It's Sunday night here, after a crazy busy weekend. I'm not sure I can even remember everything we did this weekend, but I'm going to try. Warning: This post may be super long... feel free to skim, and skip anything boring.
Okay. Lets get this ball rolling!
Friday: We got to sleep in (Hallelujah!) and went over to Ekkamai with Alan at about 2 pm. We dropped off our stuff at Alan and Lynette's house, and went wandering. We had a couple of businesses that Pastor Bei asked us to go visit. One was a massage shop that one of the ladies at the church owned. None of her employees are Christians, so she asked us to come visit, and help them practice English, and get to know them. The other business was a restaurant that another lady owned, and it was pretty much the same deal. So we wandered down to the Massage Shop first, and found out that the owner wasn't there, and the employees were too busy to talk to us. So we continued on in our trek. We walked down to the little restaurant, and discovered that it was closed. Apparently, she is never closed, but Friday; she was. No big deal, we'll visit the Muslim slum! So we wandered down there, and walked around. We stopped at three houses that Alan had connections with; not a single one was home. By this time, it was about 6 pm, so we headed back over to the house, and had prayer and dinner at the restaurant downstairs. At first it was pretty disappointing; we had walked around for 4 hours, and hadn't talked to hardly anyone. None of the goals on our checklist had been accomplished. But as I thought about it, I landed on this thought. God has been in control, and has orchestrated every encounter that we have had thus far. If we didn't run into anyone that we had planned on talking to, that's okay. Because God is still in control. In each area we walked through, we prayed and asked God to bless the people that loved there, and to open their hearts to our influence, and His love. And perhaps, that Friday, that's all that God wanted us to do. So we played a game and headed to bed about 11.
Saturday:
We woke up early; about 7 am, and went on a prayer walk around Ekkamai with Alan, Pastor Bei, and a couple of students from the Bible College. We walked down Ekkamai, to Sukhamvit, then back up the other side of Ekkamai. It was pretty much the same deal as Friday, just praying for the community. On our way though, we got to see where the church is moving to at the beginning of September. I think I mentioned how small the church was... about the size of maybe 2 small bedrooms. If you go to New Life... Think about the size of the Orange Room with the storage part. That includes the stage, and everything. Cramming 30-40 people in there gets a little bit tight. So they get to move into another building that can seat 250 people, which will be absolutely amazing- the church that is there currently is also having to move due to size. It's so exciting to see how God is working in this small church, and how it is growing because of it. Anyway, I'm getting on a bunny trail. So on our walk, we stopped at a couple of businesses that are owned by church members, to pray blessing over them, and to talk to them a little bit. We ate lunch at the restaurant that had been closed the day before (amazing food!) and then continued on back home. At 2 we had our third Thai lesson, which went really well, and then went over to another Muslim slum area to teach English to some kids that live over there. There were eight kids that showed up- I think the youngest was seven, and the oldest was 12. It was so much more fun than I thought it would be. The teaching part was the thing that I was the most nervous about coming here. I was worried that I was going to suck at it; not be able to do it, not know where to start, or how to do it. But it was so much fun. The kids are super eager to learn, and had a lot of fun. Thai language only has 6 diphthongs, so English is pretty difficult for them, they always want to add vowels in. So the word "sports" turns into saports, and "spill" turns into sepill. The three of us girls were laughing because we knew that as much as these kids were struggling with the English words; that's exactly how we sound in Thai lessons. We're like 2 year olds trying to learn how speak. Can be frustrating, but Pii Wan is so patient with us. We raced out of there at about 4:45 and headed over to another missionaries house for a game night with Alan, Lynette, Tim, Duffy, Mark, Kara, Deanna, and Joyce. We ate delicious food, and got to meet everybody, then settled in for a really long game of Settlers of Catan.
Sunday:
Sunday was church, where Mark Rodli preached. After a really great service, we played guitar for a little bit and sang with some of the ladies there, then had lunch. Every 3rd Sunday, there is a youth group called "Wake Up Gang", so we hung around for that; so much fun! There were about 16-18 kids there, from 6th grade to about 18 years old. We played a couple of games, then Pastor Bei talked and one of the kids shared his testimony, and then we played a couple more games and had ice cream. Then... the fun part! We headed over to another Muslim slum, and hung out with a musician over there. He was asking us to help us translate some stuff into English, then he was explaining some of his heart and passion for his community. It is Ramadan in the Muslim world, which means fasting every day for a month, until the sun sets, and then they pray and feast together. So we were invited to go break the fast with them. As women, we weren't allowed to go into the mosque, but they had the four of us (Duffy was with us) sit right outside, and they brought us bowl after bowl of food. So sweet, and absolutely delicious. Alan and Tim were invited inside, which was quite the honor, since they were Farang, and not Muslim. There were members of the Thai Parliament there, and other higher ups. It was so much fun, just hanging out with the people, and practicing our limited Thai. They were some of the kindest, most serving people we have met yet, and thats saying a lot in Thailand.
Anywho. I'm soooo ready for bed, so good night!
Please be praying this week for:
- Good connections with people- open hearts, and open doors.
- Good health for the three of us girls- lots of bugs and stuff we're not used to!
- APSAI building to be ready- we get to move in on Wednesday if all goes well, and everybody else will get here that night!
Love ya'll! g'night,
Jessica
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