#52 - Praise God for His provision! ~ In need of more financial supports!

It is like “tax season” for me & Amy in the past 6 weeks but instead of working on taxes, we are overwhelmed with various ministry works God has brought upon us here in Cambodia. Let us give you a quick summary of what we have been up to:

Discipleship through Accounting Training
About three months ago, we have started to hire and train more of our students as our accounting; currently we have a total of 5 apprentices. Four of them will graduate from university August 2016 and we really want to spend more time with them and help them build a Godly character and the right attitude towards work. We pray that they will become a true follower of Christ and be the salt and light in their future work place in Cambodia. While we were worry about the financial burden of paying the students’ salary, God opens door for 2 more accounting clients (all are Christian organizations) and the fees we collected can help ease some of the financial burden of paying the students’ salary. We praise God for opening doors and His divine plan. It is very easy to teach the technical skills but extremely difficult to help these young Christian to treat “work” as a worship to our Lord and work with all their hearts and might, care about the task at hand like they would care and love our Lord. Please pray for us and these 5 students.

Teaching the accounting apprentices

Christian Café
As we reported in our last blog, we are helping to reorganize a Christian café ministry in need. Amy and I have spent most of our mornings at the café trying to train the new staff, make plans and lots of hands-on work in the operation and we are also planning some outreach activities. Also it serves as an excellent training ground for our apprentices on the accounting and admin work. The café is still struggling and there were just too many work needs to be done for it to function as a small business and to reach its goal to be truly self-sustainable and not rely on donations, personal subsidy or even rely on the business from a few "friends". There are just so many challenges and still a great distance to run before the operation can be passed on to the local supervisors but we pray God will straighten the path for this ministry. 

We organized the freezer using paper boxes to separate the food items.
Sometimes I thought I am part of those TV show that helps people organize clutter and redecorate.

The purpose is to teach the kitchen staff how to manage inventory and not over-stock or over-purchase.

<<<***** BIG NEWS***** >>>

 New Boy's Dormitory

In the midst of the busyness, a building becomes available for rent 50 meter away from our dormitory building. It has been our prayer to separate the boy and the girl especially with new students coming in Sept for the new school year. And we really do not want anyone to fall into the trap of sexual temptation. At the same time, we need the 2nd building to be in close proximity because the students would need to travel between the buildings for bible studies, evening classes, fellowship and Sunday worship. After some negotiation, we have just rented a second building as our boy dormitory and the old building will be for the girls. Praise God for His provision and we cannot plan anything so perfectly without Him. We will post more news in the next blog as we are making some plan for the move and transition and new program plan for the new school year.

2nd building of the dormitory - will be used for boys.

It is only 50 meters away from the current building - will be used for girls.

First visit to the new building with Thomas' Dad and the kids

Roof-Top (there is a small room behind)

Room in the 2nd building

Sunday Worship
We are at the end of the study of Jesus’ life through the Book of Matthew and with reference to the other three gospels. We will start a new series in about one month when all the new students arrive Phnom Penh. 

Aug 16, 2015 (Sunday worship)

16 Aug 2015 - This week has many high school students joined the worship

because they came to Phnom Penh to prepare and study for their national exam on 24 Aug.

Aug 23, 2015 (Sunday worship)

Aug 23, 2015 - We sing English songs!!! It was a challenge for the students

to learn new English songs and we spent the fellowship night (on Sat)

to practice and learn together.

Joelle was helping to click the powerpoint slides during the sermon

Reading Bible in English and Khmer

Gryphon's turn to help

Message on Matthew 18: 6-9

If anyone causes one of these little ones—those who believe in me—to stumble, 

it would be better for them to have a large millstone hung around their neck

and to be drowned in the depths of the sea.
*We almost finish preaching on the Book of Matthew as we already finish Ch21-28 last Easter.

Aug 30, 2015 (Sunday Worship)

Aug 30, 2015 -- Another week to sing English songs!!!  We also practiced

the night before during fellowship (Sat).

This is the 1st time for one of our students to translate during worship!
We are very happy that our students are growing and willing to step up to serve more.

Sept 13, 2015 (Sunday Worship)

Sep 13, 2015 - Some new students just moved in and join our discipleship program
while a few old students are in their hometown for the school holiday

Thank you for your continuing prayers and support! None of these are possible if you are not partnering with us.  Our students know that too.  

Our prayer requests:

1. Praise God that we just learned that there are 9 students will be coming to join our discipleship program!  We will have total of over 25 students!


2. Pray for more scholarships available for the students to apply because all of them (9 so far) are in need of supports to pay for tuition fee and living costs.


3. Pray for more financial supports for the 2nd building's expenses for the discipleship and dormitory program.

4. Pray for wisdom, patience, and good health to continue to work with our students in the apprenticeship programs and the challenges at the Christian cafe.

Please contact us at thomas.k.chong@gmail.com if you would like to support a student for their tuition fee and/or living costs (see detail below)