2015 Cabinet Cambodia Mission - A Growing Church, A Different World

Rev. Betsy Ott, DS New York-Connecticut District, writes:

Reflection after a long day. We learned about the growing church in Cambodia. Scholarships for boys and girls to attend college and universities -$500 a year. $800 for engineers, $1,500 for doctors. Trying to keep educated young people in Cambodia. Trying to keep them out of trouble, sex traffic in Thailand. Then we rode 4 hours to be present for the dedication of a new church and parsonage. The parsonage is a huge blessing and will help make the appointment of pastors possible. Up until now Pastors have been living in their own homes and farming to supplement their income. Elders here make $100 per month and our equivalent of local pastors, $70 per month. There is no pension or health care provided. But the church is growing and changing and changing. And parsonages will help support pastors and their families.

Our ride took us through country with rice paddies, sugar cane fields, lots of Brahman bulls everywhere. There were grass huts and small houses on raised stilts with tin or tile roofs. Shops press against the road in the cities and villages and architecture is a mix of old French style and the very new merging with Buddhist pagodas and statues of the Kingdom of Cambodia. We saw the people from our bus. Working in the fields, laying bricks, managing small family, children playing as children always do, young adults on bikes and scooters, a man peddling a huge load of wood, rubber plantations, small fishing boats on the river, a woman in her hammock on the porch of her home in the heat of the day, children selling fruit to tourists … mid ride rest stop. “Pineapple lady? Earn money – Go to school.”

There is a Boom going on here. Out of the brokenness comes beauty – life from the crash of the past. War, Khmer Rouge. The People are working hard to build their lives. And we are a presence. Blessed to be present. Ready. For what? We’re not sure but we belong to God and God will take us there. We’re on a journey. Ken said, In Incheon in ten minutes he heard fur Elise from the Motown carts, re-enactment of the
Korean king and queen from the historic past, and heard strings playing the Beatles. The world is very small and for us, getting smaller as our community becomes larger. We are learning through it all, and growing as God plans.

NYAC VIM 2015 Cabinet Mission - Learning from Cambodia and Korea

The Cabinet is going to Cambodia and Seoul Korea!

Rev. Joseph Ewoodzie, New York Annual Conference Mission Coordinator, writes:

Our Bishop, Rev. Jane Middleton, along with District Superintendents: Rev. Denise Smartt Sears, Metropolitan District, Rev. Elizabeth Ott, New York /Connecticut District, Rev. Timothy Riss, Catskill Hudson District, Rev. Kenneth Keiffer, Connecticut District, and Rev. Sungchan Kim Long Island West District, Mr. Ross Williams, Chief Financial Officer, Rev. Matthew Curry, Director of Connectional Ministries, and I are headed on a Mission Journey.

Some of us have never traveled on a Mission Journey before, and some are very seasoned. Together we anticipate a very meaningful time as a group. We ask for your prayers as we take this journey. One of our many highlights will be the dedication of Okroch Methodist chapel (see photo 1) and the parsonage (photo 2) on Sunday November 15, 2015.  We plan to have Bible study and fellowship at Raksmei and Samrath Methodist churches. We will celebrate the Women’s ministry Livelihood projects. 

We plan to interact with Cambodia Methodist Bible School students and members of the Phnom Penh Methodist Church;  AND  we plan to see the Genocide Museum, Killing Fields, and Angkor Wat, a temple complex and largest religious monument in the world, considered to be the 7th Wonder of the World.

Our journey starts November 12th 2015 but the mission partnership between Methodist Mission in Cambodia and NYAC started years ago. In 2010 NYAC funded the purchase of the land at Okroch for the building of a church and a parsonage when Rev. Romeo del Rosari, the Director of MMC invited the NYAC Youth Ambassadors in Mission to worship at Okroch. (see photo 3).  Since then the relationship has been blossoming and will be strengthened during our visit.

We are excited to be part of the naming of the chapel within the new Okroch Methodist Church. It will be named Randolph Nugent Chapel in honor of Rev. Dr. Randolph Nugent. Rev. Nugent served as the Executive Secretary of the General Board of Global Ministries for many years and was the first to appoint and bless the first missionary to Cambodia Mission.

After we leave Cambodia, we will visit Seoul Korea where we will be hosted by the Incheon Methodist Church for 4 days. There we will tour the DMC, and the Appenzeller Museum which is Korea's first western style modern educational institution and was established in 1885 by the American missionary Appenzeller.

I invite you to join us on this mission journey with you prayers and follow us on Facebook and Twitter.