Richard News

It has been almost a month since I have posted on the Blog. Life after Dengue is not easy. The fever really hit me hard and the after effects continue on. Jill and I go to bed every night before 10pm. I usually get a good nap 4 times a week, but I am always still tired. My cough will not go away although it has been over 5 weeks since I began hacking. I have heard from many ward members that have caught Dengue that it took them almost 4 months to fully recover. I believe them and hope my return will be quicker.

Although I haven't felt up to swimming my daily laps and going on my morning run these last five weeks, the pounds are still falling off. A lot has to due to stress with my work and also my appetite is a lot smaller here in the Philippines - food isn't as tasty as it is in the US. The weight loss actually has been a nice feature of the fever. I have thought of bottling up a few of those Dengue Mosquitoes and sell them on eBay as a wonder diet. I weighed myself this morning and I now weigh . . . drum roll please . . . note that I weighed 226 when I landed on this island almost 4 months ago . . . I now weigh 200 pounds! My goal is to get down to the 190 market by my birthday in December. However, I would like to add some muscle once my strength returns.

I have been trying to do some good in my spare time. I am working on two super projects to help the people of Cebu, especially the members of the church. The projects are a seaweed farm and also a organic farm. The ultimate goal is to create a school for members across the Philippines to come and learn the system of our farm and return home and copy it. I will make more specific posts on these later.

Unfortunately, my time is limited to get these projects rolling. There is so much work to be done here in the Philippines. About two Sundays ago I met with a man in our ward by request of the bishop to help him with his finances. He is Brother Israel and get this, he has 10 sons. The ward members call them the tribes of Israel. Bro. Israel is doing his best to just survive. They have been inactive for a very long time. Their excuse for not coming to church . . . they have to work to eat. The ward has been trying to help them the best they can, but as one sister whom I home teach said, "We are the poor helping the poor." I know that to be true.

So what do you do? Handing over a 1000 pesos ($25) would help them a great deal considering Bro. Israel is bring home only 120 pesos ($3) a day after working a 10 hour day as a salesmen at a mattress company. What about a side business? Well the boys buy vegetables from the market, bring them home and cut them up, and sell them on the street to earn an additional 120 pesos ($3) a day for the family. What about the wife going to work? The wife is pregnant right now and cares for 10 children ranging from 2 - 21. There is no such thing as daycare here. Everything that you can think of they have a valid reason to rebuttal your argument.

So I sat down with Bro. Israel and tried to teach him the principle, "As a man thinketh in his heart so is he," so the proverb says. We analyzed his budget with the income and expenses of his family. It was the first time in my life that I had gone through that process with someone when there was literally nothing I could point out to him to save money on. Usually, with clients I can point out: refinance your house, consolidate some debt, cancel the cable TV, lower your cell phone plan, only eat out 2 times a month versus 4, etc. But how do you tell a guy that works 60 hours a week to only feed your family 5 kilos of rice a day versus 6? They don't go to the mall, they don't go to the movies, they don't have a cell phone, they don't even go to church because they don't have money for the bus to get them there.

I did hire Bro. Israel as my new pool man for 1500 pesos a month. Now an extra $37 a month doesn't sound like a lot of money to even a 10 year old in the US, but it is huge for Bro. Israel. He comes 3 times a week at 5:30am in the morning and spends 2 hours each time cleaning our pool. He has been a great pool man.

Brother Woods and I, also invested in his vegetable company to the amount of 1500 pesos ($37)so that he could increase his supply of vegetables to sell. The members came together to help them find people that would buy from his sons on a regular basis so they had a customer base they could count on. In my meeting with Bro. Israel, I helped him lay out a business plan of reinvesting some of his daily profits back into his purchase capital so he would have more product to sell. Our plan, if followed exactly, would help him get above his bills in about 4 months and out of debt ($1000) in about 1 year. The plan also details how to pay back Bro. Woods and myself in about 10 months. I hope he follows through.

This last Sunday Bro. Israel did show up for church for the first time in about three years. The Bishop also told me that he has started paying his tithing again. It is just a spirit lifter to see people making steps to improve their life in all areas especially spiritual progression.

I believe God blesses those that will receive his blessings. In my meetings with Bro. Israel, I tried teaching him that God wants us to be wealthy and have our wants and needs. Yet, God's definition of wealth is not what we read and see in the media - His way is everlasting wealth. Christ teaches all to come unto him and eat and drink without price. However, once one has accepted Christ, then Christ sends you out to labor for him without purse of script. God wants us to be wealthy so we can be strong, not weak, not to be lazy, not to retire, but to then go and work for him. I think back on my mission and wish I could have that same freedom that I had then, here today. I wish I could spend all day serving and not all day staring at a computer screen. Christ is wealth, Christ is freedom.

So back to the idea that there is so much work for me to do here . . . As I was driving home from my experience with Bro. Israel I couldn't help but think that there are thousands of Bro. Israels here in the Philippines. I am beginning to see more and more why God wants the Richard & Jill Ottley family in the Philippines.