It has been about a month
since John went back to the States with the Voorhees and about a month also
since the Myanmar students went back to their homes and ministries. John is
enjoying the American experience and meeting new friends. As for the Myanmar students,
they have returned to their churches, ministries,
and families. They stated how blessed they were to be a part of the Seminary
and blessed to have the opportunity to learn the Bible with Stephen, Dr. Derek,
Isaiah and others who taught at the Seminary.
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| John with the Voorhees in America |
The Wongratanamajchas are
slowly adjusting to the different shift in the ministry. Stephen is working on
turning his lecture on the book of Hebrews into a commentary and then he will
have to translate that into the Lisu language. After this is finished, he will
need to raise money in order to publish the book of Hebrews in Myanmar. Praise
the Lord! Finally, the process of printing Stephen’s Lisu commentary on the
book of Revelation has been completed. Now it is on the stage of delivery those
books to churches throughout Myanmar and Thailand. This Revelation commentary
is also being requested to be published in China by some Christian leaders,
please pray that God will move this to happen. The Lahu people have already
made a request to translate Stephen’s commentary on Revelation into their
language. To clarify to everyone, the commentaries that are being printed or
will be printed will be handed out to churches and to people interested in
studying the Bible at an extremely low cost (or even free) rather than being a
means to acquire money because the Lisu Christians in Myanmar and China are
mostly, what the world would say, poor. Before the people had even received
these commentaries, many are already requesting Stephen to go into Myanmar and offering
a conference or seminar in order to further learn about the book of Revelation.
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| Revelation Commentary in Lisu |
Mary is getting better
from her health problems after getting some medication. Please pray for her as
she is still a little weak. Becky is doing really well, she is actually teaching
herself how to cook by watching videos on YouTube. Nick is doing many things
including helping an international church with their youth program. Nick was
also asked to be a guest host a Thai radio station. Recently, Nick was asked by
several friends to go to the town called Mae Sot, 6 hours, to visit a friend
named Thi that was going through depression; on that trip, he was able to
encourage and share the gospel with the 3 guys there. Thi even began praying
before his meals. Through friendship and constant talks of the bible, one of
Nick’s Thai friends named Kojii was baptized last month as well. God is good! On
top of all this, Isaac has been very enthusiastic in sharing the gospel with
his classmates in 4th grade. He even took the Bible and the Bible
stories with him to school so at their free time, he reads those books to his
friends. Now all of Isaac’s friends want a cross necklace even though their
families are all Buddhist. Culturally, all Buddhists have their little Buddha’s
images as necklace since they were young. To take those images out is very
offensive according to their faith. Because of the kids’ requests, Mary and
Stephen had to meet each individual parent in order to ask their permission.
Praise the Lord! Every parents gave permission to do so.
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| The annual routine of planting rice before the Rainy Season |
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| Isaac with his Bible stories |
Stephen and Nick are also
in the process of helping the Lisu people in Myanmar to overcome their poverty
and drug involvement. For example, due to the poverty and drug problems among
Lisu people of Thailand, many of the young generations both Christians and
non-Christians have been involved in drug and human trafficking. In order to
avoid the problems like such in Thailand, we have seen that providing new
alternative crops and teaching a new agricultural system with an environmental
sensitivity in replacing the old system of slash-burn will help churches become
self-supporters, preventing the young generations from drug and human
trafficking businesses. There was a call from a Korean company that wanted to
enter into Myanmar in order to start a coffee business. Stephen believes that
if this works, the Lisu people will be able to have legal jobs and the churches
be able to become healthy churches. Stephen and Nick and some of the other Lisu
are representing the consultant team for both the Korean and the Lisu people.
We are keeping both sides in check. This way both sides will be fair. Frankly
speaking, we are helping the Lisu people from being cheated. Also, a corn
company from Thailand wants to invest the corn business with the Lisu people in
Myanmar. Please pray for this ministry that Stephen and Nick are requested to
help, even though they are not being paid to do this task. Because of our lack
of agricultural knowledge, we do really need someone who has an agricultural
background to carry out this ministry. Please pray for the need of this
ministry!
May our Living God bless
you all!
In Christ Alone,
The Wongs
