Cambodia Bible Education Centre

Well folks it’s been a while since the last one. I know that some of you have been hanging out for a blog, so my apologies for the wait. A fair few things have of course happened, so here it is… Going back about two weeks ago we had a week of holidays here for what the Khmer call something like “Phjumben day”. It was a pretty funny era of listening to the array of ‘barang’ (us foreign folk) try to correctly pronounce the word. Basically, you could tell if your pronunciation was correct judging by the amount of laughter that was that was hea rd following the attempt. So the days around a public holiday are usually deemed holidays also, and all bar one of the dorm students went back to their home province for about half a week. Before they all left we put on a movie night over at the dorms. It was a great afternoon and evening involving ‘Kungfu Panda’ (a lot of laughter) and ‘Get Smart’. The Khmer love Kungfu movies so therefore quite enjoyed the sight of an overweight Panda performing h...

Kong goes first Our time here has just about finished, which we are very sad about. The last seven and a half months have just disappeared. It doesn't seem that long ago that we were packing our things and commencing our trip in Cambodia... now we are packing our things and getting ready to leave Cambodia and we feel like we will be leaving our hearts behind when we go. But our trip here has ended on a happy note. David and I have been teaching three girls in preparation for baptism, and last Saturday before the Seminar we witnessed their baptisms. We all went over to the new dorm and we heard Kong, Sokhieng and Sokhean acknowledge their faith. It was a lovely time and we had many students arrive to see the ceremony. After the seminar we had a fabulous dinner, laid on by Sister Theavy and her hard-working crew, and spent time with all the visitors and dormers. This is the day In Cambodia, we don't settle for offering t...

Class in the orphanage One Thursday a couple of weeks ago we all headed off in a van for the day, to visit an orphanage in Takeo province, south of the capital. We headed off at around 7am for a drive of an hour or so... two and a half hours later we got there - perhaps the estimate was a little optimistic. On the way, it was lovely to see the countryside once again and all the green rice paddies. We eventually arrived at the orphanage/school, and we were introduced to the children, who were ever-so-friendly - so much so that we basically had to peel them off us when it came time to leave. Some of the children here were orphans, while for others their families couldn't afford to look after them. These children were really excited to see us and all came out as soon as they could to talk to us. Tobi and Tavi were pounced apon, much to their disapproval! When we asked some of these children their age we were amazed to discover that they were a lot older than they looked. This ...

Over the last few weeks we have had a few intriguing events taking place here at the BEC.   Our silicony window sill First up: a few complaints were being whispered around the BEC about windows leaking when it rained, so Vitou was on the blower to the landlord, and before we knew it the fik-it men were here to remedy the problem. Two men arrived and were duly shown the windows and the locations where leaks were to be encountered. Our bedroom windows didn't actually leak but it seems it was deemed necessary that virtually every window in the house should be fixed regardless! Silicone was the solution of the day, and so it was applied liberally around the frames, the sashes, the tracks, the flyscreens and even some on the glass itself. Problem fixed, the fik-it ('x' is more or less unpronounceable to Khmer speakers) men left!  It wasn't until a while later when we decided it was time to open windows to clear the...

This week has seen the Bethezer boys dormitory move to the new premises which is a few streets away from the old dorms. The girls dormitory moved a few weeks ago and it’s good to have all the students at one location again as the two locations made logistics for the early morning dorm class a little bit more interesting. The early morning dorm class, led by Dan and Kez, is currently looking at the book of James. Dan has recently purchased (as opposed to qualifying for..) his moto licence. Such is his love for his shiny new helmet, resembling a lady beetle, that he’s been known to eat, sleep and ride in it. We have been blessed with a deluge of new students at the BEC. The new teaching schedule now includes classes on both levels of the rooftop of a Sunday morning. Sunday is always a bustle of activity with the BEC bursting at the seams with people and the class rooms being used for back to back lessons. The roof was the only space left available and we’re thrilled to have so many peopl...

Last weekend the BEC held its ‘Outreach’ program. The ‘Outreach’ program happens once a month, when contacts living outside of Phnom Penh come to the BEC for a series of studies. This month we also had seven LCDI students (who have been attending Bible studies at LCDI) come and stay. The theme for the weekend was “Reasons to Believe the Bible.” The program started on Friday evening with a two part study on the history of world empires in the Middle East. This was done by Dan with dinner served in between the two sessions. The following morning Dan did a review (as this topic is a lot to take in when you are hearing it for the first time!) as well as a talk based on Daniel Chapter 2 and how we can see that a kingdom of God is coming to the earth. The following talk was done by Deb about bible inspiration and bible echoes. After lunch, Kerren did a session on the topic “Creation: Design or Chance?” which we followed up by showing the students a documentary on the diversity of life...

At the conclusion of Sunday's meeting, Dan stood up and said he had an announcement to make... and proudly stated that he had asked Gaye to marry him, and that her answer was in the affirmative. It seems that the question was popped at the top of Udong Mountain on Saturday (but not inside the wat, Dan assures us). They plan to have a formal engagement ceremony in Thailand near the end of the year. Congratulations!