Dear Friends,

Good day to ALL!

The eyes of the Lord your God are continually on it from the beginning of the year to it's end. Deut. 11:12

We do want to praise the Lord for God's provision even as we've had a bad experience already this year. A thief pulled Grace's purse out through the bedroom window bars (using a long stick), and important documents were in it. The robber came early in the morning of January 29 - the same date is Joel's birthday. After the thief took our money and Grace's passport and a lot of other things, we decided to go to the Nelsons' house to get some encouragement after what happened to us. It's good that the Nelsons took us to the Coffee Grounds restaurant to celebrate Joel's birthday. We just want to thank them for being there to listen to our sentiments and heartache. The house was so quiet during Joel's birthday. We didn't go out after we had our lunch with them, but stayed in our house, praying that God would direct the thief to return the important documents. The Cambodian visa is quite expensive to replace, and even the police report needed to get a replacement costs a lot of money. However, God directed a man who found several items in the garbage, including the passport of Grace. He brought them to the government office in our area, and the officer gave the things to our Filipino missionary friend, who called us. So, we praise the Lord that Grace's passport and ATM card were recovered, plus some souvenir pictures of when we had good looking hair. However, the money and a necklace were not recovered. That necklace Joel bought 4 years ago as his gift to his wife. However, we praise the Lord for having the important papers back, as well as for the letters of comfort from our friends who really prayed for us also.

Kampot

We want to praise the Lord for giving us the ministry in Kampot after Chris Wilkins left for Home Assignment last year, because on Dec. 6 we were able to baptize 92 people, as well as 4 young people from our Takhmao outreach. They are so happy now to bring their Bibles every Saturday. Some of them could not really read, but after our teaching literacy classes, they are so excited to read the Bible. We want to thank the people who sent the funds to buy the Bibles.

During our visitation in Kampot, we discovered that the houses are far from each other, and the people don't have good water to drink ¡V they just drink the water from the ponds where we've seen a lot of ducks swimming and piglets playing. The people said they don't boil the water because they are lazy. That's why we need to think of helping them - to teach about the concepts of being clean and good sanitation. We are always encouraged to go to Kampot with our two young people from Takhmao and our leader Barnabas and his wife because the people there are so kind and always bring something for us, like young coconuts and green mangoes. They are looking forward every Saturday to having the literacy class and English class also. Pray for a lot of people who are having liver problems in Kampot because of poor water sanitation. When we visited, we found one lady who is dying because of liver cancer. We read the word of God promising about the heaven to

those who received Him as their personal Savior. We asked her if she accepted already and she said that she has accepted God already. So we prayed for the family and the husband.

Takhmao

We also want to praise the Lord for giving us the place to minister in Takhmao. We have an attendance of 25 to 35 young people. Please pray for our two artists, Somnang and Sovanarath, because they have expressed a desire to become pastors. The problem is that they stopped their studies 7 years ago, and if they go back to school they would need to pay a lot of money just to re-enroll. They have only completed up to Grade 8.

Please don't forget to pray for Srey Toech as she is being persecuted by her grandma and not permitted to come to our English classes anymore. Sometimes she sneaks out from her house and comes to the class for a few minutes just to hug Grace and her friends. Please pray for her because the grandma is Buddhist. February 13 we will have a party for the youth in Takhmao. Please pray that we can share the gospel with them. We told our young people to bring friends with them.

Barnabas is a big help to us. Every Tuesday through Friday he is there with us. While we're teaching English, he helps keep an eye on the children.

The Svay Chur Building project has almost finished - the roof is being put on this week. We want to thank the Australian TMI team for bringing the money and for their efforts to build the church. We are the ones who assisted them because they needed someone who could communicate with them and the Khmer helpers.

Prayer Requests:

• For our daughter who needs to do an internship in a big hospital in Manila. We need financial support to help pay her expenses for the month-long trip.
• For our members in Kampot that we can develop more leaders there.
• For our leader Barnabas and the family - they are really poor and don't have even land on which to put their house
• For our Missionaries here in Cambodia.
• For our Church planting places
• For our English class in Takhmao
• For our literacy class in Kampot
• For safe travel to Takhmao everyday and Kampot on Saturdays.
• For more souls to know more about Jesus
• For spiritual maturity for our leaders here in Cambodia
• For the thief that he will know about the truth and Jesus.

Respectfully yours,
Joel and Grace

Mailing Address :
P.O. Box 602, 
Phnom Penh, 
Cambodia