Teaching in both English and Khmer, with the help of a Khmer pastor, the men gathered around the table learned the basic, essential doctrinal truths of the Christian faith. At the same time, John taught them how to study the Word of God, knowing that a day would come when he would no longer be able to teach these eager Khmer students.

Until that day came, John worked through each text, drawing out the history, the context and the spiritual significance of each passage. Often times a metaphor would be completely foreign to those studying and he would stop to clarify. Other times a question would come out of the study that had everybody wondering and thinking. John has been a student of the biblical Greek language for many years, and this often allowed him to go from the original language straight to the Khmer with no detour through English, a definite benefit.

One of the most amazing things about this group was their faithfulness and diligence to come to each and every study. Since shortly after John’s return to Cambodia in August 2003, the same group came consistently to hear and study the scriptures. With our move to Sihanoukville in April 2005 John's time with these men came to an end.

Having now relocated to this small provincial port town, we look forward to beginning another discipleship group which will include many of the staff from the orphanage. There are many opportunities for outreach and evangelism here as we are finding out that one could likely count the number of foreign adult missionaries living in this city on both hands. The fields are truly white for harvest, and the laborers are few...please pray the Lord of the harvest to send forth more laborers into the field.

Pastor Borin will take the role of mentoring and teaching the Khmer staff, as well as seek out opportunities of evangelism and outreach within the community. Pastor Borin once told us after an outreach to a local village, "My heart goes boom-boom for evangelism." Our hearts beat with his heart.

 

1) Orphanage Development

2) Discipleship

3) Outreach & Relief

Every Tuesday and Thursday during our time in Phnom Penh, a small group of men gathered on John’s covered veranda. Seated around a long table they opened their Khmer and English Bibles, and the teaching began.

Focusing on apologetics and defending the basic truths of the Christian faith, John used a verse-by-verse approach to work his way through various books of the Bible.