People Series: Part 4

 

One Sunday morning, just after the preparatory prayer time before the service, one of the ladies from the church approached Keith about going to pick up some kids from a nearby neighborhood. Keith was busy, preparing his heart for the upcoming service and getting ready to preach the sermon. However, he decided to follow whatever God may be doing and take her to go pick up these kids. 

Although, he decided to trust God and go, that didn't mean that he wasn't a little bit skeptical, 

"Are there going to be any kids when we drive there?"  

"Is this even OK with the parents?"    

"Do the kids actually want to come to church?"    

Trust despite understanding

How many times have you heard or quickly recited Proverbs 3:5-6? As a child, it is usually one of the first verses that you memorize. And while it is a wonderful verse to memorize and tuck deep into your heart; knowing it from such a young age often causes us overlook the powerful message contained in these two verses.

Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not on your own understandingIn all your ways submit to Him, and He will make your paths straight. (Proverbs 3:5-6  NIV)

We all know that we need to trust in the Lord. And we try to, for the most part. But the trust that the author is talking about here is trusting in the Lord through situations that don't make sense. He writes, "lean not on your own understanding."

This is where I begin to struggle. I ask myself, what does it mean to trust God through my understanding? And what does it mean to not lean on my understanding? I don't think that I am the only one who has a hard time trusting in God when I can't understand what is going on.

But that is what we are being instructed to do. To place our trust and faith in God despite our circumstances and despite what we think should happen.

Then the author instructs us to submit our ways to God and He will make your way straight. I like the way the NIV translates this verse. I feel like it really speaks to my heart. We must submit our plans, our hopes, our dreams, our visions; so that He will lead us down straight paths.

We only have three more months in Thailand before we return for our one year home assignment. Our prayer for these last three months is that God would use us to do His ministry in ways that are beyond our understanding. We know that God is faithful and loves the Isaan people. We long to submit ourselves to Him, so that God alone would direct us and this ministry.

Please pray with us for the various ministry outreaches and evangelism that will take place over these next three months. Please pray that God would continue to draw the Isaan people to Himself and that we would be faithful in our ministry here until the very end.

Thank you for your faithful prayers and support.

People Series- Part 2

Next in this series is our friend Joom.

From the time Joom was a teenager, she lived a devout Buddhist life. She followed all the right rules and was always looking for ways to do good deeds. She even became a strict vegetarian, so she would not receive any bad karma for eating any killed animals (since that's a sin in Buddhism). She followed the ways of her family, specifically her Grandmother, in trying to live a pure life. But she felt empty inside, and could never be perfect.

People Series-Part 1

We are really growing in our friendships and connections here in Isaan, Thailand. So we thought that it would be nice to use this space over the next couple months or so, to share about the people who are impacting us. We hope this will be an encouragement to you and help you get a better picture of our life and ministry in Northeastern Thailand.


The first person we want to share about is John.

John is from a small town about 80km from the city where we live.

He became a Christian when he was 20 years old. His friend's sister was a strong Christian and was faithful to share God's love and the gospel with him. It took two years of her inviting him to church before he finally decided to go.

Return to prayer

As of the last month or so, we have felt especially compelled to seek the work of the Lord more diligently through prayer for the nation and peoples of Thailand. It goes without saying that we have been praying for the ministry, peoples, and Christians in Thailand for more than 3 years now (since being assigned), but we did not have a solid system or routine that ensured we were covering our Thai friends, neighbors, churches, ministries, cities, and country in diligent daily prayer.

Growing Surprises

So it is official, our yard is awful. The soil is dry, hard clay, which makes it nearly impossible for us to grow grass, or a garden, or much of anything really. When we first moved to our home in Sakon Nakhon, we poured everything we could into making it work. We fertilized it, dug out countless stones and rocks, added new soil, planned seeds, planted plants and flowers, watered it, we did everything within our power to change our yard. But nothing seemed to worked.

Paid In Full

Here is an excerpt from our most recent quarterly prayer update, please let us know if you are interested in receiving this newsletter...

We are overwhelmed by all those who have reached out to us and supported our vehicle fund financially.

We are thrilled to announce that our truck has been paid in full!!! 

Vehicle Update

We wanted to update you all on our current situation regarding our vehicle.

As of the beginning of December we had raised 59% of the support needed to purchase our truck. We feel so grateful that we were able to make this much progress. We knew that we would be without a vehicle to use for ministry at the beginning of the new year and as we have mentioned before, there will be a new tax placed on vehicles starting January 1st which would significantly increase the cost of new vehicles. Therefore, we decided to move forward and purchase the truck.

We feel so grateful and blessed to have this vehicle to use for our ministry in Isaan. However, we still have 6900 dollars to raise.  Please prayerfully consider supporting our vehicle fund.

Thank you so much to all who have helped us get this far!

Merry Christmas and May God bless you, especially this holiday season.

New Season

The rice fields on our drive from Sakon Nakhon to Si Songkhram

We are now settled in to our new home in the northeast and have already become quite active and plugged in to various ministries in this area. Keith is already involved in preaching and teaching in Si Songkhram and at some of the surrounding churches. As an outreach into the communities, he will also be teaching English at the church, and he has been invited to teach English at the local high school once a week. I am teaching children's Sunday school at the church and also will be working to start monthly free health clinics out of the church. Besides this we hope to do many outreaches in the town and surrounding villages, and be involved in evangelism and discipleship of the local believers.

Moving Day

Earlier this week, we moved out of the third place that we have called home since we made our big move to Thailand. We spent a week or so packing and preparing for this move. Which by the way, has gone the smoothest out of probably all 9 or so moves that we have made since getting married 7 years ago. 

Moving means more transition and change. And change comes with both excitement and fear of the unknown.

We are so excited about this new change. We are so excited to settle into a new home and neighborhood, to begin new ministries, to make new friends and start new traditions.

Aside from the actual moving, we know that we have a lot of other transitions coming our way in these next few months or so as well.

We are transitioning:

• 

  chicken in our new yard

  from full time language study into full time ministry
  

  We will be helping out at a small church in the city we are living in, helping out on a church planting team in a small village about 40km away, teaching English in various locations throughout the province and praying about what else God would have us do to minister to this region
• from Lauren having a full time nanny to Lauren and mama having time together.
• from one child to two
• from the big bustling city of Bangkok to a fairly small city/town
• from a condo/apartment to a house with a yard

We feel so grateful for this new season and all of these new changes that we are and will be entering into and we are just so amazed by God's goodness to us in this time.

We often feel that we go from one extreme to the other. Either we are struggling through barely able to keep our heads above water or we are standing at the top of the hill in amazement of the beautiful view.

God has blessed us with so much and we are just so grateful to Him for all these blessings.

the lake near our new home (about 10-15 minute walk)

checking out the new playground

Upcoming Assignment

Our placement/assignment has officially come in...we will be working in the Northeast region (Isaan), Lord willing, we will be moving in August.

Our heart and hope has always been to work among the most unreached people groups and we will have an opportunity to do so in this region. We will be working in an area called Si Songkhram with another missionary couple, the Kues. The area has about 5,000 people and no church.  The Kues have found a building and are starting to meet.

The Kues

The building for the church

We are very excited to see how God will use us in this next step of our journey.

Keith just took a trip up to the area for a day to meet some of the church members and to look at a house for us to move into. We feel so blessed to have found a home for rent in the region.

The house that we will be moving to

So, here's how you can pray:

• Please pray for us as we finish up language study. Pray that God would use us as we continue to speak into the lives of those in our community. Also please pray for the church that we are currently serving at in Maha Chai. Please pray that God would use us to encourage the believers there, that He would strengthen the church body and draw more people to Himself in that region.

• Please pray for the area we will be moving to as well, Si Songkhram. Pray for the small group of Christians there. Please also pray that God would prepare the hearts of those that we will have the opportunity to share His love with in that community. 

The downtown :)

And how you can support us specifically:

• We feel so blessed to have received a car that has been passed down from multiple missionaries, but we know that it will not last forever (since it has over a 160,000 miles on it and is about 20 years old). It is also a sedan, in a region that would be better suited for a truck/SUV due to the dirt roads/rural conditions. Vehicles are not included in our basic GCF support fund. If you would like to contribute financially to our vehicle fund you can click on this link, http://www.cmalliance.org/worker/neigenfind-keith-sarah. Since we will now be living in a rural region, public transportation will not be very accessible.

• Please consider supporting us financially though the Great Commission Fund (GCF). We feel so grateful for the opportunity to learn and serve in Thailand and if you would like to partner with us in this journey you can click on this link, http://www.cmalliance.org/worker/neigenfind-keith-sarah. Every amount is a blessing. 

Thank you all so much for your sacrifice and prayers. We appreciate you so much!


P.S. for more specific instructions on how to support us financially please click on the Partner with us  tab above

A Week in the Life

We had an opportunity to do a home-stay with a Thai family for five days out in the rural area of the country (called Bua Yai). Our host family was amazing and we felt so welcomed and connected to them right from the start.

Our main objective was to practice speaking Thai (every waking hour of our day) and that objective was most certainly met.

our afternoon snack

 



However we walked away with so much more than just practicing our Thai. We learned about life, culture, parenting styles, that frogs find Lauren's shoes very cozy, how to make new Thai meals, that certain bugs are actually pretty good (when fried), that God is doing amazing things in “our” community, and that He has an amazing plan for His people in this region.

Cell group meeting and dinner

Practically speaking, during our time with our host family we had the opportunity to visit various members of the community, attend cell group meetings, participate in the Sunday church service and so much more.

It was such a blessing to hear the stories of God's work in their lives. From hearing testimonies of miraculous healings, to seeing God's sovereign provision in their lives, to seeing the fruit of past missionaries' labors in this region, we left feeling so encouraged.

 

It is clearly evident that God is doing some great work in this community. Please join us in praying for the Thai believers of Bua Yai and those throughout Thailand.

Northeastern Thailand

It is hard to believe that the second month of the new year is almost gone. We have been pretty busy here traveling and studying. We have definitely not been as consistent as we would like to be in the blogging department (sorry about that, I suppose we should have made that one of our new year's resolutions).

Anyways, we would like to share with you about some of the traveling that we did back in January. We had the awesome opportunity of traveling around the northeast area of Thailand (called Isaan). We spent about a week visiting some of the missionaries, seeing the churches, and getting a better understanding of the region as a whole.

Church just outside the city of Surin

We were so encouraged and inspired by the work that is going on in Isaan. The missionaries currently working there are doing a great variety of projects: church planting in both city and rural settings, assisting with work at a children's home for young girls who are risk for falling into the sex trade industry, working at the bible school (Northeastern Bible Seminary-NBS), managing and assisting with leadership development, and so much more. 

Lauren playing with some of the girls from the children's home--Remember Nhu in Sida

In one the villages we visited--harvesting silk worms

While there is new growth in this region, it is also a very dry and difficult land. There are some provinces with hardly any Christian presence at all. Our heart's desire is to one day serve in this area and take the Gospel to the regions that have little to no access to the good new of Jesus Christ. 

http://estar.ws/statistics-maps/christian-presence-map-new/    Check out this link to see a current map of the percentages of Christians in Thailand--from eStar Foundation

Please pray with us for this region and country and all those who are hurting and lost without the love of Christ.

In front of the Thailand Christian & Missionary Alliance office

In the meantime we are still working hard everyday to learn the Thai language. Some days are encouraging (the Thais will even complement our speaking abilities—although I think they are just trying to be nice) and there are some days where we feel like we are fighting a losing battle. Please pray the Lord would help us to learn Thai well.

Thank you for all of the support and encouragement you have shown us.