nardo has been preaching for a number of years. This church has an adequate meeting house and our attendance was about 60.

Rosalito came from a background with liberal or institutional churches and he has many friends and contacts from the same background.  I too came from a congregation that embraced liberalism when I was young, so I appreciate brethren from this background who are willing to study and analyze the issues related to liberalism.  We had visitors from the community as well as visitors from the liberal background.

My first lesson dealt with basic principles of the gospel: “The Gospel Makes Us Right with God.”  The next two lessons dealt with “Two Attitudes Toward God’s Word: Conservative and Liberal.”  The fourth session was an hour long open forum in which many good questions were discussed.  Institutional brethren appeal to Galatians 6:10 and James 1:27 in an effort to prove the church can donate funds to sinners in the world and to human benevolence organizations.  While reading through Galatians 6:1-10 and James 1:18-27, I listed the pronouns used in these passages to show the instructions given are addressed to Christians in their individual capacities and not to congregations.

We stopped at 3:00 PM in order to accommodate the request from Sammy Facus that we visit the New Ayapo church about 20 minutes away.  Sammy works with Isaac Valdez in two congregations.  They are learning about the liberal issues and have open minds.  I spoke from John 6 on “Jesus Christ, the Bread of Life.”  In this chapter Jesus struggled to convince the Jews that he did not come to set up a civil government or to meet the needs of he flesh such as hunger – he came he came to save us from our sins.  When many of the Jews learned he offered them salvation but no feeding ministry for the body, they turned away from him.  Promoters of the social gospe, still cannot accept what Jesus taught and they constantly expand the mission of the church to include all sorts of social and recreational activities.

Again the open forum generated a lot of good questions and everyone seemed happy with the answers given from Scripture.

Meanwhile, on Saturday Jack Jaco traveled into the mountains to visit a gathering of 160 souls from the T’oli people, indigenous tribal groups.  Six were baptized.

Six sessions on my first day of preaching left me exhausted, but we were blessed by clouds and rain after a drought lasting six months to a year.  Most of the Philippines have suffered a drought lasting six months to a year, depending on the area, but during the last month rains have been returning to southern Mindanao.  God willing, there should be a harvest of new crops within the next couple of months.

On the Lord’s Day, July 31, Samson Castillon took me to San Isidro, Lu Padidu, Malapatan, Sarangani Province for the morning service.  Most of the audience were tribal brethren and Samson decided to translate my sermon to be sure they could get everything.  I broke the lesson on “The Resurrection of Christ” into two parts to accommodate the slower pace required when there is translation.  This was Samuel’s first time to translate, but he seemed to be relaxed and did well.

Then we conducted an open forum.  One of the questions was whether God’s Word in the Old Testament was confirmed by miracles like the New Testament message.  We read and discussed Exodus 4:1-5 where God gave Moses the power to confirm his message with signs following.  The Ten Plagues provide additional illustrations.

In the afternoon I preached at the Riverside church in Apopong, General Santos City where Johnny Julom has labored for many years.  We studied 1 Peter 3:18-4:11, “The Prison of Sin.”

Meanwhile, Jack Jaco and Salvador Parbo spent the day preaching at Lake Sebu in the rural mountain area and baptized seven precious souls.

There was rain yesterday and the atmosphere was somewhat cooler today with a breeze. God is blessing us in every way!  I am looking for the moon, but its phase now is a waning crescent and the sky has been cloudy.

In Christian love,
Ron Halbrook

To see good Bible study material, go to:
http://www.HebronChurchOfChrist.com
http://www.biblework.com
http://www.truthmagazine.com
http://www.CEIbooks.com