It only took one week of searching to find a house. We decided to expand our search geographically to Digos City, a one hour drive south of Davao City. Digos has a population of around 200,000 and the cost of living is much lower than in Davao.
After just two days of driving up and down the streets and calling every telephone number we saw on a gate or utility pole advertising a house or apartment for rent we found "our" house. It had the features we were looking for: plenty of space to live and work, a big living room area for gatherings, made of cement (not wood), a sunny yard where we can raise some vegetables and flowers and a big kitchen.
The house does need painting on the inside, our first job! The kitchen counters are the lowest counters we have ever seen, but we have a plan for a counter on top to make it more usable. The bathroom presents some unique challenges. It is very small and the only things in it are a toilet bowl (no tank) and a water spigot about 18 inches from the floor. We are looking for ways to "make some lemonade with the lemon" in the challenge of this bathroom. The bedrooms have no closets--but that is a circumstance we've dealt with before. Even given all of these things, we are thrilled with the house because of the size and location in Digos. The lower rent (1/4 of what it would cost in Davao) will allow us to hire more staff for the ministry.
We have company coming for three days, Monday-Wednesday. It is a family from Michigan who live in Shanghai. We are excited to have visitors--it's cold in China now, and they are looking forward to the beach.
Thank you for your prayers on our behalf as we searched for a house.
Tomorrow is Sunday and we are looking forward to seeing our friends at church and worshipping once again with our Filipino brothers and sisters.
We pray that you will have a blessed and restful worship this weekend.
Love in Christ,
Rodger and Dixie
