Dear Church, thank you very much for your
participation by prayer and financially. By God’s grace, we had an opportunity
to make a youth camp with a mission in the South of Thailand. It was a blessing
for our youth, from two of our “Avoda” projects, to have a fellowship and serve
together through children camp and mercy ministry, helping local people in the
South. The church where we had our camp, doesn’t have children ministry
because there is no one who can lead it. We expected not a big number of
children to come, especially because it’s a Muslim area. The first day was
beyond our expectations because God brought more than 50 children and young
people, some came with their Muslim parents, two of them continued to come for the
next few days. Children were happy to participate in all the camp activities
and learn together how we can see God through creation, listen to Him, and talk
to Him. When we asked at the end who has ever been in a camp like this, and who
has ever heard about God and Jesus before, guess how many hands were up? Only
one. One boy, out of 56 children and teens said that he heard about God before.
What about the other 55 children, what about their families?
We realized, that God brought us to the right place, these
people need Jesus! Now we have a burden to pray for God to send the right
people to serve there and might be for us to visit that place more often.
Besides kids camp, we had an opportunity to serve the elderly in this church.
Most of them came to Christ after the tsunami that happened here many years
ago, some don’t have any family members who would take care of them. Thank God,
we could give some food packages to families, share about God’s love and help
some in repairing some houses. Some of our youth members also come from needy
families, but it was so nice to see them giving caring for others. When we were
leaving, we didn’t promise, but we said we hope to come again at least next
year. They are waiting. Please pray for us to do this and also for the faithful
people to come and serve there.
Our God is great! We have very good news: The new generation is not interested in drugs anymore, because most of the young people go to church!
The area where our church is located is called the “Golden Triangle”, and famous for its opium-growing past. Almost every family is affected by drugs, whether selling, using, or having someone in prison for this cause. Recently one of the families was reunited with their father after 11 years of being in prison. But the good news is: in this particular village, the new generation is not that interested in drugs anymore, because most of them go to Church! Yes, you heard this right: Most young people in our village go to church. Praise God for such a big change! A few years ago our church had only girls and ladies, and a few small boys. If you visit us now on Sunday you will see that more than half of the congregation is now boys and young men. Some are very interested in learning about God, some come with their friends, some even helping in leading worship time on Sunday’s. One of our Sunday school groups is only boys! Praise God! It’s a big field to raise these young people for God’s kingdom, who will faithfully serve Him and do His will. We can witness God’s great work and answer the prayers of many. Please continue to pray for God to lead us and give us wisdom.
Another blessing is that God brings people from different tribes. One Saturday, when we had a school at our church, one lady came and asked us to pray for her. She was willing to stay the whole time, till we finished with the children. Her request was about her health. As we talked, she said that long ago her family was Christian and then because of social pressure in the village, they turned to worship spirits. But now they decided to come back to God and leave the village where they lived. We prayed with her and invited her for Sunday Service, and she accepted an invitation. On the next day more than 10 people, that are close to her and her extended family, came to church! Some of them continue coming, we pray that God would give them courage and strength to stay strong in faith.
Thank you again for your faithful support and prayers, may God richly bless every one of you!
Ps.22:27 “All the ends of the earth will remember and
turn to the Lord,”
Dear Church, thank you very much for your faithfulness
in your prayers and support. We are glad to see God’s work here.
It was Sunday morning when we saw a new face at our church. We noticed her interest in reading the Bible and participating in worship with all her heart. She introduced herself and said that she was very happy to be here. As we learned later, Ching* comes from a Buddhist family. She heard about God from her friend and was very interested to learn more, now, when she started high school, one of her classmates was a Christian who invited her to come to church. Ching rode her bicycle for a few kilometers on hot days to get to church. One day we were taking her home after evening Bible study and she asked: What does it mean to be a real Christian? I want to be a Christian! What do I need to do? We had a good talk before we arrived at her home. She asked us to stop next to one of the houses, where she secured the bicycle and happily went home. The bicycle she was using was not hers, she borrowed it. Ching continues coming to church and Bible study. Today she asked if she could have a Bible and read it at home. She is happy to come and help with children in Sunday school. Ching wants to learn more about who God is and she hopes by helping to teach children she would learn more. It’s only God who works in the hearts of people, changing them from the inside. We also thank God for another lady, who comes with her son. She said that she learned about God before and for some reason, was not going to church for a long time. She brings her son to Saturday school and comes together on Sunday. She wants her son to know God and glad to spend time with Christians and pray together.
Praise God we started a new school year, every Saturday more than 40 children come to learn English and the Bible. We are very grateful for our local helpers who are helping in teaching and growing in service for God! We would like to tell you that every
15 $ – would be spent for a small daily snack for
children
30$ – for small monthly prizes for children
30$ – to equip teachers and helpers monthly
We appreciate
any amount of your investment! We can surely say: God provides!
Thank you
very much for being co-workers in God’s work. May God richly bless you and give
you strength and wisdom!
The Life of elderly people in our village is not easy, especially with the language barrier. Even though they live in Thailand they speak their tribal language. Some of them come to our church with their grandchildren. God put a desire on our hearts to organize a group for the elderly, where we can study the Bible in their language. This is a spoken language and doesn’t have its own alphabet. Thank God that we can use audio Bibles, listen together, and discuss what the Word says. We often use pictures for better understanding.
At this point, we have 3-5 elderly women who come every week. In the beginning, they were too shy to pray out loud, but later two of them encouraged others. As we talked about God’s love, we asked them how they see that God loves them. One of the ladies gladly answered: “I was going to Church, but it was so hard for me to hear and understand and I felt sad about it. But now God told you to come and have time with us, where we can study the Bible, Thank God, He really loves me!”
When they come and share about their life of the past week, we hear from them how other people react to them when they speak about God. “Oh, I don’t think you can go to Heaven, because I remember you worshipped the strong spirit, he will not let you go.” – and our sister answered: “My God is the strongest Spirit, and will easily take me!” These 70-year-old and older ladies are full of energy, happy, and glad to share about God with their generation and people younger than their age. Please pray for their faith to grow and be bolder in reaching others. Please pray for us to have wisdom in continuing this ministry.
Tong* was born into a big family where everything went well until his parents divorced. His parents moved to different cities. At a young age, Tong moved to live with his aunt and cousins, hoping to find acceptance there. For a few years, it was a good time, till one of his cousins got married and before moving to the house with his wife, he asked Tong to leave and to move somewhere else.
It was not easy for him to accept the new reality with all these changes. Tong was in middle school when he started to live with his relatives in a big city. During all this chaos, God was there! Not far from the place where Tong stayed, was a Church. Tong started to attend the Church and learned about the One who loves him. Tong learned to play guitar and made new friends. But it didn’t last long. After a year he needed to move and he started to live with his grandparents, where the whole family stayed in one room. His sleeping place was under the TV. God didn’t make a mistake this time either. That was the place we met Tong. He started coming to Church and made new friends. Despite all rejection in his life, God accepts him and he tries to live his life for Him. Since he loves to play guitar and joined our worship team. He shines when he plays for God. God gave him the talent to write songs. His biggest dream is that one day his family will be together.
Your prayers and support help young people like Tong, Few, Tiew, and many others, to see the love of our Lord Jesus Christ, to accept Him and grow in knowing Him more and more. When we talked with our youth we asked: How do you see your life in 5, 10, 15 years? Tong answered that he would like to be a policeman, learn the law, protect Christians and support the Church, that Og (our other young men) wants to open up in the mountains, where there are not many Christians.
OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA
During this time when young people have a lot of free time, we were able to purchase some digital learning programs, and they can come to church and learn guitar, piano, ukulele, typing on the computer, and more. They also learn the Word of God and find wisdom for the Christian life.
Thank you very much for your prayers and support, we
can see God’s hand in it.
Please pray for every young person in our church to grow in the faith and make the right decisions and for the project “letters from God” which has been created for every child to learn about the bible through the mail. Please pray for us as leaders, we need God’s wisdom and guidance.
Every Sunday, children from different houses, which are up in the mountains, are running with a great joy as they see our car entering their village. Some children already waiting in the assigned place, some running down and some up the hill trying to come on time. Some come with their Parents, some with older siblings. They come, because they want to get a letter, a “letter from God”. This is a folder with a Bible story in it, and at the end of the story are a few questions that need to be answered and then they need to drop the folder off in a special mailbox. Once a week all the letters will be picked up, checked, and on Sunday, given back with a new Story and small surprise.
As the pandemic started, we were challenged on how to continue share about God, we can’t do it online because many children don’t have devises and internet access. As we prayed, we saw God answer in making this project, which we see showed big interest in the hearts of the children. This is a ten-week program with the main Bible stories, where they can see step by step God’s plan of salvation. We are very grateful for your prayers and support, because we see how God is leading us and provides. As we read answers from children, we can tell that some children don’t have any knowledge about God, creation or theBible. Some are even using Wikipedia to answer the questions. Younger children are seeking help from their older siblings or parents, which gives opportunity for the whole family to learn about God.
Please pray for everyone in these two villages as they are reading and getting to know about the true God. At this point we have more than 70 children. Please also pray for our team, and youth to be faithful in their calling. May God richly bless every one of you!
