Times of Refreshing

"You've NEVER been drunk?" Johann asked again, his jaw dropping in disbelief. His reaction was quite typical to many conversations that we had on New Year's Eve. Our prayers to stick out from the ordinary were definitely answered. It was an incredible night where we all had a great time and were able to about our faith in Jesus with several people. The conversation didn't necessarily get spiritual with every person that we met but the free BBQ on the rooftop bar was a great place for meeting people in our hostel and making connections that we can build on through the rest of our stay here.
On new year's day we had a full day of prayer and fasting for the nation of Thailand. Over breakfast time we went to a nearby temple and prayed that God would lift the veil of that is over the eyes of those enslaved to Buddhism and that Jesus Christ would be revealed as the "substance" of which all this searching for meaning is but a shadow. For the mystery of God has been revealed and in Him are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. During the rest of the morning we had a Bible study together and then personal devotional time. Over lunchtime we went to a nearby government building and prayed about the current political instability in Thailand. I won't get into the details here but it's quite interesting and I would recommend reading up on it. During the afternoon we took some time to seek God for personal direction and vision for the new year. Over suppertime we prayed about the issue of human trafficking, sex slavery and prostitution. Again, I won't get into the gory details right now but please check out StopTheTraffik For more information. We finished off the evening by having communion together and reminding ourselves again that "He became sin, who knew no sin, that we might become the righteousness of God".
Praise God as well that on that morning Becky was able to give a Bible to Mike, one of the Americans that we've been hanging out with here, just before he left to go to Laos for awhile.
We took today, Jan 02, as our Sabbath day. The best part of the day, by far, was joining the Chiang Mai Community Church for their evening service. It is an international church that has services in English. Many of the regular members are involved in ministry here in some way. It was absolutely GLORIOUS to be able to worship with them and be united with them in communion. I talked to a few people afterwards and was greatly encouraged and got some good information about where to get Bibles and tracts in Thai.
Tomorrow Malori, Luca and Becky are spending most of the day in a Thai cooking class. There will be about six or seven other westerners in the class spending the whole day together, cooking and eating and hanging out. It sounded like a great opportunity so we are going for it. Pray that they meet the right people and have boldness to share Jesus with them. They are together all day so they really have nowhere to escape to if they don't want to hear, right? I will be spending the day doing a variety of different things. I'll probably spend most of it here at the hostel. Pray that I get an opportunity to speak more with Johann, a middle-aged Belgium guy who is "slowing down a bit" and getting into a "different kind of traveling" that involves trying out various forms of meditation and so on. I talked to him for about an hour on new year's eve and I would love to give him my last booklet from Micheal Graham (Jedi Micheal, that I met last year in India). Besides that I will be praying about direction for our team over the next week or two and possibly visiting the Thai Bible Society to get some literature.
That's a brief summary of what we're up to right now. Thank you for your prayers and support!
Long live the KING!