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Home again

I got home last night from my month-long trip to the Philippines and Cambodia. The trip went very well, and I took many pictures. I plan to give you a detailed series of trip reports shortly, once I can get the pictures processed. I did some in-depth teaching in the Philippines, and then in Cambodia we prayed at many locations where multitudes were killed during the Pol Pot regime in the late 1970's. Much land was cleansed of innocent blood, but more work remains to be done.

In an unexpected development, our Cambodian friend who had invited us to go with him back to Cambodia discovered that he was engaged to be married. The request has been made earlier by both bride and groom, but it was not fully arranged until we got there. So I was asked to be the groom's father, and Brad was his brother at the elaborate engagement ceremony. It was a great honor for both of us, but yet also a surprise to all of us. We hope to return for the wedding next year, if it does not conflict with trips already planned. At any rate, we found ourselves to be guests of the bride and her parents's hospitality during our stay there. More about this later.

A good friend, Kevin Jacobson, died on Monday, and his memorial service will be held tomorrow. He attended the conference in Cloquet last month. Some of you may have met him and his wife, Joyce. He was the one using a walker.

I have to write the December FFI as soon as possible. It may be sent out a few days late.

One thing has emerged clearly during this trip. I need to update Secrets of Time and to put together a study on PowerPoint. Some of the Filipino pastors are quite anxious to learn these things, and I need to return next year to teach it to them. But my last update was done many years ago. I am thinking that I should try to break up the book into a series of smaller books as I work on the PowerPoint teaching tool.

I had been planning to start a study on 2 Corinthians when I got back from this trip, but I may have to postpone that study. There is so much to do all at once. It is hard to know where to start and in what order to proceed.

A lot has happened in the world in the past month. Many Saudi princes and powerful political figures are under house arrest for corruption. In Zimbabwe, long-time president Robert Mugabe was overthrown, and there is dancing in the streets. Closer to home, more than a thousand have been issued sealed indictments by the Justice Department, probably due to the information taken from Anthony Weiner's laptop. This has the potential of being the most significant purge of corruption and pedophilia to date in American history. Coming on the heels of the Tabernacles conference and all that we understand about 2017, we should watch these events closely.

On the trip, I usually had sufficient internet access to keep up on the news and even to answer a few emails. I was able to skype with Darla most mornings (my morning, her evening) using my ipad. It was a real blessing to be able to see and talk with her face to face on such a long trip away from home.