Some time back we had a visitor to the site of our orphanage / church property here in Tanjay City, Philippines. The visitor asked me, ”so, what do you guys do all the time?”
Here’s how a typical day unfolds at the Philippine Mission – Casa Esperanza of Angels project:
Our day usually starts fairly early – some mornings I am on the property before 6 am, just as it is getting light.
On these days, I spend a couple hours cutting the growing wild grass that constantly threaten to overrun the near 5 acre property. On grass cutting mornings I will return home for breakfast and then my wife and I will return to the property. We will review the construction work on the first children’s home planned for the day and determine what materials will be needed and how soon.
Our construction workers typically arrive between 6:30 and 7 am when they begin their days’ work. Often we will need to instruct the workers to specific tasks we want them to complete that day, even though the architect for our project also instructs the workers.
The middle of our typical day will be completing various tasks and sometimes meetings. We may meet with the architect to confer on ongoing work designs, or we may be meeting with various sub-contractors.
Other tasks we are continually doing are newsletters / correspondence (such as this one), petty cash reports to keep track of all our expenses, banking/preparing money for days when the workers will get cash advances and payroll, and purchasing materials for the construction. This last task often requires us to travel to Dumaguete which is 34 KM away and will usually take up a large portion of the day to purchase and arrange delivery.
Gigi keeps a daily journal of our work along with key items of importance for us to complete in the near future. We also often work on presentations, like the one we will soon be presenting at churches in the US.
We keep all our documents and requirements of the Bureau of Internal Revenue and Security Exchange Commission up to date and in compliance.
We frequently have to deal with minor crises – immediate need of some construction material, workers out sick, construction specification/error issues, security issues, tools or machinery in need of repair … and anything else that Murphy’s Law may throw at us on any given day!
A 10 to 12 hour day is more typical than not. We are often at the property at the end of the construction work day when we tend to and water plants and fruit trees as needed. As the day ends, we review the work completed that day and scrutinize it for accuracy and plan the next day for our workers.
The construction work continues 6 days a week but we work 7!
Each Sunday, after we have our morning worship service, we go to the property to cut grass, tend to the plants, and clean up trash or construction debris.
We may also use this time to discuss design issues and review the construction work while none of the workers are there so we can plan accordingly for the work the next week. We often document the progress with photos during this time as well, so we can keep our supporters informed about the work.
So why do we do this 7 days a week, month after month?
Because we have a plan … a vision … a passion … of how we, and I mean YOU and US together, can impact the lives of desperate children and people of this community.
We can give them HOPE. We can give them dignity and we can help them develop the most important thing that will sustain them in this world and the life to come – a relationship with Jesus Christ and our loving almighty God!
So if you wonder what we do all day and why, this is it! As our project develops our daily routines will change but the goals remain the same.
We are thankful and blessed in this mission, and we are grateful to all those who support this work!
Make a donation to the Philippine Mission Casa Esperanza of Angels today
Romans 8:25(KJV)
“But if we hope for that we see not, then do we with patience wait for it.”
Ronald & Georgia Brown