Our schedule said to wake up at 6 for devotions, so we did- only to find that devotions were cancelled. So we had one of our own. We went through Romans 8 and though I didn't know it at the time, it was good preparation for the rest of the day. We went back to bed for a nap, had lunch, and got picked up in the afternoon for what we thought was an outreach to Palakpakin. Not the case. Everyone except us seemed to know that we were going to climb a mountain that day and enter into an intense spiritual atmosphere.
We quickly learned that during Holy Week (easter and all that), mass amounts of people flock to this one mountain in the Delores area of San Pablo. These people climb the mountain, some to a place called Little Jerusalem and take part in rituals, sacrifices, prayer and worship of all kinds of gods/religions. Basically it's a giant melting pot of spiritual forces that have existed in that place since long before our parents were thought of, let alone born. This is also a mountain where higher up, crucifixions still take place. So basically its crazy right.
We prayed before getting into the van and leaving the compound. At this point, I still really didn't know what was going on. We drove a ways, then walked for a bit, handing out flyers, if you can call them that. They are little sheets of paper with information on sin, confession, salvation, etc. Then we drove some more and finally, a couple hours later, started to climb this beautiful, beautiful mountain. The climb was FUN. Having grown up with ravine in my backyard I hiked a lot as a kid and since I've been here I never realized how much I miss it. We didn't get all the way to the top, because we'd spent too much time elsewhere. So with the sun about to set in two hours time, we gathered together at Little Jerusalem. A group of people (who wear catholic bracelets coupled with occult gowns) allowed us to hang out where they were camped for the week. We chatted with a few of them and prayed, then when the sun was pretty much down, we ate some bread and prepared for our program. This group of evangelists from Frontline are experienced in this business, where I was quite uncertain and out of my comfort bubble- the demon worship going on all around me didn't help either. Anyway, the Pastor introduced us and shared a bit of what we were doing there. Then Taylor and I gave our testimonies, followed by some clips from the Jesus movie. Right in the middle of our presentation we had to stop the movie, because at whatever time it was, the catholic-cult people had to have their prayer time. So they got around and literally worshipped the mountain. I probably don't need to say that everything about it felt wrong and weird and bad. Anyway, the program resumed and we finished our movie. Then we asked for people to come up and receive prayer if they were in need of healing or wished to be saved. I had the privlege of praying for three people and with the help of Jonah, led one man to be saved. It was awesome! Two of the cult women were healed that night as well, praise God. Haha... though, after they'd been healed they went right back to their demon worship. Oh well lol what can you do?
After all that, our other activities seem mundane to write about haha. But our worship this morning in church was fantastic! Filipinos can really teach North Americans a lot about praise. We woke up for breakfast at 5:00 and got to the church for 6:00- it was so early because every easter sunday they have a sunrise service. It was a sweet, sweet service with the ordaining of three new ministers and a sermon about what Jesus really meant when he said "it is finished." "Tapos na."
Okay now I'm finished with the blog. Time to watch some old men play basketball! Haha.
God bless, I love you guys!!
Angela.
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