Monday, 17 August 2009
it has been a week since i came to Ban Chang. i won't say i have gotten used to life here yet, but everything is fine for now. in the span of one week, and by God's grace, i managed to make friends with the Thais here, including children, youth, adults in church, and teachers at the childcare centre. they have really helped me to feel comfortable and ease into the Thai way of life. maybe it's the culture, but i have not received any criticisms of any sort for now. not that i receive a lot in Singapore (!), but i guess i got used to having constructive comments coming my way before coming to Thailand. it's true that generally Thais have a "mai pen rai" (never mind) attitude, especially towards people from other countries, but as Christians we cannot say mai pen rai to everything. whenever there's an opportunity to share Christ, we take it. and we thank God for everything that comes our way, good or bad.
yesterday i played acoustic guitar for service! of course it has always been a privilege and honour to serve God through music, but i felt really moved whenever i worship, especially yesterday when we sang my favourite Thai worship song: Phrung Nii (Tomorrow). the song talks about not being able to predict what will happen tomorrow, but we don't have to worry or be afraid, because we can place our hopes in Christ. this song is special to me because it reminds me of my Khon Kaen days 2 years ago, when we learnt and sang this song for the students before we left. it also reminds me of the time when Terence Koh and i sang this song for our Thai teachers after our Thai 3 oral exam in NUS. never did i dream of singing this song on stage in church as a worship song. by the way i'll be playing acoustic guitar for the next few weeks, because apparently there isn't a free acoustic guitarist at the moment, and my pro roommate Man has to play keyboard and electric guitar.
also, i ran today! my 1st training for 42km this Dec. the facts are that i ran for 1 hour, and many times during the run, i wanted to stop, but in the end i didn't, so thank God for sustaining me haha... what i don't know is how far i actually ran. if i calculate by worst case scenario, assuming i ran 2.4km in 15-20mins on average, the total distance for 1 hour would be about 7-9km. i ran towards the Phala beach but turned back at a point about 3km away, so that should mean that the beach is about 7-8km away. and if i want to achieve my target of running to the beach and back, it means that i have to run about 16km. hmm... oh ya, at some points of my run i got barked at and chased by dogs. thank God they were all bark and no bite, because i don't think i'd be able to outrun the dogs haha...
please pray for me as i try to share with a group of Thai workers who come to the church to do some construction work every day. some of them can speak Mandarin because they worked in Taiwan before, but some of the things which they say to me are not so nice, eg, 来，我带你去找女人 (come, i bring you to find women). the fact that they learn these phrases means to me that probably they did those things when in Taiwan, and maybe here in Thailand too. by God's grace i can get them to come for service this Sunday, or even better, come for an evangelistic rally on 1-2 Sept. by the way, the speaker for the event is none other than Pastor Lawrence Seow!
pray also that as i start my 1st proper week in ministry (last week was orientation week), i'll be able to transit from the "trying to get used to things" attitude to the "take initiative to do things" attitude. until now i still have the 1st attitude, doing what i'm told to do, speaking only when spoken to etc, which is fine for a while. to be an effective servant i must adopt the 2nd attitude, being able to help others, rather than wait for others to help me. of course this also means having a close walk with God, feeding on His Word so that i can in turn feed others.
thanks for your prayers thus far! God has indeed been gracious and faithful :) i trust that God will use me to bless the people here, even as i am blessed by them already.
giving thanks at 18:21 :)
david chow en yuan