Great Lakes District | The Christian Missionary Alliance

Friends,

Thank you for praying for us (and for our boys) while God was blessing us with a 6 day get-away to the beaches of Phuket.  We were totally spoiled (and blessed) during this time together.  (We were also glad to return to home to our boys and see that all had survived our time apart!)  We are thinking that we need to do this more often.)  [btw - Lori is also thinking that our twins only have 2.5 more years with us before moving out and going to college - our empty nest is not far away.]

One major concern for us before I move onto other needs-opportunities….  The twins are presently in 10th grade… they have two summers before they head off to college.  We are praying-thinking-talking about opportunities to send them back to the States next summer so as to (1) build up their confidence in living in the States… (2) building friendships-relationships with other non-MK kids  (3) learning to work a real (hard) job 40-50 hours a week.  Presently there is a chance to work at a Christian camp located in Colorado…(http://www.idrahaje.org/)  This seems like a great opportunity, but we are open to the fact that there might be some other door of opportunity, or a place to send one of the twins instead of sending them both to the same camp.  If you are aware of other opportunities… we would like to hear from you.

One great thing about living in Thailand is to be apart of the Christmas Outreach that happens in this country.  For the Tribal folks, many take the whole month off (after all, the harvest season is just finished) and they use this time to travel from village to village proclaiming the Good News of Christmas.  In the Thai Churches, there are many activities planned for this season.  The GOOD NEWS needs to be proclaimed!  And for us living in the Buddhist country – there is no problem in proclaiming Christ!!!  Funny isn’t it.  In fact, in our shopping malls, it is common to hear Christmas chorus as much as other Santa related songs.

Here are some of our Doors of Opportunity…

• *  Tonight we have invited about 20 of our neighbors to come and share a meal with us at our home.  After this is over, we then want to invite them to join us in an outreach the boys’ school is putting together….  [Update.... what a great evening - almost all of the Thai neighbors we invited came and enjoyed themselves.  One of the highlights was our closest neighbor "Mrs. Walls" when she came to join us, I offered her two doors to enter the home... the main door (for Guests) or the kitchen door (for Family) - she paused to think about what I had said, and she then started walking toward the Kitchen Door!]  Please be praying….

*  The school is planning on an outreach to the whole neighborhood… last year we had more than 1,000 folks attend.

*  On Wednesday, Lori has invited 40 kids from the slums of ChiangMai to come to the boys’ school to join Miriam’s 5th grade class.  Each of the students has been assigned a kid and will be responsible to watch over them for this 1/2 day outreach event.  There will be many activities, the Christmas story will be shared, and each student has been asked to make-purchase a gift for their kid… a season to give!

*  On the 19th of December (Saturday) we now have 1750 churches in partnership to be reaching out to their neighbors through the Billy Graham “My Hope – Thailand” project.  This project is expected to impact 2-300,000 non-Christians throughout the country.  These 1,750 churches represent 40% of all Churches… this alone is incredible… to get these many churches to agree on the same goal!!! Praise the Lord… and please keep praying.

*  Tomorrow morning we will have about 40 guests over to worship together in our home.

*  Friday evening, we have a city-wide outreach.  We ‘take over’ the local British Sports Clubhouse for the evening and put on the Christmas Pageant.  Bruce has been asked to play the role of King Herod…. hmmmm, I wonder why?  Last year there was a Japanese woman sitting in the club house and watching, and shared with the pastor afterwards that this was the first time she had really understood the Christmas Story.

Here are some pictures from our dinner this evening…

We are excited for the many ways God is touching the lives of those around us…. please rejoice with us and keep praying.  After 17 some years it is our great desire to Jesus lifted up and to have a revival come across the Nation.  May it happen in our life time!

Lori and Bruce

Matt-Mark-Chip