Siargao Island is coming to the end of rainy season and heading into the hot summer. Hope for the Island Organic Farm is doing great as we approach the summer months. The last few weeks we harvested and enjoyed eating radishes, string beans, okra and pechay!
The goats at the farm will now enjoy free range grazing. Goats don’t like getting wet, so during rainy season we cut and carry their feed to them. The produce at the farm needs more moisture, so we have installed water taps at various locations on the farm. Pray we find a solution to our water well running dry during the summer months. We have had to haul water from a neighboring village because our pump stopped drawing water!
As the rainy season ends, summer brings an increase in activities for Kids and Youth Ministry. Our Organic Farm will be providing the healthy snacks we are committed to supply for all the big events! We also receive donated dehydrated vegetables and fruit from Gleaners in Canada. This has made it possible to give each child a nutritious snack after each ministry time. We mix the dried fruit and vegetables with organic coconut milk, organic mongo beans and organic root crops to make “Ginataan”, a favorite snack of the Filipino people.
All of us at Hope for the Island LOVE going to the farm and the farm workers anticipate our visits as well! Monthly, we have a chance to visit the farm for a picnic style fellowship. Hope for the Island main compound is located in northern Siargao Island near the town of Burgos. Our farm is located in the center of Siargao Island near the village of Jamayaon a forty minute drive away. We currently have six full time farm workers and seven local full time staff serving alongside Derek and Jenn at HOPE in Burgos.
Each time we visit the farm we are warmly welcomed and handed fresh coconut juice from our trees! Our recent visit was an opportunity to get to know and love the neighboring children adjacent to our Organic Farm.
We invited them to visit the Hope for the Island Organic Farm so we could get to know their names, pray for them and let them know that we will have monthly Kids Ministry for them. We prayed for them, gave them clothes and told them to invite their friends. We look forward to getting to know the families who have watched with curiosity as our farm has got up and running.
These kids honestly had no idea what to do with the love they received from the Hope staff. Little Mark was a favorite of mine. He never changed his “shocked” expression during the entire time we were there. When Christina was helping him try on his new clothes; it seemed that it was then that he realized this was for real. We told him that God loves him and we love him too and can’t wait to tell him a Bible story next month.
When we were done Mark looked at me straight in the eye, gave me a tiny smile of acceptance, left his old tattered clothes behind and went home. It was an amazing moment for me because I know that this little child has no idea that God has an amazing plan for his life and I get to be a part of it!!
Jenn
