All Dorm Fellowship- Boat Night

All Dorm Fellowship

We have an all dorm fellowship every quarter where all four dorms get together and have a friendly competition. This quarter it was boat night at the pool. Each dorm had the task of building their own boat from scratch. The boats were judged for best designed, then we raced the boats, and then saw which dorm could fit the most people on their boat. Then we just had fun in the pool. We all had a great time.

Family Home Weekend Games

The new year has started! We have officially been in school for one week. It has been a great start to the year. This year we have 13 boys from 6th grade to 12th grade. Seven of the 13 are new to Faith Academy. That brings lots of excitement to the dorm. In just one week we shared many fun times with each other. Including board games, sitting around talking, going out to eat, going to Starbucks, going to an amusement park, and some of Uncle Larry's crazy games. Please pray that we will continue to grow closer to God and closer to each other as the school year advances.

Thank you for your prayers!

The Keatings

Back to School

Christmas Break is finally over. We all enjoyed three weeks of break with our familys. The boys came back to our home on January 11 and school resumed on January 12. It is nice to have a full house again.

We had a good break and had good family time. We spent most of the time with Kim's parents, the Hardistys'. The first two weeks we celebrated Christmas and the New Year in our home in Manila. Then we went up to Baguio to Kim's parents house for the last week. We had a good time of rest.

This semester we continue to have 12 boys. However one of the young men graduated last semester and will start university in Korea in March. But we also have a young man that is joining us this semester. He is new to Faith this year. His parents came for the first semester and now have gone back to their ministry. So he will stay with us. He is a fine young man and we are happy that he will join us.

We look forward to this new semester. We continue to be pleased with our group of guys. We have seven seniors this semester. We think this is a good thing =). They are all great leaders and we are not looking forward to saying good bye to them in June.

We continue to thank you all for your prayers!

Love the Keatings'

The Flood

I have been terrible about giving updates especially about the flood. Most of you know that 1 month from today, on September 26, Manila experienced a great flood. It was actually the worst flood that Manila has had in 43 years. Roughly, there was 16 inches of rain in 9 hours. There was over flow from many rivers and dams. Many people were trapped in their homes and forced to be evacuated while being stranded on their roofs. Many streets turned into rivers having 5-6 feet of water. Cars were stranded in the streets so the drivers could be safe. The last report I heard is that there were about 400 deaths and about 1 million people displaced from their homes. The needs here are almost unbearable. One week after the Manila flood there was a storm up north in Baguio that did more damage. They experience flooding and also land slides in the mountains. They experienced the same tradegy of deaths and homeless people.

As in most disasters we saw God move as only He can. Thankfully our home did not have any damage since we live on top of a hill. So, we were able to help many of the people who were affected by the flood. School was cancelled for a full week. We spent the week cleaning up houses consisting of sweeping water, scrubbing walls, cleaning personal items, and packaging and giving food. There were many missionaries who lost everything. It was amazing to see God's people come together and help the hurting. Some of our boys were very active in helping out and some needed a little extra push. But over all we were very proud of our boys.

Now almost a month later things are almost back to normal. School is back into session and people are back into their busy daily schedules. But you can still see the affects of the flood. We have heard that some areas still have 3 feet of water. Some areas next to the high ways have been a dump for garbage. It will take a long time to completely clean up and rebuild from this disaster.

So we thank you for all of your prayers. Continue to pray for the Philippines. There have been some diseases that are sprading because of the conditions. And most people have a lot of rebuilding to do.

Thank you! We love you all!

The Boys are back!

The boys return back to the dorm today from 1 week of vacation. Many of the boys were able to return to their homes and visit with their families. Some of the boys were not able to return home but we able to spend the week at friends' houses.

The Keating family had a nice peaceful break. The beginning of the week we were at camp for a CMML retreat. It was a great time of hearing from the Word and fellowship with other CMML missionaries. At the end of the week Larry and Kim were able to spend the night at a hotel in Manila and our friends watched Tyler and Abby for us. It was a great get away. So we are pretty much rested and have caught up on our sleep and are ready for the boys.

We want to thank you for all of your prayers! We are very thankful to God for a great year so far.