Weekend Away

Several weeks ago an old friend from Lubbock, TX contacted me about perhaps visiting a church that she has been involved in supporting in Northern Thailand. This last Friday Ethan had a holiday from school and with Mark being gone I thought it might be a good time to make the trek up to the new church plant in Taprang, Thailand. I asked Nok, my housekeeper to accompany me to act as my translator and her husband, Noon would be able to drive. She was so excited to visit an area of Thailand she had never seen and it would be a rare holiday for their family, along with their 4 year old son, Peem! The only catch was that they had to attend the Sunday services with me.

Along the way we spent two nights at Khao Yai National Park, the oldest park in Thailand. It was about a 500km drive. It was in the mountains of Thailand and was so nice and cool. We spent an entire day hiking through the park, about 7.5km and enjoyed the wildlife that it afforded. I was disappointed not to see any of the estimated 200 wild elephants in the park. It was funny because at the entrance to the park there is a farm with Holstein cattle, Nok and family were so excited to see black and white cattle!! They reacted somewhat like I might have to see elephants in the wild! In Thailand normally only white, Brahmas cattle are seen! It was funny!

On Sunday we finally found the small congregation of believers, we were over 1 1/2 hours late. They were so gracious and kind and waited to begin the service for us! It was embarrassing compounded by the fact that when we drove up the entire congregation was standing in front of the church on the dirt road in the heat waiting to greet and 'wai' us. It was such a blessing to worship with these Thai Christians and even though I couldn't understand a lot of the service, I did understand the joy written on their faces, their hospitality, their expressive singing, and was able to follow along with some of the scripture reading. Much prayer had gone into the day. This was Nok and Noon's first time to attend a Christian church, to hear the gospel in the Thai language from the mouths of fellow Thai's. Nok has always thought that Christianity was for westerners and Buddhism is for Thai people, it was so great for her to see otherwise. Please join me in praying that scales will continued to be removed from Nok's eyes and that God will draw her and her family to himself.

(Mark sees the surgeon on Thursday, I'll let you know the exact plans when I know them. In the meantime he is visiting family and friends in TX.)

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