We are very grateful for your prayers and support for our ministry in Thailand, a country where less than 1% are Christians. Four years ago, God gave us an opportunity to build a church out of bamboo and all these years this church building was a big blessing for an evening school, Bible study groups, camps and Sunday services. As almost four years passed, we see a big need to change our bamboo to a metal construction because it’s not that strong and safe anymore. For now, we put some supporting bamboo to help it to stay stable till the nearest school break, which is at the end of September.
We are sincerely asking you to take part in this project whether by coming and helping in building or by giving financially. The material would cost around $10,000 without labor, to hire workers would add $3,000-$5,000. The good news is that at this moment we have around $4,000 and we trust that God will provide the rest as He did it before. We also need skillful men, who can share the knowledge in making this construction strong and durable for many years. If you have an opportunity to participate in this project please let us know, we will appreciate any help.
Let’s continue to make God known till the end of the Earth
Grace to you dear brothers and sisters in Christ! Thank you for being with us in this part of the World through your prayers and support!
After an active school year, we were thinking if there are enough resources for us to make a summer camp. I was praying: God, please send us a helper for the camp who can speak English and has a heart for You and children. But it seemed impossible, the camp is three weeks away and who would travel that far? Relying on God’s power we started our preparation. One week passed, and another started – nothing happened. It still seemed impossible. Impossible, but not for our God! Less than two weeks before the camp we met our new friend who is here in Thailand (in a small town next to us) to teach English, and he was very glad to help us with the camp. As he said it was a big blessing and encouragement for him, and it was defiantly God’s answer to our prayers! God has His own ways and He is never late! It was nice to work in the team with a mature Christian and to experience the power of God’s family.
That was only the beginning of the blessing because God already prepared our teens and gave them the desire to help in the camp. Seven of our teens, as young as 10, were ready to prepare activities for the camp and think how in every activity the children would learn the truth about God. More than 30 children came to the camp. They had a chance to learn how God speaks to us today and how can we talk to Him. Children would also memorize Bible verses, learn new songs, do craft have sport and fun activities. It was amazing to see our children teaching other children and sharing the Gospel with them! Our prayer and desire are to continue the camp ministry in other villages, which will help our children to grow in faith.
One of the ways to show God’s love to non-Christian families is to visit our children at home and especially on their birthdays. Their families are so grateful, you would even see tears on the faces of some parents.
Thank God for the transportation that He provided for our family. Now we have more opportunities for us to visit the children, go to church, do groceries and travel around the village.
Thank God for our trip to visit family and the church! It was a big encouragement and many lessons were learned. How great is to be around God’s people.
We are blessed and also challenged to have little ones, who come to our church. God gave us a desire and resources to make a Sunday school group for 2-4-years old, beside the one that we have 6-9 years old, where around 30 children come.
Thank God for every one of you, your prayers and support, May God richly bless you and helps you to serve Him with joy!
Please pray for:
Our teens in making the right decisions especially as they are growing older.
Some of our children who left to work or study in big cities, that they would find a church and have a desire to continue growing in Christ.
Wisdom for us as the leaders to raise future leaders for Christ.
The new school year and all the children who will come to learn about God
Dear Church! Thank you very much for your prayers and support! God is faithful He helps us to continue!
“And howcanthey believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And howcantheyhear without someone preaching to them?“Romans 10:14
Can you imagine living in a world with little understanding of what is going on around? Hear the sounds, words, not able to read on your own and speak a language that not many people around can understand? This is the life of many elderly people in our tribe, and many other tribes who live in Thailand. The young generation speaks Thai, not many are using the Mien language anymore.
God put a desire on our hearts to visit the elderly people in our village to show them the love of Jesus and His care. Our challenge was to communicate with them. The vocabulary that our children use is enough to greet and ask simple questions, but not to translate the songs that we sang about God. This particular lady was very touched that we came to visit her, and her eyes were happy when children tried to speak Mien to her, but we realized that she didn’t understand what we were singing about. When we turned on a Christian song in Mien for her to listen, she was happy and excited. She held the phone close trying to hear every word of the song and said: “I will give it back to you when you will go home”. She was desperate to hear and understand. Can you imagine living in the world with a little understanding of what is going on around, being spiritually blind? They are worshiping spirits, bringing sacrifices to them and trying to please them. Yes, many elderly people in our tribe don’t know God and what did He for them. They need to hear the good news! This is one of the ways we can do it.
Thank you, everyone, who is supporting this project, because now we can give not only small present of some food and towels or pillows but also to put God’s Word and some available Christian songs in the Mien language on a small device and share it with the elderly who live in our village. As our children are practicing songs and prayer in Mien, we are asking you to pray for the elderly in our tribe – that their hearts would be ready to hear the Gospel as we continue to visit them.
This month is also the last of this school year and we had a get-together on the last day in our school before the summer break. Some children who came have very special life stories, and some of those we would like to share with you.
Vigo, is a little boy, whose grandma brings him on an old bicycle to school. She is very glad and thankful that he can come and learn. Every Sunday this boy comes way earlier before the church starts.
Aan, is a four-year-old boy, who is living with his grandma, and often making troubles in the neighborhood. When we brought him to the church, the first half an hour he was very quiet, and probably analyzing what is going on and why do these people look happy when singing songs. He really enjoyed playing with the boys and having a snack. He listened to the Bible story with other the children and we saw his interest. At the end when his grandma came to pick him up, she was very thankful that he was able to spend this time at the church and was glad seeing him behaving very well. One of the Sundays she said: “Aan really likes to come here and reminds me when Sundays are approaching”
Atua is another boy who is living with his grandma because his dad is in prison and mom got married to another man. Atua is a happy and smart boy who keeps on coming to every evening school and doesn’t miss a single church service where he learns a lot about God.
“When Nok Young started to learn with you, she became more confident and happier in learning another language.” – said her mom. She also learned how to pray and does it daily now since then.
And there are many other names and stories of children who need to continue to learn about Jesus and how to follow Him. We would like to invite you to join us for the new school year and If God is touching your heart and calling you for the long term, you would take a significant part in continuing helping these children grow in Christ.
Please pray:
For our summer camp, the team and every child who will join.
For the elderly at our tribe and outreach program with them.
For our health as air pollution reached a new high in the last few months.
For God to send the right people here for the long term.
May God richly bless everyone, of you as you follow Him!
Last month was very active for us, thank you very much for your prayers, encouraging emails and messages; they were always at the right time. It is great to see how God sends His help and encouragement through His people!
We had a very blessed time during our outreach program. It was a snow party! Right here in Thailand, even though only a few people saw snow in real life, they were happy to learn more about it. Some of the main verses were: ”Wash me and I will be whiter than snow. He directs snow to fall on the Earth…” and God’s word doesn’t return empty. We had a special prayer at the end, and we asked God for His blessings for this New Year. More than 100 people came to this event. Children with their parents were able to hear the Gospel, learn it during games and some of them even memorized Bible verses.
One evening we shared that Jesus loves little children, He listens and answers their prayers too. As soon as children were asked to share their stories, one hand was raised first. It was an eight-year-old boy, who lost his father last year and has since been living with his mom. His voice was not that strong and it seemed like it was very important for him what he wanted to say. ”The other day my mom didn’t have money, and I prayed to God to send us some. Next day someone gave my mom 200thb ($7). God has answered my prayer!” Another little girl said: “It was a rainy day and my mom was driving a motorcycle, I prayed that my mom would not get sick, and everything was well with her.” God is great indeed!
God not only answers the children’s prayers, but He also gives good things even before we ask. On the yard sale, we found one pair of roller blades for our children. You cannot imagine how happy they were when we brought them: “Wow, God gave us not only roller blades, but also the right size, almost all of us can wear it!” Yes, more than 20 people are enjoying it every day. Another girl said, “I really wanted roller blades for my birthday, and didn’t think it’s possible to have it” God is showing His kindness even through little things like these.
Please pray for:
Wisdom in sharing the Gospel in the hospital with sick people. Some are from other tribes and there is no chance to communicate with them, except praying for them.
Spiritual growth of our children and teens, their non-christian families.
It was one of the evenings when we talked with children on how we cannot measure Gods love with a measuring cup, scale or time because His love is beyond our understanding and is immeasurable. We asked the children; how do they know that God loves and cares for them? They were thinking about it and couldn’t really explain it, then few of our older girls (13-14 years of age) took their courage and shared how God shows His love to them through answered prayers “God is helping me in school … It was hard for me to learn to play musical instruments, but I asked God to help me and now I can play guitar and ukulele in Church. Before I was very scared especially at night, when we moved here, I started to come to Church and learned about God and, now when I am scared, I pray to God and I am not scared anymore.” You might think: Such childish testimonies, what is so special about them? The amazing thing about this is that not that long ago, these same girls were very shy to pray out loud in a small group of three, and now they are glad to stand and share about God’s love in their life in front of 50 children!
In addition to it, when they are asked to pray at the end of evening school, they are not shy anymore and their voice is strong enough to be heard by all the students. Praise be to God!
When you experience God’s love, you cannot stay the same! One of our teens shared: “From the time I was little, my mom encouraged me to go to church in order to get some help for school uniform and supplies, also it was nice to have a good meal together with my friends every Sunday. My family is not Christian, so everything that I learned about God was in Church. I should say that I was not serious about reading the Bible or praying on my own. Later, when I grew up, I went to Bangkok with my sister looking for a job during our summer break. My sister encouraged me to take a Bible with us. At that time, we didn’t find anything but had plenty of time to read the Bible and pray, we asked God to provide a job for us, and God answered! We found a job and not only for that year but the next 3 years. This experience helped me to see God as my personal Helper, and later as my personal Savior.” This person is one of our main helpers in the ministry now. Glory be to God!
Every Sunday, church life starts early in the morning, a group of teens is preparing lunch for church, another group of young children is wiping and preparing our room for Sunday service, there are also few ladies who are cleaning the property outside and they are being accompanied by the singing of worship songs, by teens who are preparing for the Church service. Not long ago, there were only a few people, who cared about all these things, God is working in the hearts and is encouraging to participate in His work. Praise God!
We also had an opportunity to visit children in other projects of Avoda. Together we studied first chapters of the book of Proverbs. We learned about wise and foolish decisions and that the beginning of wisdom is the fear of the Lord. It was such a blessed time to worship, play, learn and work with other children who believe in God, and to have fellowship together. As we were saying goodbye, there were many tears and hope to see each other again. For some of them, it was the first time seeing other Christians of their age.
Please pray:
ForNok-Young youngest brother, who has problems with walking and hearing. This is a Buddhist family; whose daughter comes to evening school and really believes that God can help.
For Ing and Gick as they are teaching children to understand the Bible and also help out in evening school
For Eak, Sen and Meak spiritual growth. These three boys are helping us out a lot.
We are very grateful for your support and prayers! God is answering your prayers and pouring His blessings on us!
One evening a few of our girls came to me and they had a surprising request. They were invited to participate in a special ritual with other young girls, and since they now believe in Jesus, they were not sure if this is something, they should be involved in. They explained that is a special ritual for young and beautiful virgins who are invited to someone’s house (those people who organize this ritual) and those people serve them for a few days. Feeding, caring, providing for all their needs and wants, during this time and they are not permitted to do any work, except participating in the ritual. This was a dilemma for our young girls, and Nai, one of them who had the courage to ask me: “Teacher, tell me, Yes or No, and I will do what you’ll say! Should I go?” It sounds like a fun activity, but later we found out that this is a ritual to prepare young girls as ”wives for the spirits”. Yes, for the spirits. Now it doesn’t sound like fun anymore. I asked: “When you do this, who are you worshiping to?” Satan – was Nai’s answer.
“What do you think now, would you still like to do it?” This question made her think. Later, that evening, Nai said that she will not go and participate in this ritual, even encouraged other friends not to do it either. Two days later, when we had a bible study and shared our blessings from the past week, this topic was one of the blessings, Nai was one of the first ones who wanted to share: “I am very glad I didn’t do the ritual, I thought about it and I want to worship God, not Satan!”
Another example of how our children show their faith is in school is that every day they start and finish school with a special prayer to Buddha. Now, since some of our girls are in middle school, they are supposed to be an example for younger children and were asked to teach and show how to pray and bow before Buddha in front of the whole school. The whole school is watching, and if they don’t want to do it, then they face serious consequences. The teacher said: “In our school everyone does it!” In the Asian culture, the word of the teacher is powerful, and shaming is often being used to make children obey. Nobody wants to be shamed in front of the whole school or even spanked. That was not an easy decision for Meek (one of our girls), when it was her turn to go up front, all the thoughts and the truth that she learned in Church were coming to her mind, but the word of the teacher was fearful and strong. She went up front and followed the teacher instructions, but when the turn came for another of our girls and she was faced the same questions, she went upfront but refused to follow the instructions of the teacher.
These are just a few examples of what young Christians are facing here. There are questions that come up again and again: Yes or No? Is this right before God? Will it please Him?
Our mission is to guide these young souls from the very beginning, so as they grow in faith, they would be ready to make the right decisions on their own.
“I really want to be closer to God!” – was Sen’s answer, when he was asked: “What is your biggest wish?”
God is working in the hearts indeed, and our prayer is for these teens to become strong followers of Christ!
Please pray with us:
For our children to be strong in faith even when their families don’t support them.
Thank you for the good news from our children who finished school and are now in universities, and that they found a church there and continue to grow in their faith
