You know when you go on a mission trip that is a completely life-changing experience, and you come back all fired up? You just stared injustice in the face and realized you can actually do something about it. Your life takes on new purpose. It’s like the small seed of justice that had been lying dormant within you suddenly bloomed, and you feel an almost uncontrollable urge to share your experience with others in a way that will make them understand what has to be done.

You know that feeling?

That’s the type of passion-driven person the Compassion Philippines office hires. And they’ve come up with a pretty unique way to find those people.

The Compassion Philippines hiring process is unique. As part of the final round of interviewing, each candidate is required to participate in an “immersion experience,” a process designed to look into the heart of the candidate.

The immersion experience requires the candidate to spend four days and three nights living with the family of a Compassion-assisted child. The location selected is usually among the worst of the slum areas.

The candidate stays with the family, eats what they eat, sleeps in their home, and remains in their community for the entire time.

After the stay, the family and the church partner write a review of the experience and provide input on how the candidate related to them in their poverty. If a candidate does not pass this review by the family and church partner, he or she will not be offered a job at Compassion Philippines.

Country Director Noel Pabiona explains that the purpose of this final step is to identify candidates who truly have a heart for serving Compassion-assisted children and church partners.

“A candidate may look perfect on paper or in office interviews, but you can’t fake it in the field.”

Program Communications Manager Wendy Sebastian spent her immersion experience with a family of seven children in a small slum home. She worked with the mother breaking large pieces of charcoal into smaller pieces to sell.

Wendy shares how that experience impacted her: “Chopping and re-packing coal with Anna helped me see firsthand the difficulty and health risks she encounters every day to net 40 to 80 pesos a day ($1-2). I felt compelled to do something beyond enjoying and maintaining my privileged life. This experienced confirmed that God purposely led me to Compassion to help build His kingdom agenda and I had to obey His calling.”

Along with the hiring process, Compassion Philippines office staff who do not spend time in the field are required to participate in an immersion experience every two years to keep them in touch with the children and partners they are serving.

Wow! Now that’s on-the-job training if I ever saw it.

Working at my desk thousands of miles away from those in the field, sometimes I catch myself losing track of the reality of the ministry we’re doing. It’s easy to get swept up in the mundane routine of my daily tasks.

A radical interview experience like those in the Philippines would surely sear into the mind of any potential employee the serious and life-altering impact of his or her job.

As I was writing this, I was also working with the Compassion Philippines staff in the wake of Typhoon Ketsana. Along with thousands of our children who have lost homes, some of our staff have lost everything as well.

If you are interested in more information on this disaster, visit its crisis page. And please remember that we will contact you directly if your child has been affected by the disaster.

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Pastor Joel grew up on the remote island of Siquijor in the Philippines, which has long been known for magic and witchcraft, but Compassion in the Philippines only began partnering with churches in Siquijor this year.

Although Compassion reached the Philippines in the 1970s, we finally landed in the isolated island after 30 years!

In 2004, we began regularly updating our strategy map to identify the poorest and neediest provinces in the country with the fewest number of evangelical churches, and the list included Siquijor.

And now Joel, who has turned away from his island’s belief in witchcraft,  is pastor of the Siquijor Celebration Christian Fellowship, one of our newest church partners in the remote island province.

He has been pastor here for 15 years and vividly remembers the years when it was so difficult to share the gospel. But today, the church has led to the Lord at least 15 individuals who used to be part of the occult practices.

“There are now 32 evangelical churches in the island, and witchcraft has greatly lessened its control. We used to be known as an island of sorcery but not anymore, thanks to the gospel. And now that Compassion is here, we are excited to create more impact.”

Only a few months into the partnership, the Siquijor Celebration Christian Fellowship has seen an increase in church attendance.

“We have 100 new Bible studies for the 100 new families of our 100 registered children.” The church leaders are meeting in the homes of all the new families to hold small Bible studies.”

And Cyrene is one of the 100 Siquijorian children to be registered. She is full of potential, just as the pastor was when he was little.

Cyrene tops her grade one class with a score of 100 percent in all her tests. Many of her classmates are two years older than her because they did not have the money to go to school earlier.

“I want to be a teacher,” bubbly Cyrene says. When asked why, she insists, “I just want to be a teacher.”

Like Pastor Joel, Cyrene’s parents did not finish high school. In fact, 90 percent of the adult population here doesn’t. Rogelio, Cyrene’s father, says,

“We were so poor when I was young. I was like Cyrene before, getting good grades and all. I was also at the top of my elementary classes. I had high hopes because until high school I had good grades, so I wanted to go to college.”

Poverty, however, won and he stopped schooling when he reached the third year of high school.

“My father was a fisherman/farmer and our family subsisted with whatever little amount he could earn. He couldn’t even send me to a free public school because I didn’t have food to eat in the morning or uniform to wear.”

But with Cyrene’s sponsorship, her parents have found hope.

If not for Compassion, Cyrene would most probably end up as many of the locals here – uneducated and unemployable.

Her bouncy personality and intellectual potential would not be harnessed to the fullest. Soon she would have to stop schooling because Rogelio does not have a steady job to support her.

Both Rogelio and Merlyn are focused on their daughter’s education and future, not necessarily thinking of how historically significant it is. Little Cyrene represents a milestone in the our ministry in the Philippines:

She is the 50,000 child to be registered in the Philippines program.

Compassion Philippines has seen its programs go through several transformations over the past 30 years. And now that we have reached out to Siquijor and other similarly far-flung, hard-to-reach provinces, we look forward to registering the next 50,000 children into our programs.

Now, unlike Pastor Joel, Rogelio and Merlyn, Cyrene has a different hope for life. With her sponsorship*, she has been given a chance to follow in the footsteps of thousands of successful Compassion alumni who have gone through our programs through the years; the chance to follow in the footsteps of:

• Sarah Jane, a former sponsored child who is now a medical doctor
• Jonathan, a former sponsored child who is now an accounts manager in New York
• Bobby, a former sponsored child who is now a successful international businessman
• Erla, a former sponsored child who is now a missionary to China
• Keewani, a former sponsored child who is now a sponsor herself.

Cyrene is next in line. 

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