We are thrilled to give a good follow-up report on the results of our Missions Conference held in October! By God’s grace, our church voted in December to begin supporting the three new missionary families who took part in our conference. Harvest Baptist Church of Silay is now privileged to support eleven different missionary families.

We are looking forward to our 2nd Annual Medical Mission, scheduled for the last week of April. This was a great outreach ministry to our community last year. Even though hosting it pushed our church to the limits financially and physically due to not enough volunteers and medical personnel to match the overwhelming amount of people who came, we all agreed we must still press on and host it annually, as the need is so great. Our church members did great at volunteering and taking time off of work and school to have a part in it, and they are ready to do so again this year. We just need help in raising the $1,500 needed to pay for this event. We already have a team of doctors, dentists, and nurses scheduled to come from Manila. All patients will hear a clear presentation of the Gospel, as well as receive a free medical or dental checkup, along with free medication. It truly is a practical way to be a blessing to and show the love of Christ to our needy community here. Please pray and consider if you or your church could have a part in helping to raise the finances for this special project. Also, if you work in a medical field as a doctor, dentist, nurse, or pharmacist and are interested in taking a medical missions trip, please contact us. We would love to work it out for you to join us and the Filipino medical team, and the patients would be so encouraged by your presence. This is scheduled for April 30 through May 2.

Pastor Mel Veloso, our Filipino assistant pastor, is heading up our Discipleship Ministry. He has already set in motion the plans to get more church members involved in one-on-one discipleship for 2020. We use the book Continue by Paul Chappell for discipleship and need more copies of them if you’d like to take part in purchasing some of them. Bro. Chris Pattison, our fellow missionary and youth pastor at HBC, has been a great blessing in keeping our Sunday school teachers equipped with curriculum. He has also been supplying our two church plants with materials. The Pattison family will be in the States on furlough beginning this May and may even be available for a meeting at your church.

Please continue to pray for both church-plant mission works. The most recent one in La Granja with the Yap family is off to a good start, and we have enjoyed making several trips to win souls and conduct Bible studies with them.

Our other church planter, Jesse Leones, is located in Bago City and has a great need. Their landlord is ending their contract, and they are looking for a new place to rent. The church is three years old, and it would be great for them long-term to have a permanent location. Around $30,000 would put them in a good position to buy property. We are confident that the Lord will provide in His time and way for this young church.

Audrey, Jonathan, and I flew to Manila at the beginning of December for Jonathan’s regularly scheduled MRI. We had arranged babysitters for three days, booked an Air BNB close to the hospital, and gotten all the necessary appointments scheduled. However, during the pre-screening appointment with anesthesia, right after the doctor inquired if Jonathan had had any cough or colds in recent days and we promptly responded with a resolute “No,” Jonathan immediately burst out in a long, productive-sounding, wet cough. We, together with the doctor, were quite shocked. Any type of cough or cold present in a patient about to undergo anesthesia is a big no-no for anesthesiologists. They fear infection being worsened by the effects of anesthesia and causing pneumonia or other bad upper-respiratory-tract infections or putting their patients lives in danger while under sedation even. He really had no cough before that day, but by that evening, it had worsened. He ended up having it for an entire month.

We were very disappointed about the waste of money that we had spent in getting to Manila, not to mention the anxiety we always have to deal with before scans, but they had to be canceled. It was the best choice for Jonathan’s safety. It seems it is also a lesson for us in learning to trust God more and not live from scan to scan. Please continue to keep him in your prayers for his areas of struggle in speech, balance, emotional stability, and delayed processing. We will attempt to start him in K-5 homeschool with Abeka this year. Also pray, as we will head back to Manila in March to try to have his scans again.

In Christ,

Nathan Goodpaster