It's good to pray
“I urge, then, first of all, that petitions, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for all people— for kings and all those in authority, that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness.” I Timothy 2:1-2
Dear Family and Friends,
Since our last email, we have been settling into our work and life back home in Cambodia.
Despite mobility limitations, Yong has been working from home supporting various organisations and friends with different websites and admin support. Recently one team mate who is working at the Gateway2Khmer language school contacted him to help with their programming support and timetabling. He has also recently been making more instructional videos for the MMCC admin team as they continue to learn about using the Google platforms.
We are thankful that Yong has had knee surgery at last. Finally all the correspondence with insurers, doctors and hospital administration came together last week. Yong had the surgery on Saturday Oct 18th and it went to plan. He is recovering very well. He will need to walk with crutches for 6 weeks and it will take several months before his knee will be strong enough to ride off-road motorbikes again. Please pray for this healing process, including a helpful plan for home exercise, physio appointments, patience and perseverance to keep motivated to work on this, improving fitness and strength.
Wendy has joined the team facilitating a new cohort of 16 international and Cambodian believers who want to deepen their faith through the Journey Deeper course. The course started with a 3 day retreat at a venue in Phnom Penh. There will be online meetings over the coming months, including some coaching with individuals and a small group. We pray it would be fruitful for each participant learning more about listening to the voice of the Good Shepherd.
Hospital work with the nurses continues, including two recent teachings on Pharmacology and understanding medical records (physicians notes). Also in early October, Wendy recently filled in a gap to lead a lunchtime bible devotion with nurses, which required some quick thinking and preparation to do that in Khmer. After several years without formal Khmer language study, Wendy decided to invest in this again, with 1:1 tutorials each week, particularly working on reading and expanding vocabulary.
Recently at MMCC hospital, we have been able to see great progress in the OR team competency and confidence, which we give thanks for. We are training nurses in the skills of circulating nurse, anesthetic nurse and scrub nurse. We have a goal to have several staff trained in these areas, so that we can have 2 OR teams that are able to rotate. To develop the surgical skills among our physicians, long term we are praying for funding for a surgical fellow position and also for discernment about which completing resident would have aptitude and interest for surgical skill development. Please pray with us for that.
In our last email we referenced the border conflict with Thailand. This conflict stems from historical disputes about the border demarcation and political issues. We are thankful for the further diplomatic peace talks and agreement over the weekend. Some of our prayer circle colleagues rode up to the north east areas this month, riding as close to the borders as they were permitted. They were praying through, praying for people they met, praying for peace and reconciliation. We pray with them also, that peace will hold and that trade can be open again and that displaced people can return to their homes and to their work.
Thanks for engaging with us and praying for all that the Lord wants to do here. We are thankful for all God gives us to do and for all the people we can work alongside- we pray we can demonstrate to them Jesus’ love and encourage others to follow Jesus.
For pray and thanksgiving:
Praise the Lord for successful knee surgery for Yong and we pray for his recovery over the coming weeks and months
Thanks to God for the new cohort of believers- internationals and Cambodians- who want to journey into deeper faith and relationship with God and the opportunity for Wendy to facilitate this with a team
Pray for peace at the borders of Cambodia/Thailand
Praise God for the surgical skills we have as we develop the team at MMCC team- please pray for the long term needs of a surgical fellow to rise up among our doctors.
We continue to ask God for the sale of Wendy’s Dad’s house.