It has been an uneventful month in many ways. Go to school...come home and study...go have dinner...study some more and go to bed. That is our routine for many of our days. Spliced throughout the week, however, are some wonderful opportunities for ministry and well as some R and R every now and then.

I finished module 4 and will spend the next month with a private tutor, working primarily on my speaking and listening skills. Kay is in the middle of module 4 and will continue her work with her tutor. We study with khruu Satorn. He is a very talented young Thai with exceptional patience and understanding.

One short story to share with you. As I have mentioned before, as I was growing up, I heard from people time and time again that there are untold millions of people throughout the world who have never heard the name of Jesus. When I heard that statement, it was hard get my mind around such a statement.

However, we meet people all the time who will very honestly tell us they have never heard of Jesus and know nothing at all about Him. That statement still boggles my mind. In America, there seems to be a church on every corner, religious TV and radio shows, newspaper articles, bookstores, etc. and etc. Bottom line is this - in the states, anyone who wants to know who Jesus is has fairly easy access to the truth. However, in most places throughout the world, such opportunities are very limited.

In our city of 15,000,000 people, the largest evangelical churches would be considered tiny compared to some of the large churches in America. It is still difficult to fathom that less than 1% of the people in Thailand claim Jesus Christ as their Savior.

In our Bible study class last week, our teacher asked if everyone in our group knew who Jesus was. One 29-year old man raised his hand and said that he had never heard of Jesus - He didn't know who He was. Every single time I hear someone utter that phrase, I am again reminded why we are here and we thank the Lord for the opportunity to share the message of hope that can only be found in Jesus.

A Time of R and R

The political unrest seems to have abated, at least for a little while. The red shirts and the yellow shirts seem happy to pursue their agenda in Parliament and not through massive protests in the streets. That is good news to everyone. The latest 'comers' on the scene are the blue shirts. These Thais have a desire for all the unrest to end and hopefully will work as silent moderators between the reds and the yellows.

During our break, several of us spent some time on a day tour. We went to the floating market, the Rose Garden, the Crocodile and Elephant Show, as well as a few other stops along the way. It was a good time of R and R from the rigors of school.

Kay and I had a surprise blessing last Sunday morning during Bible Study. We attend the English speaking Bible Study class at New Vision Church. Besides the teacher, we are the only farangs (foreigners) who attend. Though it's main focus is teaching the Word, it has a secondary goal of teaching English. So, several of the participants are not believers in Jesus but come for English study.

A young man attended for the first time last week. He is in his mid-20's and is a soldier in the army. We were reading the story of the feeding of the 5000. To be honest, having heard that story numerous times in my life, I listened without paying much attention. When it was the young man's turn to read, he read it in total amazement and then posed some questions to his friend to discover if the story was actually true. You see, he had never heard it before and was in awe of the miracle. He didn't have to say anything - his wide eyes and dropped jaw said it all!

Sometimes the Lord has to hit us between the eyes with a board to get our attention. This past week, He used the simple story of the feeding of the 5000 to remind me that the truths in the scripture are never too old or simplistic to attract someone's attention.

I'll be watching this young man in the future weeks just to be reminded of beauty of simple, childlike learning. Pray with us that this young man will understand the deeper things of God and have a desire to turn to the truth found in Jesus.

Bangkok protests

Just thought I'd take a moment to get everybody up-to-date with the protests and all in Bangkok and let everyone know how we're doing.

First off, as some have asked, it is true that our apartment is near the epicenter of the clashes between the government and the red shirts so we have 'hunkered down' in our apt. and will do so for the next few days. At the same time, our apt. is a couple of hundred yards off the main street so we feel very safe and secure and do not anticipate any trouble near our apt. but it is always prudent to take precautions for it truly is an extremely volatile situation. Even as I update this blog, there are some physical clashes between the red shirts and the yellow shirts just down the road with volumes of smoke coming from fires that have been set.

We took the skytrain past Victory Monument this afternoon and saw a number of barbed wire barricades manned by government soldiers blocking off most entrances to the monument. This is where the main conflict occurred these past couple of days. It is apparent the government is not going to let the monument become a staging point for the red shirts again. In speaking to some who have been here a long time, we have come to realize this situation is different from earlier incidents and that is causing some alarm...for expats as well as Thais.













The above pictures were taken from the same exact spot. The picture on the left shows what traffic usually looks like and the picture on the right was taken today in the middle of the afternoon, which is always a very, very busy time. The Thai New Year has taken a lot of people out of town but there is still concern and, apparently as seen above, a lot of people are not going outside.

But, on the other hand, Songkhran is going on albeit with a somewhat subdued festive spirit. Click on the file below to see where all the people actually are!!!



Songkhran is a water festival that commemorates the Thai New Year. People roam the streets with water guns, seeking to douse whoever might come their way. Young people drive around in the back of trucks with 55-gallon drums filled with water with which to saturate those standing next to the road. It is all taken in good fun and everyone knows that, if you dare walk the streets in Thailand during Songkhran, you are inviting yourself to become a water target!

What a paradox. Water guns or government guns. Laughing outloud with glee or screaming with explosive anger. A choice between frolicking with either family or fanatics.

The truth, however, is that this situation is no surprise to the Lord. It is our hope and prayer that the He can take this challenge and turn it into an opportunity...a time when the Thai people will reevaluate what is really important in their lives and, those who have been made aware of the grace of the Lord, will turn to Him.

Pray for Thailand and the future of the people we have learned to love so very much.

What a difference a month makes...

To catch everybody up, this past term I started module 4 (reading and writing short vowels) at Union Language School and Kay started working with a private tutor reading and writing long vowels. Both of us have discovered unique challenges to our learning curve and we both will have to really 'buckle down' to get the language learned. So...that has been the 'sum toto' of our past month.

I had the opportunity to spend part of Friday afternoon with Tony, an Australian who has lived in Bangkok for the past 7 years. He is a street preacher who, though witnesses to everybody, has a real heart for people visiting Thailand from the Middle East - Iran, Israel, Pakistan, etc.

While he preached in Thai at a bus stop, I walked through the crowd passing out tracts. We did that for about 30 minutes. After that, we went into MBK, a really, really big 7-story mall and just 'cruised' the hallways, filled with throngs of people, many of which are tourists. He could spot somebody from the India or the Middle East and pretty well determine what country they were from just by looking at their physical appearance. When he approached them and asked what country they were from, he was usually right. At that point, he would pull out a tract in the language of the speaker, be it Hebrew, Arabic, Hindi, or whatever. Believe it or not, most of the time, the people took the tract, shook his hand, and thanked him for the gift of the tract. Really, really cool.

I want to spend the rest of this blog sharing the story of a young, dynamic man named Tong. Here is a picture we took last week. (For those of you who have forgotten what I look like, Tong is the guy on the left.) He is from northern Thailand. He moved to Bangkok and became a drug dealer...and he was very, very successful. He became a very wealthy man. However, Thailand has extremely strict drug laws and, when he was arrested, he was imprisoned with little hope for his future.

It was in prison he started singing in the prison choir and heard the story of Jesus for the first time. After hearing the Good News several times, the truth slowly began to sink into His heart and mind. He prayed one night, "God, if You are real and can somehow get me out of this prison, I will spend my life serving You." Realize, however, that, at that point, he had little hope of parole.

One day, a short time after that, he heard an announcement come over the loud speaker, asking for Tong to come to the front office for his release. Knowing that there were several thousand imates in this particular prison and, in that Tong is a rather common Thai name, he thought the announcement was being made for someone else.

A little while later, the announcement was made again but Tong chose to ignore it. About an hour later, the prison warden approached Tong and said, 'Why didn't you come to the office when your name was called,' said the warden. 'We have papers for your parole. Don't you want to be released?'

At hearing the news, Tong literally ran to the front office, not believing the news he had been given and, sure enough, someone, somehow approved his early release from prison. (Though, to us, we know it God's response to a specific prayer request.)

After leaving the prison, the immediately went to his parents home to tell them the wonderful news but they did not believe him. They thought he had escaped from prison and would not unlock the front door to let him in for fear of the authorities.

Having nowhere else to turn, he sought out the House of Blessing, the church that, as a part of the Thailand Christian Prison Ministry, was instrumental in his decision to become a believer in Jesus.

(As an aside, when an inmate who has become a Christian in prison is paroled, he can move into the halfway house at the House of Blessing and live for up to 6 months until he gets and job and finds a place to stay. )

So, Tong settled into the halfway house, very unsure of his future. As time passed, it became apparent God had some specific plans for Tong and his wife. He, in essence, became the halfway house administrator and oversees the care of the parolees who choose to stay at halfway house during their reintegration into society. He has been in this position for the past several years.

Here was a man, tagged with an extremely long prison sentence, who took the Lord at His word and prayed, believing God could do something miraculous. And, when God answered, Tong was faithful and did exactly as he had promised, serving the Lord at the House of Blessing to be a minister to others. What a wonderful testimony of God's grace in a dear man's life.

Just a day on the farm...

I remember a day several years ago when we were visiting with some church members who raised chickens to show at the Eastern New Mexico State Fair. (They could potentially read this posting so I won't say anything about how funny those particular chickens looked with the feathers on the top of their head resembling an inexpensive whisk broom!!! ) They took us out to the chicken coop and proudly showed us the nests, filled with all their prized flock. I was watching some of the chickens as they were strutting around in the dirt, using their talons to poke around the clods, looking for something to eat. I vividly remember us talking about the marks the chickens made in the dirt as they 'scratched around.'

Funny thing is that a lot of the letters we are learning to write as we learn the Thai alphabet look a lot like some of those chicken markings! Many of the Thai letters are actually kinda' fun to draw. They are very fluid and cursive in style. The hard part is that there are a lot of exceptions to the rules and then there are exceptions to the exceptions, and, in one case, an exception to an exception to an exception! Go figure...

We have been blessed with a number of beautiful new friends. Several have stepped forward and volunteered to help us in any way they can to help us try to master the language. I've included a couple of pics of our some of our special friends. The first of is Ta. She works at the Baptist Student Center and is one of our main language tutors. We attend Friday Night Live each week at the BSC to make friends with young Thai students and encourage them with their English language learning. (And, if you're wondering...yes, we do enjoy talking to people in a language we can understand!!!) She is a precious young woman with a vibrant faith and love for the Lord.

The next picture is of Nittaya Chang. We worked with her extensively in 2005 when we spent time teaching at the Seminary in Bangkok. She and her family have become very dear friends to Kay and me. The first time we attended the church they started, there were about 12 people. Here is the picture of the church taken during the Christmas celebration. Look at the growth! How exciting it is to be blessed by the Lord in such a beautiful way.











We're in the picture above. See if you can find us...kind of a 'Where's Waldo?' challenge.)

Here's a picture of our current class. We have students in the class from Portugal, Mexico, Japan, Russia, Korea, Boston, California, and the Land of Enchantment. It is quite an eclectic group. We will be finishing our current module this week and will have to prayerfully make some decisions about the next one - whether to move on or take this one again, in that it is so difficult. So we would appreciate your prayer support in this endeavor. Otherwise, life for us is fairly mundane. Go to school, come home, study, go to bed and get up the next morning and get ready to go to school again. But, please know, we are so truly blessed to be where we are and are thankful to all who support us through their giving to the Cooperative Program and the Lottie Moon Christmas offering. Your love and support make all this possible. Bless you for your encouragement and prayerful.