The Buddha Fell Off!

On our way home from our holiday, we had a fender-bender. Good damage to the car I was in, but no physical damage to us. Yet the spiritual repercussions have been interesting to hear about...

The car belonged to Kieow's youngest sister, Gew. On the dashboard is a yellow bandana cloth with many Buddhist "lucky charms" sitting on it like a coin in a jewelry case, a gold Buddha, and some jasmine flowers. Above the two front seats on the ceiling of the car, three dots are painted as well as some writing which is a blessing placed on the car by Buddhist monks. And hanging on her rearview mirror are at least two jasmine flower chains and one necklace with a Buddhist idol inside. On our drive, they bought a new flower chain twice from roadside vendors. Once placed around the rearview mirror, they bowed to it and asked for blessings for their trip. As you can tell, its a religion where if you follow the right rules, live in fear of the spirits, and buy and worship the appropriate gods, you are supposed to be blessed.

Yet, on our way home, like I said, we had a fender bender. Kieow says one of the Buddha's fell off the dashboard during the accident. Huge deal! What is the meaning of this to a Buddhist person? Kieow, the only Christian in her family, would ask them that question and tell them that their god was not powerful enough to help them. Like a coward, he ran away at their time of need. Gew said she would take that Buddha out of her car and leave it in her room. Yet through this circumstance, Kieow tried to explain the trivialness of trusting in golden statues and "lucky charms" for our salvation.

Please continue praying for her family. Pray for God to open their hearts to Jesus Christ who died for their sins. God loves us and his only requirement from us is to believe in Jesus Christ and we will be saved. Not necessarily in fender-benders, but regards to our whole life and death.

Thai New Year with Kieow

Kieow's family was so fun to visit for the Thai New Year! They picked jasmine flowers from around the house and strung up jasmine necklaces for everyone. Add a "hawaiian shirt" to the outfit and we were dressed for the holiday.
The houses in the NE of Thailand are on stilts mainly and more open to the air and elements. I woke up early each morning to the roosters and went to sleep early too. All the mango, banana, and other Thai fruit trees surrounded the house! I've adjusted to bucket baths now and washed my hair successfully! Yet, it helped being the hottest month of the year!
Kieow's sister, Gew, was in the village's beauty contest for the SongKran Festival. Whoever had the most flowers bought for them won the contest, so it was quite expensive for Kieow's family!
The family had reserved their own section of the festival to party, play in the water, and dance around. What a crazy family pulling me on to dance with all the older ladies!
Everyone wanted to take a picture with the white girl! Many people had never even seen a foreigner before. Kieow's uncle gave me a bag of mangos because I was the first foreigner he'd ever seen and I could eat Thai food!
During the Thai New Year, the water ceremony is a very important part. It shows respect to the elders and allows a time to bless one another. I felt honored to be able to play a part in it. I poured water on the hands and feet of the elders in Kieow's family and received a blessing while they tied a string around my wrist.
God mightily kept me able to eat everything put in front of me, including swirly oyster shells, frogs, and really spicy papaya and mango salad!! It's amazing how much respect I can receive just by being able to eat their food. They all would just stare at me until I swallowed, smiled, and declared it "Delicious!" This lady shoved a whole spoon of spicy mango salad in my mouth right when the picture was taking, causing my eyes to water up. :)

Tough Unrest

With concern shown through emails, I felt it good to write about the political situation. I'll try to do it in a way that I can on the blog. I did just return yesterday from a great trip to Kieow's hometown from the SongKran holiday. Yet throughout the time I was there, the political situation was tough. This situation is not new, but has been happening long before I came here for this two year term. Presently, the "red shirts" are protesting against the present government. Many of the members of this group gathered together in large mobs in Bangkok and other cities this past week to try to cause upheaval of the government, which often works. It became violent in their mob risings, causing soldiers to have to come into the main city and enforce curfew for a few days. Feel free to check the news for more. The present holiday season has caused things to be simmering down some.

Please do keep Thailand in your prayers. God reassures us many times in his Word of his hand at work within powers, authorities, and uprisings. Pray that amidst this tough time for all the Thais, that God will soften their hearts to recognize their need for him. The protests have not reached our neighborhood which is located outside of downtown. Our team has been in no danger, but always do pray for our safety during these times. Thank you for your interest, prayers, and thoughts.

Thai New Year

Tomorrow, I hope all of you celebrate the Thai New Year, or SongGran. For this holiday, you should pull out all your water guns, hoses and water buckets and have huge water fights. At least that is what we do here for this three day water festival. It is a time of "atonement" in the Buddhist holidays, for everyone to turn a new leaf and "be clean." Pray for opportunities for us to share the good news of Jesus amidst this Thai holiday.

I'll be going home with Kieow today through Thursday to her parents' home about 10 hours away by car. Please pray for safety on the roads. Pray also for humility for me amidst language and other cultural things. Kieow was one of the first fruits of our ministry in Thailand, being a Christian through our English school ministry about eight years ago. She has been working for us two years in mercy ministry. Pray for her family who aren't yet believers.

And as a sidenote, this has been a tough week for me. My cousin, 13 years old, died in a car accident this past week. He was young and the news was hard. Hard to receive from across the world. Yet many heard the Gospel through this tragedy. Pray also for my health during this hottest month of the year. Struggling with fevers and strep throat already has made it a tough week. Thank you so much.

And if I Lose?

The losers of this game modeling the frog dance.The great and famous papaya salad song modeled for you by losers (yet dear friends of mine).

The key to many group games here is humiliation. With various games involving amazing acts of coordination, quick reflexes, and Thai comprehension, I inevitably lose. For example, the game of flying animals. If the leader says the name of an animal that flies, clap twice. If the animal doesn't fly, don't clap. Upon losing, I am told to go sit in the middle of the circle. After a sufficient number of victims have been picked out of the original group, all attention falls on us. We are all told to stand up together, and to dance and sing a familiar humiliating song. The choices include the frog dance, the chicken on a skewer dance, and my personal favorite, the papaya salad dance. After enough laughing and clapping, the "best performer" is voted on to sit down while the rest of the losers dance for everyone one more time. Surprisingly, I have grown to love losing and being in the middle.

I am a White Truck.

My friend in Asheville spots all the hilariously wierd bumperstickers found in our beloved city. I felt it only fair to write about one I saw in Bangkok.

Riding down the road, I spotted a black SUV with a bumper sticker stuck on the back saying "I am a white truck." "What?" I said out loud and pointed out the truck to my English students sitting with me in the car. Instead of the apparent contradiction or lack of English skills I presume that truck driver had, my friends told me a much stranger but appropriate story to Thai culture...

The driver of the truck might have gotten into an accident one day. He felt that the spirits were not happy with him causing his accident, so he went to see a Buddhist monk. The monk told him that in order to change his "luck", he'd need to buy a white truck. So, instead of buying a white truck, the guy decided he'd just buy a sticker that says "I am a white truck." to put on his black truck. So interesting, huh?

But do you know the female heavyweight Olympic gold medalist from Thailand had her name completely changed out of supposedly "bad luck." The monk she went to see gave her a new name to give her "good luck" and then she won this past year. Doesn't this story give you new light into the religious views here?

Pray for Maisie

The lovely family you see is the Tanchanapongs. They are Thai and have recently added another member to their family...Meno. Natee is a huge encouragement and support to the church plant the MTW Thailand team has begun here in Ram 2 and it was actually thru his friendship with Natee at Covenant Seminary that our team leader, Dave, came to Thailand as a missionary. A couple weeks ago Maisie (shown in picture at her first birthday last year, April 4) was diagnosed with a form of leukemia. Please keep this precious family in your prayers as they see their baby girl go through chemo and as they trust in God to do His work in them and through them. Meno, Maisie's baby brother is just six weeks old. Pray for us as a team to know how to encourage them during this time. We know we can trust God and we know He is good. May He prove Himself faithful, once again. Thank you for praying.