Cambodia Bible Education Centre

Welcome to a belated post from the Cambodia P2P Group for the Bethezer Dormitories here in Phnom Penh! Our group spent the week at the dormitories, working our way happily through a few awesome tasks that were set for us. Members of the group were Sammy Venn, Aaron Venn, Rosie Johansen, Dan Wolstencroft, Matt Watson and Kylie De Calmer. Our first and major task was to build a garden on the dormitory roof - but how do you build a garden bed on a concrete roof?? Under the careful and wise guidance of our wonderful Sister Loy, though, we soon had a plan for a wooden frame which would support an organic hanging garden! Building in Cambodia is a lot different to building back home...we couldn't just pop down to Bunnings and buy the timber that we needed, so Rosie and Aaron were dispatched, along with the boy's dorm manager, Him, to the local 'timber yard'. They returned trimuphant with some lengths of wood and a dodgy handsaw, and before long we were sawing away...well, not ...

hey all this is Jonno Nutter signing in from the BEC, Phnom Pehn. I'm going to sum up the last 5 weeks I've been here in Cambodia in a simple phrase. Cambodia has been awsome. I arrived here on the last day of December with Dan Wilstoncroft. since then it hasn't really stopped. I've spent heaps of time at the dorms, and there its an absolute spiritual feast. Some of the Dormers have been going through the soul and spirit with me, its been an incredibly exciting journey, to see their old church foundations being shaken and the realisation that there is the possibility of some ideas that are very different but right being taught by us. The relationships I've built there has been incredible. And the most exciting part of it is I'm not leaving for Brisbane tomorrow. I'm going to continue here in Cambodia until mid Febuary, teaching at the dorms, at LCDI, and sharing beautiful fellowship with my brothers and sisters here in Cambodia. We've had the bible schoo...

*Me and Vanny *Palace sunset *crusing the Mekong *fishing on the Mekong *Living on the Mekong *Lunch on the boat - look at all the pnom (drool) *Mekong Boat *Baptism lunch at Jam Chan *60 pairs of footware *heading to bec after baptisms *Kim Sreang and Belinda's Baptism ant Olympic Staduim *dorm service *LCDI - sunday morning *we give ém a feed too *under a rock at the zoo *dodgy *crazy *same rock *LCDI kitchen *Srose teaching at LCDI *Garden we built The saddest thing about putting these photos up, ...

In an unlikely place, a far more unlikely event unfolds. Perched on an open rooftop in an unfashionable suburb of Tuol Kork, the sun slowly sets and the breeze begins to cool the hot bodies. Loud music drifts across from the neighbour's party, but all ears are directed at the three men standing at the front of the crowd - each searching for the familiar tones of their countryman. They sit on bright red and blue plastic chairs or sprawl uncomfortably on bamboo mats. There are a lot of them, about 110 if you took the time to count. The gathering looks odd and it certainly is momentous. We are on the rooftop of the Bethezer dormitories. There are about 16 Khmer brothers and sisters, 40 from Australia and another 40 from the dormitories. Seventeen Vietnamese brothers and sisters have just joined us. For most of them, it is their first time out of their country. And they don't speak English, or Khmer, so the speaker has two translators. Khmer and Vietnamese. But the physical symbols...

G'day all back home our group for the 1st week of prepared to preach went out to the LCDI school in Phnom Phen (capital of Cambodia) Brother mr potent (kunthea) is the founder and director of LCDI. The LCDI (leadership character development institute) is a series of schools (nine) around cambodia that bring people (usually late teens, early twenties) to a "school" where they learn english, character development ie confidence etc, morals and values. the young people at the school come from very low social-ecconomic backgrounds, gangs, farms, off the street etc, and are given the chance to get out of the poverty cycle, this is because if you know english in cambodia you have a job. on teusday our group (lindsay, carrol, tim, sarah, deb, esther, and i) minus me and lindsay (as we were on the big white phone after eating something dodgy), went out to the LCDI and introduced themslves to the students and were asked to sing songs :) on wednesday we were in full fighing strenght...

Well its happened. After months of preparation and no little excitement on the part of many people, p2p Cambodia has basically been and gone. With our Bible school starting in a day or 2 the excitement (and therefore the madness) is not yet over, however I thought that more than enough has happened to be able to fill you in on just a snippet. Last Tuesday 4 teams of Aussies, Khmer and 1 staunch New Zealander (haha) launched themselves into 5 days of preaching and physical labour. 2 teams headed out into a few different provinces, while 2 teams remained in Phnom Penh teaching and toiling under the hot Cambodia sun. I was blessed to head off to Kampong Thom and Kampong Cham to notch up a few extra village life experiences. 12 of us (5 Khmer, 6 Aussies, and 1 (naturally staunch) NZer) crammed into a mini bus and headed northeastish. We stayed a night each in 2 different villages which was a fantastic (and probably quite challenging for some) experience. There is nothing quite like sleepi...

The past couple of weeks have seen a trickle of Aussies heading over to Cambodia for p2p and the end of year Bible School. This turned into a bit of a deluge on Monday, although thankfully most people have headed up to Siem Reap for a little sightseeing before descending once more upon Phnom Penh come Saturday. Its going to be nice to enjoy a slightly quieter week (people wise) in which to continue our teaching and prepare for the no doubt busy few weeks that are about to ensue. One of the joys of working with locals in another country is that you are often invited to experience a completely different culture. Which is what happened to us last Saturday. On Friday we were all issued with invites to the engagement party of the son of one of our contacts. Excitedly we all accepted - although I must say I was a little dubious about the 7.30am starting time. It appears I was not the only one feeling this way - Saturday morning saw a bunch of bleary eyed individuals clambering into a couple...

Aaah, Cambodia makes me smile! God has blessed me so much during the past 2 months, and I pray that I will use what I’ve learnt here for the rest of my life. From the very start, everyone was incredibly welcoming, warm and friendly, so I felt at home as soon as I arrived. I have loved laughing, talking and learning with everyone and I thank God that we were able to share such quality time with each other. I appreciate God’s Word so much more, it just amazes me that God has blessed me with an upbringing which allowed me to know and love and understand the Bible. Now, the only thing that I can do with this knowledge is to share it! God is so good, and the promise of hope that he gives us freely is the most exciting thing ever! I pray that wherever we live, in whatever circumstance we’re in, we will all continue to love God and live for Him totally. There is so much to learn from the experiences that God allows us to have, and it’s all to prepare for a perfect eternity. I pray that we all...

Sometimes I wonder where the time goes. It seems like yesterday (but was in fact just over a week ago) that I was down in Sihanoukville taking advantage of yet another Cambodian public holiday (a 3 day holiday somehow amazingly converts to a one week break in Cambodia – maybe we need to implement this scheme back home???). The beauty of this trip was that we welcomed Chanthuon into the family of Christ Jesus while we were down there, as well as enjoying a few days at the beach - a much anticipated and appreciated trip I must say. While it was nice to enjoy the beach (something I have missed exceedingly in the last year), it was really sad to see how hedonistic society can be. We were lucky to find a few places less cluttered by sun lounging chairs, half dressed tourists and touts offering everything from bracelets to hair removal. It was a blessing to sit a nd talk about God’s coming Kingdom while watching a sunset which turned everything some brilliant shades of orange. However the ...

After a long absence, our family is back on the ground in Phnom Penh and vying for space in the crowded mission flat. We've wished a fond farewell to workers Steve and Lynne who have done a fantastic job here and will be missed. They've left us well equipped and organised and the teaching program is continuing with plenty to be done for our four additional workers. We had a small memorial meeting on Wednesday night for brother Veasna and Sister Loy who couldn't make the Sunday meeting and the singing was fantastic. Had our first full morning out at the school and Sarah, Sarah, Abi and Josh all took classes. It was my first time out at the new site. Unfortunately, spiraling rental costs have forced the school to move to a smaller lot with almost no drainage and they are locked into rental prices twice as expensive as previous. God willing, there will be a way to fund the rental through donations or capital for income generating projects. The dormitory is operating nicel...

Wherever we may be, and whatever we’re doing, we are in God’s presence and leading examples of Christlike living; once committed to Christ, preaching is a 24/7 dedication. The hunger for God and His hope is immense and rapidly growing here in Cambodia. The BEC is well and truly up and running, with a constant buzz of Bible and English students. This is so exciting; it also demonstrates that we must take every opportunity that God presents to spread his good news. During the past month while teaching English at LCDI, I have worked through many and varied activities using song, actions, poems and phonetics exercises. However, I found that there wasn’t enough continuity or consistency with my lesson plans, and so decided to brainstorm different approaches to teaching this tricky language, commonly referred to as English. After some discussion with my fellow fieldworkers on what I could perhaps present in my LCDI English classes, an exciting thought came to mind! As I am teaching Sunday Sc...