Posts tagged: Missions
This is part two of a three part update. If you haven’t read part one, you can scroll down and see it below.
When Eunhae got back from Korea it was a few weeks into the school and the students had been learning a lot. Every morning we start with worship and then go right into classes about Christianity and the teachings of Jesus. After that is leadership teaching. The last half of the day is learning media skills such as video production. After Eunhae was feeling well enough I would go in to school in the morning and come back home at lunch time to pick her up and she would sit in with the students the rest of the day. She was excited to finally get to be with the students!
Almost half way through the school we have a day where we spend all day fasting and praying. Eunhae really wanted to come early on that day because she really wanted to spend the day praying with the students. Everything was going great until Eunhae suddenly started losing large amounts of blood from her surgery wound. It was a scary thing to see how much blood she was losing and not knowing exactly how much blood a person can loose and still be ok. Praise God the hospital is literally across the street from the school. We rushed her to the ER and found out that because of an infection, the wound had swelled and the stitches popped a blood vessel. They said she needed to have emergency surgery. Praise God it was fasting day and she didn’t eat so she was able to go right into surgery. Before we knew it, about 30 minutes after it all began, she was in surgery. Praise God the correct Dr. was in at that time when she usually leaves earlier in the day.
(The hospital here in Chiang Rai)
Less than an hour and the Dr. came out and said the surgery went well. We checked in to a hospital room and were talking about how crazy all of this was. All of the sudden eunhae started getting faint and her heart rate went crazy high and her blood pressure went very low. She kept passing out and the nurses kept waking her up. She had lost way too much blood so she had to be moved to the ICU to have blood transfusions. We found out that if she would have stayed at home that morning and I had to drive home to get her and bring her to the hospital, she probably would have not made it to the hospital in time because of how much blood she was loosing.
(The outside of the ICU)
In the ICU they quickly squeezed 2 bags of blood into her and that was definitely the most painful part of the whole day. Shortly after midnight she was a lot more stable and her blood pressure was getting up to better levels. The next morning they moved her back into the normal hospital room.
(The View from Our Room)
We spent two more nights in the hospital and were free to go home after that! Thank you all for your prayers for Eunhae! SHe is doing so good now and the Dr. said that she has completely healed now! Praise God!
(we took this photo as we finally walked out of the hospital)
Happy New Year!
We are excited to continue on in ministry in Thailand another year. This first year has been a lot of settling in, learning language, and also traveling to other near by countries to do ministry. This coming year we are excited for two, ten week training schools and a number of one and two week training camps. From our training camps in 2011 we saw students from Thailand develop their skills in Photography while being exposed to the gospel message for the first time. We also saw believers in Burma, and the Philippines learn how to reach their nations with the gospel. It’s been rewarding being a part of this and we’re excited to pick it up a notch for much more training this next year.
Over the past year we have been building relationships with a nearby Akha Hill tribe. This year we are hoping to be able to raise funds to transport the kids to school because they tend to drop out because of the long walk to and from school. Stay tuned to this blog or our email updates for future information on how you can impact these kids lives.
Another project we will be working on between schools this year is a series of around 20 internet videos aimed at the general Buddhist population in Southeast Asia who know nothing about Jesus and His gospel. Many people here don’t even have the slightest idea of what Christianity is, so we aim to present the gospel to them in their language, simply, using themes that they will understand. We are very excited about this project and we will continue to update this blog about it throughout the year.
We want to thank you all for standing by us this past year. Many of you have given your precious time and hard earned money to support what we do and we are very grateful. We want to promise you that we will continue work our hardest this next year in reaching Asia for Christ.
Merry Christmas everyone!
We have had a wonderful year serving in Thailand and we could not have done it without all of your support and prayers. Thank you so much! This December we are reminded of the reason we are here in Thailand. Jesus was born to die so that we can live.
Share the good news with someone who doesn’t know!
Posted by: Eunhae
We just finished running a week long Thai language photography camp that we call “Engage Camp”. The first engage camp was a summer camp for Christians. Last year our engage camp taught media skills to young Thai Christian leaders. This year was our first camp to have students who are non-believers. We had a total of 18 students. Our youngest student was 14 years old and our oldest student was 47 years old. Even with the big age gap, and Christians, and non-Christians (more than half were non-believers) we all became very close and had a great week.
Most of the students were non-believers and very strong Buddhist. Our oldest student, Arthit, has Buddhist tattoos and even wears a Buddhist idol necklace. We didn’t really know how these extremely Buddhist students would receive our message and worship time. We told the students they were not required to come early to worship but that we would love for them to join us if they were able to make it. The first day Arthit seemed very confused during worship. I’m assuming that it was his first time seeing Christian worship in his life. The second day he and his daughter (who was also in the camp) showed up again for worship. We were a little surprised. Arthit was paying very close attention to the lyrics on the TV screen with a curious look on his face. The third day, they showed up again, and Arthit started to clap along with the song. After that, he was at every sing worship time for the rest of the school. By the end of the week he was even singing along. The last day one of our staff members, Ryan, shared the gospel message to the students. This was the first time many of them had heard of the good news of Jesus. Ryan read from the bible and explained that we were created by God, and also what Jesus had done for us. After Ryan shared, I decided to tell the students my reason for living in Thailand. (My heart was beating so fast.)
“Does anybody want to know more stories from this book? Does it sound strange to you? Or wrong to you? Or make you curious? If you want to know more and you want to read this book for yourself, I would love to buy it for you as a gift. Feel free to ask me. This is the reason I am here living in Thailand. What I believe, the story in this book, it’s too good to hold only to myself in Korea. It changed my life and I want to share this good news with all of you!”
Right after the class, Arthit came to me and our Thai staff member/translator Joy. He said, “I want to know about this book more. Can I have one?” That day I gave him a Thai Bible and a book called “From Buddha to Jesus”. When I gave it to him, he pointed to the sky and asked me to pray for him and his family. It was one of the most touching moments of my time here in Thailand.
The next day one more student named Yot asked for a Bible.
God is so faithful in this ministry. This is the reason why our MediaLight team is here. God loves Thailand so much and so do we.
Please pray for Arthit and Yot and the rest of the students who heard the gospel this week.
Arthit
Yot
This is a photo of two former MediaLight students producing some of the only Christian media in their entire nation.
Pray for Nomi and Nini as they reach their home nation of Burma.
*P.S. Nomi (left) is the wife of pastor Robin and just gave birth to their first child!
Posted by: Drew
Where to start… I guess we can start at the end. We are finally home after being away for about three weeks. Our trip was much more than we expected and we have many stories to tell. The day before we went to Burma, We had to go to the Embassy in Bangkok and get our Visas to enter the country. The next day we had to wake up at 4:AM to get to the airport for our flight to Yangon. The excitement for the trip made it not too difficult to get up and get ready to go so early in the morning. We made it safely into the country with no problems of any sort. Thank you all for your prayers in that area!
When we met our host Pastor Robin at 8:AM he informed us of our busy day ahead, starting with teaching a group from his church at 10:AM.
We met the enthusiastic, eager-to-learn group at the church at ten and started teaching. Pastor Chuck (Our leader) started out and I (Drew) finished the class a couple hours later. Pastor robin is putting together a media team from his church. This might not sound like a big deal to you if you live outside of Burma, but because of the situation in the country, this is a huge deal. For many many years, Burma has been in a media blackout. Things still aren’t good there but there are a few signs of change, and that’s what makes this the perfect time to invest in Christian media in Burma.
A few years ago, Yangon had one email address for the whole city. If you wanted to send an email, you had to write it out on paper, and bring it to the government office. If they approved it, they would take your phone number and call you when you got a reply. Then you could go down to the office and pick up your email. Now they have internet cafe’s and they are allowed to have Gmail. The government still screens your emails, but it’s an improvement.
Websites like youtube, twitter, and blogging sites are all blocked in the country, but more and more sites like facebook are slowly becoming available. In the past two months Burma got 2 FM radio stations and 2 TV stations. This is huge news. They will soon be allowing non government businesses. (Even the first non government gas stations have opened in the past months) To get a cell phone number, it used to cost $1,000 (USD). It still costs a few hundred, but the price is getting lower and lower. The people are getting more freedoms all the time and the country will slowly be opening up for business and ministry. I could go on and on with examples but the point is, things are changing, and changing fast. We don’t know when, but we know that soon the opportunity will open up for big positions in Media in Burma. The Christians of Burma want to be ready when that position opens up. There is literally nobody to compete with in media in Burma. Imagine a Burma in the future where the biggest radio, TV, Movie, and print companies are Christian companies. It is very possible and that is why we believe in investing in the Christians of Burma. Our goal, as well as theirs, is to be ready when the opportunity arrises.
I will stop here for now but expect a continuation to this story soon!
Thank you for your prayers and support and your investment into the lives of our brothers and sisters in Burma!
Drew & Eunhae
[Pastor Robin Translating what Drew Teaches]
Posted by: Drew
Hey everyone! Just a quick update here. SInce I JUST posted the link to the site on facebook I’m guessing I will be getting a little more traffic, particularly from people I haven’t talked to yet. PLEASE email or call us if you have any questions about anything or if you would like to set up a time to get together and talk! I would love to meet with you! Also, if you haven’t received a support letter from us, please email us you info to drewandeunhae@gmail.com. I am also available to speak at churches, youth groups, small groups and anywhere else that you meet with a group of people! Make sure you follow us on twitter and facebook by clicking the links at the bottom of the page. Check back soon for an update from Eunhae who is in Thailand right now! Thank you all for your prayer and support!
Drew
