Hi family and friends,
Hope is a bit of a fleeting mindset for me. I have bursts of hope where the most dire situations seem full of potential and then settle into skepticism and disappointment. I feel that way about our community development, about our church, about my neighbors’ lives, and even about my own future. When I have conversations with neighbors and they express their opinions about the community and its indomitable problems, I adopt their hopelessness, too. When I think about a future for my kid neighbor May, who will never develop to the same level of her peers, I can’t see many options and worry about her being taken advantage of in life.
I think I’ve come to the realization that hope is essentially tension: a desire to see something develop or come to fruition but currently waiting and unsure of its certainty. This past month, I’ve felt challenged to have a more enduring hope despite what “reality” appears to be and without fear of disappointment. Like Peter, when he said to Jesus when he was on the water, “If it is you, Lord, tell me to come out to you.” So Jesus replied, “Come,” and Peter walked on water out to him until he was scared by the waves and started sinking. Jesus immediately said, “You of little of faith, why did you doubt?”
I can identify with Peter. He asked for something from Jesus, which is initially full of faith and hope, then in the midst of seeing that request actualized, he became anxious and began sinking.
One of the ongoing stories of hope and tension that I find myself constantly needing to regain hope in is in one of the families in our community: Lote (father), May and Toey. Oftentimes I get anxious about the kids’ lives - what type of future is there for a developmentally slow, poor kid raised by a single, disabled parent? Will they end up like the many teenagers caught up in drugs in our community? Will they finish school? In the past month, there have been gradual signs of hope - May’s new teacher this year is particularly sensitive and aware of May’s special ed needs and how to teach her, we took May to get tested for a learning disability and were able to take May’s adult sister along as well so she could also learn more about May’s special needs and how to help her develop, Lote started working painting houses to his ability (with his disabled leg) and is taking greater responsibility in providing for the kids, Namban (Lote’s 1 year-old grandaughter) went to live with her mom easing the caretaking burden on May, and May and Toey’s lives are getting to be more stable and we can see them growing. And today, May confessed to me, “I don’t steal anymore. Isn’t that great? I used to steal, but now I don’t.” I want to keep fighting for a future for this family and holding onto hope for them. And thank you all who have been praying for them and are advocates for them, too.
Because isn’t that what we all need? We all need someone to believe in what we can become and be an enduring advocate for hope.
Grateful for:
* Our church leaders have been building up to greater community involvement. In our most recent training, we had a chance to hope and dream for our slum communities together and brainstorm together in how to reach out to youth and help their parents and other neighbors working together to develop the youth. I’ve been particularly grateful for Neung, the church leader in our community, as he’s arranged game tournaments, cut into his own work time to teach kids after school, and has taken special interest in kids that he feels are particularly neglected. It’s exciting to partner with someone who has such initiative and a heart to love.
* Our church retreat gave us a chance to spend a long weekend together and reflect over the theme of unity. It was especially great for building new friendships and renewing old ones and see how unity could be grown in a few short days.
Hopeful for:
* NEW NEW!! Our foundation just revamped our scholarship program to be more focused on leadership development in youth. We just accepted 10 youth who demonstrated initiative in both their studies and community. We’re excited to see how these youth will grow in the coming year.
* NEWER THAN NEW!! We recently started an internship program training in slum ministry. 3 young adults from our church network committed themselves to this full-time, rigorous training and development program for the next year. I’m personally excited to mentor Yui, a 23 year-old friend-to-all and eager volunteer who hates vegetables. You can see a picture of Yui here.
(If you’re interested in supporting the scholarship or internship programs, check out the footer on this email. And for all that have supported me personally, I’m able to contribute $1000 from my account because of a surplus raised . Thanks!)
* Hey, did you know prayer is really great? I’ve recently been surprised to see how God answers prayers. Let’s try an experiment, ok? Pray for Muy, an older devout Buddhist lady in our community who told us about a dream she had where she walked into a room full of treasure and when she looked down at her hands, she noticed that her hands were pierced like Jesus’ hands. She believes that the dream means she’ll receive blessing in this life. When my teammate, Lexie, shared the story of Jesus with her as an explanation to the hand piercings, she didn’t seem that interested, but she’s been on my mind a lot lately when I pray. So, pray for her and we’ll see what happens!
waiting…
love, michelle
What next?
If you’d like to give to the Internship or Scholarship programs mentioned above, you can give through the Servant Partners’ giving site to the “Thai Peace Foundation”
If you want to know more about Servant Partners, you can go to the Servant Partners site.
If you’d like to support my work financially, you can give through Servant Partners’ giving site.
Read Sara’s November newsletter in pdf format:
Hi friends and family,
I recently celebrated my 27th birthday this past week. Having been in Bangkok a year now and celebrating my birthday has given me a chance to think back on these past 12 months and what’s been significant.
so, in mass-email-survey format are my reflections in short form.
Favorite album of last year: The Avalanche - Sufjan Stevens
Favorite book of last year: Life of Pi - Yann Martel
New Nickname: Misheep. Or Mich-ugly. (you can ask my roommate/teammate, Lexie)
Weirdest food eaten: Minced pork (”Larb”) with fire ants
Favorite food: Thai Isaan-style waterfall pork, green papaya salad and sticky rice
Most endearing attribute of Thai culture: Always getting a full, broad smile anytime I smile at someone, even if I don’t know them, yet.
Dream I had last night: Of my niece, Amelia. We were playing.
Addiction over the past year: watching 30 Rock and SNL on the internet.
Unexpected personal change: Avoiding sun exposure
Current thing I’m working on: Insecurity and the need to be good at everything.
Favorite attribute of God: Gentleness
Best realization: When it comes to God, I’m only a child and will always just be a child. God is much bigger and much more able than I am.
Moment of realizing that Bangkok is my home: Laughing with neighbors about the public example a schoolteacher made of a teenage neighbor and her noncompliant trendy hairdo. Her grandma was telling the story and how she intentionally got her granddaughter in trouble because she hated the haircut.
Grateful for:
- Great trip in the US. I had such a nice break in the US and felt like I had significant chunks of time with family and good friends. It was also really helpful to get some perspective from a distance on my life and ministry here in Bangkok. (And, I satisfied my cravings for bagels, mexican food, pasta, cheeses, and beef.)
- The week of Community organizing training we had last week with other Servant Partners staff from other sites. It was super helpful getting some more practical steps and skills in how to start getting neighbors to reflect on their lives and direct energy towards positive action. The unexpected skill I loved learning about was how to ask better questions to get at issues of depth and ask questions to inspire action.
- It seems like in our church, we are hitting opportunities to grow deeper together. It hasn’t been an easy or comfortable process, but I am hopeful that God will grow our church in maturity, loving others, and knowing God’s transformative love.
Hopeful for:
- Discipleship for our church members. During our leaders’ retreat in August, the leaders themselves identified that the issue they’d like to most focus on is how to disciple believers better. Please pray for the leaders and our team for wisdom on addressing this big and important topic.
- Wisdom in dealing with addiction and abuse. We’ve recently become aware through our community organizing interviews that they believe drugs is the biggest problem in our community (using and selling). We’ve also become jarringly aware that domestic abuse is a big issue that affects many of our neighbors and church as well. Please pray for wisdom as we figure out how to respond in both our community and our church.
- Greater networking in Bangkok. I’m personally hoping to network more in Bangkok in this next season, both in a social context and in a resource context. I need more friends!
- Personally, it’s been a rougher season for me as well, as there’s been a lot of transition in our team as well as difficult issues to wrestle over in our ministry. Please pray for me as I try to figure out a healthy, sustainable routine and rhythm in this season.
Back at home in Bangkok,
love, michelle
Read Christy’s August prayer letter in pdf format:
Read Sara’s July newsletter in pdf format:
Hi everybody,
I hope you’re having a great summer! It’s been great over here– I have a lot of good news to share!
First of all, I want to thank you so much for your prayers, interest, and investment here. Every person I have asked you to pray for has come to house church in the last three weeks. In addition to this spiritual curiousity, God has answered our prayers in visible ways! They are in bold.
Lat- (The pregnant alcoholic in an abusive marriage) has given birth to a lovely baby girl, B
ea-u (from the English “Beautiful”). She was born premature, weighing about 4 lbs., but praise God with no significant health problems. Just before and after she was born, Lat’s husband Bo visited our house church as we ate and sang together. He stopped drinking as much during this time and expressed a lot of pride in his first child. Since then, his drinking has gotten worse, as has Bea-u’s health, but Lat who has read through all the Christian materials P. Pen has given her, told us that she is “100% sure that Jesus is real”. She came to our house church for the first time last week, bringing Bea-u, ate a lot of food and was happy to be around people with such “comfortable hearts”. Please continue to pray for her family.
Pan and Randon- (Our former housemates who took us up-country for holiday) have decided to become Christians. They seem to be stable financially, at least according to P. Pan, but “have been Buddhists for a long time and not yet had a better life”. They think that Christianity might offer that, so they visited our house church for the first time last weekend to start to study and see who Jesus really is. Please pray for them and their burgeoning faith.
Jum- (The single mom who came to camp with us) was reunited with her mother and son last week after a long and rocky separation. Jum has moved back into the community, as has her family, and she is trying out a number of new financial opportunities to address problems with her house, which has water and termite damage. She is steadily studying Christianity, taking things in, and visited our house church for the first time three weeks ago. She also has been excited about teaching us about community development work, since she’s on the community council. Jum is a blessing to us. Thank you for praying for my neighbors!
In other good news, our ministry network, Santisuk Chumchon (literally, “Peace in the Slums”) seems to be at a pivotal point. We are a network of 5 house-churches in slums, as well as a foundation to aid in community development. In addition to all the good things that are happening in my slum, Samaki Patana, another American teammate, Lisa, moved in 3 weeks ago!!! Also Kevin, who founded the church network years ago, recently returned from the United States after a year of reflection, insight, and planning for the future. The foundation is at a turning point– it will be changing but it’s not been decided yet exactly how. We have a training regarding “community organizing” in September with people flying in from U.S., India, and Mexico. Within the house churches, there are rumblings; people expressing a desire for expansion, depth (esp. with the youth, and also in worship) as well as more unity. There have been a lot of questions about how to use money well. We have a leader’s retreat for the Thai leaders on August 10-12. Please pray for wisdom and unity during our retreat, also that each of the Thai leaders would be able to come, as many of them have pressing financial and family concerns.
And lastly– my life here seems to have taken a turn. Thanks for praying for my personal retreat– it was amazing! In addition to that, here are some ways my life has changed recently:
1) I have real friends here! My friendship with Pen and Bui, Christian women in my slum, has recently taken 
on a quality depth, honesty, and genuine care that I can’t stop smiling about. My birthday, which I celebrated with my teammates, Thai teacher, and Thai officemates, was a full and touching celebration where I felt really (surprisingly) well known! After such a short time here.
2) I feel really happy! As you might have seen from my emails, February through May was a rougher time for me. I was frustrated more often than not. But something happened- the air cleared, I got more fluent, hot season ended…. I’m not sure what! But I am so happy with my life right now. It might not last forever, but I’m grateful.
3) I think God is leading me into ministry that involves inner healing, counseling-type stuff. I’m not qualified as a counselor, so I know i can’t offer any answers. But God’s been leading me to listen more and more, and teaching me to ask simple questions like “What do you want?” And it’s cool because I’m seeing more chances to pray with people for whatever is bothering them inside… sometimes I don’t know what to pray for, but I trust God’s doing something. Please pray that God would give me opportunities to grow in this area, to “practice” or to learn and understand it more.
THANK YOU SO MUCH for everything! I’d love to hear from you. Contrary to recent evidence, I do love email conversation– we’ve had a zillion guests in the last months and thus i’ve been really slow about replying. But. I would LOVE to hear from you! The longer I’m here the further from my friends at home I feel… so please fill me in!
Take care and much love and gratitude,
Lexie
Read Christy’s July prayer letter in pdf format:
Thankful for a Year of Renewal
Our year of home assignment is coming to a close and we are truly thankful for how it has been a year of refreshment, renewal, and reflection. We enjoyed personal and marriage retreats to reflect on our experience and direction in life. We grew through Cynthia’s training in Stephen’s Ministry, and a class in counseling. Kevin audited classes at Bethel in spiritual direction and community development that will be helpful in our work. This has also been a time of reconnecting with churches, relatives and friends. Thanks to all of our churches that gave us such a warm welcome. We have been encouraged by many. Kevin has been visiting churches each weekend during April and May and will continue through June.
Eighteen years of experience is a lot of years to unpack. The joy of lives God has blessed and the disappointments, trials and failures we have faced all serve to teach us more about God, ourselves, and our context. Lessons that we are learning for ourselves include:
Do less and focus more;
carry less and pray more;
initiate less and follow-up more;
lead less and train more;
Above all depend less on self and more on Christ.
FAMILY NEWS
We celebrated Amy’s graduation from High School this month. She chose to attend Bethel nest fall. Josh is home after his second year at Wheaton and is spending the summer working and traveling. Jon and Lukas are making the most of their time here with friends before they return to Bangkok. This may be the last time our whole family is together for a couple of years so we value these days.
PLANS TO RETURN
We are thankful to be fully funded and able to return to Thailand. Kevin will leave for Bangkok on July 5 and Cynthia, Jon and Lukas will join him on September 1 after Amy and Josh are in college. Kevin will have time to make preparations for where we will live and will begin a transition to a new role with an emphasis on training in community development and evangelism. We are excited by the challenges that lay ahead
Please Join Us In Prayer
- Pray for discernment over where we should live that will allow us to practice and train others in evangelism and community development in a low-income community.
- Pray for the house churches in Bangkok we work with among the poor that are struggling to move ahead under their own leadership and finances.
- Pray for the time of separation we will have as a family this summer, for safe travels, and for Cynthia as she is a single parent for seven weeks.
Read Christy’s June prayer letter in pdf format.
