I was so excited on August 4^th because we continued the piglet raising scheme at Kampot village.  We had a wonderful experience with the last scheme, and we could see how God was working among us.  We had loaned US$820 to the members to start the scheme, and everything was repaid except those losses due to the death of piglets less than a month old.  We were able to make up the balance, as we charged them 25% interest on top of the purchase cost of the piglets.  We also finished the scheme two months earlier than planned.  We also required all of them to pay back before we would continue with another phase.  This time, they also have the desire to raise ‘mother' piglets so that they can have larger profits, even though it will take half a year longer than the other plan. Thus, Brother Isaac and I devised another policy for the mother piglet scheme and discussed it with the local committee (the same 4 leaders). This time, we will require them to pay back part of the loan even if the piglet dies at any time.  We set the amount higher than before, and thought we might need to bargain with the committee to a certain extent.  Contrary to our expectations, the committee unanimously wanted to raise the amount higher than what we set.  They felt that the members can afford to pay more.  It seems their standard is higher than ours.

Apparently the profits balanced with what we'd loaned I originally told them we had a loss of about US$200.  Immediately, one of the committee members showed me a record of all the payments, which included full payments, partial payments and null payments. According to his record, we came out even, instead of having a loss.  I was amazed at what he did.  Then I told him that the loss was due to the overhead costs like traveling, administration, and the like.  The reason I raised that point was because I had told them we would not have any additional money to continue the scheme, but would only be able to use the money we got back.  They were convinced by my explanation, and thus we will start in again with around US$600 instead of US$800.  However, this brought about another problem, because there were about 35 families who wanted to join, 8 of them wanting to raise mother piglets.  This would cost more than US$800, so we need to decide how to allocate the resources fairly.  It was not easy because some are new members and some are faithful members.  Brother Isaac and I thought that if the committee found it difficult to decide who can join, we could draw the lot which seems to be the fairest way to handle this.  On August 4, we prepared everything and discussed again with the committee before the meeting.  Just at the last minute, the committee thought that it was not a good idea to draw lots, because those who lost would not be happy and might even get angry.  On the other hand, they had already screened the applicants, and there were 32 families left instead of 35.  Praise the Lord that He granted wisdom to us so that we consequently decided to keep raising piglets rather than do any mother piglets, so all can join in without any complaints.  The total cost came to US$620.

Throughout the process, I could see God's guidance, as well as the leaders becoming more mature and committed to help their brothers and sisters in the Lord.  As a foreigner, I may never fully comprehend their culture (ways of doing things) and mindset.  Sometimes what I think is strict, to them is readily acceptable.  Sometimes I think about what is fair, but they think about the importance of relationships.  God is wonderful that we can learn from each other and build up our spiritual life in His grace and love.

 Prayer points

• Pray for the Kampot church members who have joined the piglet scheme that they can grow both in faith and grace
• Pray for the visiting and local VBS teams that they will experience God's blessings in teaching about 400 children in four venues from 14-19 August
• Pray for our coworker Miu Ling that she will fully recover from sickness and return to Cambodia soon