Gifts of the Wise Men

Gambles Newsletter                                    12/17/17                               Volume 3, Issue 10 serving Cambodia through engineering design and discipleship Pictures Chesna's art project at school - a different painting and name from each place where she has lived.   Our team celebrating during a recent staff meeting! The roads and sidewalks in Phnom Penh are for so much more than travel.  How many various activities can you see in this photo? Our level 7 classmates toured a university designed by the most famous Khmer architect.  Of course, we had to stop for coffee and tea! At the university, this classroom building has been designed to capture both natural lighting and cool breezes.  Our teams may incorporate similar designs as we are learning as much as we can about Khmer architectural design.   The Wise Gifts Some years back we came upon an idea to give our kids Christmas gifts that represent the gifts from the wise men. Gold This gift from the wise men represents an extravagant gift that likely funded Mary and Joseph's trip to Egypt and back. In our life, this gift has been given by YOU throughout the year.  Despite losing 14% in monthly support and a 10% increase in school fees, we have all that we need and more! God has blessed us abundantly beyond what we hoped or imagined this year and through your generosity, we are at over 118% of our budgeted income year to date!  Thank for being so generous and responding when prompted to give!  Frankincense This gift from the wise men represents a spiritual gift. ~Chad and Shanthi have been able to lead a few marriage Bible studies. ~Chesna and Miriam went to a "Serventure" camp where they lived out their faith by serving in the community. ~This Christmas season we have heard many songs about Jesus in the coffee shops and at the mall.  It is surprising and wonderful to hear the gospel being proclaimed in this very Buddhist culture. Myrrh Since this spice was traditionally used for burial, this gift from the wise men represents a practical gift. ~We have just finished level 7 of our Khmer language school. That's 525 hours of learning in class plus all the additional time learning outside the classroom, nearing 1,000 hours! ~We visited Ugandan family and the EMI office in Uganda in July.  ~Chesna got accepted to the university of her choice: Trinity Western University which is just outside of Vancouver, Canada and she was able to visit in November. The registration of the office here is becoming a bit complicated with 4 board members on 3 different continents and all need to wet sign the documents.  Please pray that the logistics of this would get worked out quickly.  We can't get our work permits until the paperwork is submitted. Many decisions will need to be made over the next few months about the office starting - please pray for wisdom and team unity. PRAISE:  Nate is coming on the 20th for Christmas, thanks to a wonderful friend at Calvin whose family bought his plane ticket! It has been an amazing year!  We are blessed beyond measure!   We may have found an office location!   កាត់ ទឹក មិន ដាច់ sounds like "cat duck mun dack" កាត់ សាច់ មិន បាន sounds like "cat sack mun ban" You can't cut water or family ties Family ties are unalterable. Even if a child should disgrace his family, deep down his parents will still love him. This is a beautiful picture of God's love for us. And it's one of the proverbs we learned this level and will be tested on during our exam. Miriam's Massages (or was that messages?) You know that kids say the darnedest things.  Here you will get a few funny quotes from our kids. "I just saw that the Queen celebrated 70 years of marriage." ~Chad "Wait? What queen? Queen Latifa? Queen B?" ~Miriam "No. The Queen of England." ~Chad "English would be good if it wasn't for all the comas." ~Miriam (I'm not sure exactly what's going on in her classroom 😜) Moses' Corner Kick Soccer Season has started and I'm very excited but nervous at the same time. I am on A team. I will play Midfield and left Wing. I want to get 1st place for soccer this year because it's my last middle school year. Sadly we lost our first game, it was 4-3 and was a hard loss. Our team wasn't really focusing and we thought it would be an easy win. We did very good in basketball. We made it to the championships then lost by one point. It was hard to see how close we were.  I got my 1st semester grades and I got Honors which means all A's and B's.