Pahala, Hawaii Island and Kaunakakai, Molokai Island

Your gifts have helped to prepare and support the youth of Pahala Baptist Bible Mission to reach out to the youth on Molokai.  Their goal is to help grow the youth group at Kaunakakai Baptist Church.

In 2017, the youth at Pahala Baptist Bible Mission received Sue Nishikawa Funds that enabled them to attend youth camp for the first time.  Many of their families are first generation immigrants from the Philippines and do farm work in the Pahala area and have little disposable income.  Their leaders believed that enabling their youth to go to camp would motivate them to work harder to raise the funds needed for camp in the following years.  They also believed that attending camp would result in salvations and rededications of their lives to the Lord.

Their first experience at camp did bring the youth closer to the Lord and did motivate them to work harder at fundraising.  But God placed a bigger vision in their hearts.  When they learned that teen suicide had risen to an all-time high on Molokai, they were moved to action.  The Pahala youth understood how social media can make life on the bigger islands seem so much better than what they have where they are.  They understood the isolation felt on Molokai because they are also an hour and a half from the closest stores.  They also understood what it feels like to always have your school be looked at as the underdogs in sports and education.  But these Pahala youth are striving to be overcomers and wanted to share their hope with the youth of Molokai. 

The youth group wanted to take all that they have received and use it for God’s glory on Molokai.  The youth worked hard at multiple fundraisers throughout the year to raise the funds for their airfare and expenses.  They were willing to attend trainings on how to lead camps and they worked as leaders in their own group.  Pahala Baptist Bible Mission requested funds from the Sue Nishikawa Offering this year to help provide their youth group with materials, equipment, and Bibles to share with the youth of Molokai. 

In early July, the Youth of Pahala landed in Molokai for a week-long mission trip.  Twenty-two traveled from Big Island and led VBS for the children in the morning and held a Youth Gathering each evening.  Each day there were about 26 keiki who attended VBS and about 45 youth who attended each evening.  In addition to spiritual feeding, the Pahala group also fed the keiki and youth who attended after discovering that many were homeless or hungry.  This physical feeding was not planned but once the need was seen, they chose to meet the needs of those attending.  On Saturday, the group from Pahala helped with rebuilding the walls of a fishpond.  On Sunday, the Pahala youth led worship and one of their adults preached.  The attendance at Kaunakakai Baptist Church on Sunday was said to be one of the largest in 15 years!  Six salvations were recorded during the week among the youth of Molokai.  The Pahala leaders were encouraged by the spiritual growth and leadership that was seen in their own team.   Please continue to pray for the youth in Pahala and Kaunakakai, and around our convention, that they will continue to grow in Christ and lead their peers to a personal faith in Jesus.  Pray also that we, as adults, will learn from them how to have the compassion and drive to reach our ohana around us for Christ.

• Pray that the youth from Pahala and Kaunakakai will proclaim Christ boldly.
• Ask God to grow the youth groups at both Pahala and Kaunakakai churches.

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