Sukhothai

Well, way back on November 2nd, we got up and left the base about 7 am, and rode to here: Sukhothai



View Larger Map

Bananas we helped with

It was a longish ride, but uneventful. We spent the time there mostly helping out with a local family who had become believers the year before. At their house half of the team helped with preparing garlic fresh from the fields. They cleaned off the the dirty outer layers and trimmed the stalks, and then bundled them to be sold. The half of the team I was working on went to another lady's house to continue building relations with her as her family has not yet accepted Jesus. We helped her with peeling, cutting, rolling, cooking and packaging bananas which she sold out of her home (they were tasty too). We also took turns working at a radio station, and got the opportunities to share our testimonies and play some good music. And we went to the local elementary the last two days to teach English and do activities.

At the radio station

Outside of going to celebrate the Loi Krathong holiday a couple nights, that is what we did. But the good part was getting to spend the evening eating dinner with the family and their extended family. We had many opportunities to share with the them about what it means to live as Christians, not just the part of the family that had accepted Jesus already, but a few others that were still unsure. We got to share the things we were learning at DTS and why we were choosing to live the lives that we were living. Because who really in their right mind decides to be a missionary, right? It was good to get to spend time with a family of young believers, young as is newly believing not age, and encourage them in their walk and help them to grow stronger.

At the school we were able to teach English two mornings and then had one afternoon to play. We did activities and a skit, and some dances. Then Jam got up to share her life story with them and why she had come to be with them for those two days. It was a good time had by all. Then we had to say good-bye and head to the next stage in our journey. Tell you about that next week.

Slicing bananas

Now What?

Long time no see. I’ve been all over this country and around in Cambodia and have a lot of stories to tell. Problem is, if I tell them all at once, this update will be about 15 pages long and no one will read it. So in this update, about major outreach, I will be brief. We traveled to Sukhothai, Nakhornprathom, Kanchanburi, and Siem Riep. The first three were in Thailand, the last city is in Cambodia.

Outreach was rough because I was really feeling unmotivated to go. We had just finished DNA and I was all fired up to get back to Chiang Mai and get to work. Plus my introverted self was not looking forward to spending 5 weeks in close quarters with others and very few breaks. But overall it was really good. God did some cool stuff with the people we worked with and in all of our lives. Over the next 3 weeks I will summarize the places we went, what we did, what we saw God do, and include some pictures.

For the rest of this letter, I want to lay out my plans for the foreseeable future. I have spoken with my friend in Chiang Mai and the next step is getting my paperwork done for a visa and work permit and officially joining Frontier Missions Thailand. I am planning on staying here in Thailand for another year before I come back to America. What I will be doing is, first with existing relationships, and then with new ones as God brings them, finding young men who either are Christians or are seriously seeking, who want to really reach people with the truth. Then I will begin a long term discipleship process, which is a fancy way of saying I will be in their lives, encouraging, teaching, and exhorting them to give everything to Christ and live for his glory. At the same time I will be teaching them how to do the same thing with others in their lives already.

To really invest in the lives a few people, and disciple them to do the same with others, to start a new movement of people who are personally involved with each other and a community of the Living Church that will set this region of the world on fire is my short term dream. As of right now, I feel like God is saying I will be here doing this for around 5 years, maybe longer.

Thank you again for all the prayers and support in every rough situation I have found myself in over the past 6 months. God has used this time to really work some deep changes in our relationship, about how much I trust, ask for direction from, listen to, and obey God my Father. It has really re-lit the flame of the desire to share who God is to give hope to those around me, but to do it on His terms, not mine.

As of right now there is one week left in DTS, then I will move back to Chiang Mai to start working. I am still looking for a place to live, and I will have to go to Laos in a few weeks to take care of getting this new visa, and will most likely have to make the run another 3-4 times over the next year.

God bless you all, and be on the lookout for the outreach summaries which I will be sending out over the next few weeks.

Identity, Evangelism & DNA

Two weeks in Sukhothai. One week in Kanchanburi. Two weeks in Cambodia. A week and a half of debrief and final stuff. Then DTS is done. Time flies eh?

DNA: "Every Tribe
Tongue & Nation"

The last four weeks have been intense. A week of Identity and Calling. Getting back into the bible and looking at who we are in our relationship with God and what that means in our lives. What is the dream of our life that God has put into us? Are we on a path to reach that, or are we following the dreams of others around us, or our own dreams for what we think our life should be? How do you discern between the two? I think I'm starting to get an idea of the long term goal I want to accomplish in my life time.

That weekend we went to Chiang Mai for a guys weekend. The time together with them was great. Got to chill, watch the Rugby world cup, and play some good ultimate frisbee. Awesome.

Evangelism really challenged me in the way I view some forms of it. Especially my attitude towards the track. I still think there is a right and wrong way to do tracks, but I have less of a distaste for them. I also realized that I focus way too much on the method and style of evangelism rather than focusing on the why I am doing it. It also gave me just a renewed desire to do it. To tell people about who Christ is.

Worship

Then we had the DNA Infusion conference for two weeks at our base. Approximately 160 people, from 27 different speaking around 39 different languages. The DNA team's goal was to come in and give the new generation of YWAMers a sense of the values on YWAM and why they became values, as well as to give wisdom on how to be Godly leaders. There was so much stuff in there. I am still processing through it all. God was also moving in all of our hearts for having a more globalized approach to life. That Christ has called us to the nations and to the ends of the earth. There were great times of prayer, worship and intercession and a really challenging and filling time. The fact that as a student I even had the opportunity to be a part of it is a huge blessing from God. Check out the video at the bottom for a glimpse of what it was like.

Prayer requests:
Outreach - Two things
    1. Pray that it will just be an awesome time where we as a school can really be the hands and feet of God to the places we go and that we will see Him move in power
    2 . Also pray that I would be focused on the outreach, not on what I am doing after
After outreach:
    Pleas pray as I am making plans to transition into the next step that I will be walking step by step in the path that the Father has laid out for me.
Funds:
   School fees are done, yes. But as I transition into living and working, I will need to raise a bit more consistent monthly support to pay for my bills. Right now I am receiving about $150 per month. Which has been great to help me with my bills while in the DTS and give me spending money. But it won't cover rent, gas and food, let alone help with the rest. So I will need to see a substantial increase in my support in order to be able to stay here.

See you in about 5 weeks with cool stories of all the things that God is going to do on outreach. God bless.

Super! Thanks for askin'!

At a WWII Memorial Bridge in Pai

Well, I have some really great news... in fact, nothing but good news for this update, but the biggest piece I am saving for the last part, so you have to read it all to get there (or some of you cheaters who just read the fun parts, it's in the Praises section).

In case you haven't figured it out yet, yes, I got to go on out reach. The last bit of money came in literally 10 minutes before we left, but God is more than faithful and provided that last bit and even a bit more! So after I got confirmation of that last bit coming in, I packed up my computer and put it in my room, then joined the rest of the team in the truck to go to the bus station. When we got there, found out we were going to Mae Hong Son. Just a quick lesson, Thailand is divided up into provinces, and the capital city of each province is named after the province. So when referring to Mae Hong Son, I am referring to the whole province, where as when we get to the main city, I'll refer to it as the city of Mae Hong Son. Check it our on this Google map.



View Larger Map

The Church

So first we went to Mae Sariang (Follow HWY 108 from Chiang Mai). We spent the night there because it took us from 8 am until 6 pm by bus to get there. On Monday morning we prayed together about where we should head next and got that we should continue on a little ways north. So we went on our way up towards the next city and in talking with the driver of the truck we rented found out that he is a Christian and attended a small Karin church in that area. So we ended up staying at his house and helping out at that church and in that village. During the day we worked, pulling weeds and planting flowers at the church, making and putting sandbags in a driveway so that the truck could park, and just living with the people of that village. In the evening on Monday -Wednesday we did mini worship and teaching times, and shared about our lives and how God has affected them with the children and some of the adult members of the church. Then Thursday evening we invited as many people as we could and had a big night at the church and had maybe 50 - 60 people from the village show up and worship together, sing and play games together, and hear a word from the Bible. It was awesome. The biggest thing we saw, when we didn't really expect to see much, not that we didn't expect to see anything but that the results would most likely come after we left, was that the pastor got up and shared how God used us to show Him the Holy Spirit really is active in all of our lives.

We then headed on up to the city of Mae Hong Son on Friday and spent Saturday there for our day of rest.

At a Chinese Village in Pai

Sunday afternoon we headed to Pai (HWY 1095 above). When we got there we asked around at a couple of different churches, but none of them either needed or wanted our help with everything. So we prayed again and felt like God just wanted us to spread some joy, so we spent Monday evening looking for some good spots and then Tuesday - Thursday we sang and danced on the side of the street. The songs were a mix of worship/secular hits/Christian hits. It was a good time, and had a lot of chances to just sit and talk with people. Most of them looked at us as if we were insane whenever we explained what we were doing and how we got there. But it was still pretty cool. We also made little charms that had verses of blessing on them in Thai and English. I got to talk to people (some just a few words, a couple a good conversation) from Ukraine, Israel, France, The US, Thailand and a few others that I didn't get their nationality. Pai is a weird little melting pot of culture. On Thursday afternoon we did a couple hours of touring, and then Friday morning we packed up and headed back to base.

I asked for a favor from my leaders, and when we stopped in Chiang Mai on our way back to Chiang Rai, I got to buy my ticket for two days later so I could go a surprise Annie and spend some time with her last weekend. To all my friends in Chiang Mai, sorry, lack of vehicle and someone to help Annie at the Internet cafe put a stopper on our plans to come in a see peoples.

But then I came back to base this past week to the news that this past week, enough money has come in from a few donors that my DTS fee is now covered. I am still transferring some of it, but as of this Friday, if I can get to the ATM, the DTS will be paid off. Praise God big time for that. Now all the support that still comes in will be for my living expenses. While at the base I don't have huge amounts in that area, but that will change when I move back to Chiang Mai after DTS. It will also help with me getting a new visa when I am in Cambodia next month.

Some of the Girls with
They Lady They Stayed With

Two more weeks of lectures start this Monday, then we have a conference coming to the base for all of YWAM Asia (or SE Asian, can't remember). It is called DNA and the founders of YWAM are going to the different regions to help the new leaders stay true to the foundations laid some 50 years ago. Looking forward to that and I'll have a blog about those four weeks before major outreach.

But God is amazing. Not just because he provided for everything already, but just in every way He is showing me more and more about who He is. Seeing His provision for us the past two weeks, putting us in the middle of situations where we can work for His name, one where we could immediately see some results, one where I don't know if any of us will ever know the impact we have. For the first week getting to see a friend from Chiang Mai who had moved back to Mae Hong Son and I haven't seen in a while, and the second week getting to meet a guy from the US who has been working in India the past few years spreading the word of the Lord simply because he had had run-ins with YWAMers before, and knew that the only crazy people who stand on street corners and sing praise songs in the middle of Asia are usually from YWAM. For answering my prayers even as I am praying them. The past 4 months have been amazing and a huge blessing in my life. So thank you to all of you who have been supporting me through this so that I can complete this school and continue doing the work He has for me.

Praises and Prayer requests:
~ My DTS is paid for ~
~ God is totally changing my life daily ~
~ the chance to spend 6 months devoted to my relationship with Him ~
~ The last two weeks of lectures ~
~ DNA conference ~
~ Guys retreat next weekend ~
~ The city of Chiang Mai and the rest of Thailand as they are dealing with massive flooding which is expected to get worse the next few days ~

Two Thirds Through!

Alright! One more month of lectures finished. Two thirds of the way to completion. And for those of you wondering, IF I have done all my math right, only 250 bucks away from having the entirety of my second tuition installment so I can go on outreach tomorrow and complete the school, as well as, for those who didn't hear, not needing to make another border run before major outreach. So thanks to God for all of that!

This time I actually have other things to post about besides just lectures as on two different weekends I had friends from Chiang Mai come visit, and got to take a couple of trips, one with my friends from CM, and one with my friends from the base to go to Burma. Yet again what follows is mostly chronologically ordered, and even more from memory than usual as I forgot to bring my journal with me. :-)

Lecture Week 1: The Ministry of the Holy Spirit - Tim Ginn
So this week we talked about Who the Holy Spirit is. It was a good week because it brought me back to the fundamental Truth that the Holy Spirit is also a distinctive personality. Sometimes I think about the Holy Spirit as like this power and connection to God the Father, but not as having a personality, thoughts and so forth as we would give to God and Jesus. But if this is not true, then how can we grieve the Spirit, for one example. And we talked just about communing and being in submission to the Spirit with our own spirit which God has placed in us. Great stuff.

Annie and I

The following weekend was when Annie came to visit. We went to eat Moo Kra Tha with a couple of people from the base who have recently also become a couple (staff, not students), whoo! Then that evening and all day Saturday we just hung out at the base and had a great time. Sunday we did a Bible study together (because the church I go to meets in the evening), and then went to eat together and sent her off at the bus station. It was great to see her.

Lecture Week 2: Spiritual Warfare - Rob Wiebe (who is also the base leader with his wife Cy)
This was a truly interesting week. Usually when we think of spiritual warfare, we think of the Exorcist... or maybe The Amityville Horror (the old version, never saw the new). Casting out demons and doing battle with Satan and the like. But Rob took us back to the root Greek words, and a foundational view of spiritual warfare. To sum it up, the way we do spiritual warfare is bringing the Truth of God into our own lives, and wrestling with the lies that Satan has planted in our thinking, and learning to live in the Truth instead of our personal strongholds. We did this by going through the entire book of Ephesians. It was really good stuff, but if I get started this blog will be 5-6 pages long.

Cal hanging off a wall over about a 20 ft drop

That weekend my buddy Cal came up with a friend of his, and we hung out, and on Saturday went running around near the base. It was a great time. Got so see some great scenery and had a good time. If you want to see the full album of pics that I take, you have to get an iPhone and install Instagram, then search for my profile: zDubya81. If you don't have a profile, just go to my profile on FB and scroll through my old posts.

Lecture Week 3: Relationships - Josh Parsons (DTS staff)
Again, good stuff. We went through biblical examples of what relationships are, and all relationships, not just boy/girl ones. We started by looking in the gospels for how Jesus describes his relationship with his Father. Then built on that in application to other relationships. It was really tough week in some ways, but brought a lot of growth.

Mae Sai: From the trip with Cal and Pra Tawachai

Lecture Week 4: The Cost of Discipleship - Jeff & Becky Hooker
This past week has been a very fun week. Tough, but these two did a great job about keeping things light and not getting overbearingly heavy. But we looked at the idea of what discipleship is and that you can be a disciple of many things or people (duh), but then how to identify where we are giving authority and priority to other things than God. In our relationships, addictions, families, friends, supporters, latest fashions, etc., etc. And then how to get into the bible and really study it to see what the bible say about these things, keeping it in context as far as the fact the the bible was written for, but not exactly to us, and discerning between cultural commands and commands from God and the like. Again, great stuff.

God has continually been showing me places in my own mind and heart where I am not following Him or have believed wrong things about Him. So it has been a really growing and challenging experience. I love it here. Tomorrow we leave for our second outreach, the Faith Outreach (the link will take you to extensive information about it, starting paragraph 3). I am super excited for this. Praying hard that the rest of the money comes in so that I can go and so that I can finish out the course.

A couple students and one base staff dressed
in traditional Akha dress for international night

Next update will be at the end of the outreach, only 2 weeks, because I won't have time middle of next month because of weekend plans (guys retreat to CM & Annie coming to visit to celebrate our 1 year anniversary). Also be on the lookout for pics on my profile from this outreach! I get to take my phone but not my SIM card. I'm totally OK with that.

Prayer requests:
~ Faith Outreach: That we will be sensitive and open to the Spirit's direction~
~Final Tuition Payment: October 31st, right before we leave for Major Outreach~




Will have more after we get back!! Thank you all. Love you.

This is an emergency update: please stay tuned and be regaled with tales of Zac's lack of attention to detail as well as information about our major outreach. Not necessarily in that order.

First things first. I promised to let you know about our major outreach when I had more information about what all I can share online, which turns out wasn't a major worry after all but better safe than sorry. Anyways.

First off our Faith Outreach. Exactly what it says. Not even the leaders know where we are going. One of the staff from the base who will not be joining us will choose two locations, and then when we get to the bus station, said staff member will give us envelopes with our tickets in them, and that's when we find out where we are going. We will spend the whole time in prayer and letting God lead us to where we need to stay, who we need to meet, and what we need to be doing. We leave for that on September 11. Needless to say I am super stoked to do this as I have never really just completely gone out without an idea or plan. So we are praying a lot in prep for this and I would ask that you really remember our teams (2 teams for this) as we step out into God's will.

Then the first week of November we will head out for our Major Outreach. Again, stoked. We will go in the same 2 teams as our Faith Outreach. The first two weeks we will be in Thailand. The other team is heading to Southern Thailand. The team I'm part of will be heading to Sukhothai, which is the very South of Northern Thailand (or the very North of Central Thailand). We will be working with some ministries there and doing evangelism, but not so many details given out at that point. Then we will join up for a week at a as of yet unknown location in Thailand. Then for the next two weeks we will be working in two different cities in Cambodia!! Sweet right? Again, not so heavy on the details, but that's where we are headed. So please add that month (November & first of December) to your prayer list as well.

Now the emergency part. I miss read my email, or rather rewrote it in my mind when I gave out dates from memory rather than looking it up. But my next school payment is due on the 11th of September. So yeah, next week. As of right now I have had an anonymous donor give 5,000฿, and I have $98 transferring to from on PayPal subscriber and will have another $48 after the first. That comes to just under 5,000฿ before ATM fees and my two visa runs I will need to make before the 11th. So basically what I am saying is that I am just about 20,000฿ or $670 short of being able to go on the next outreach.

So I am asking for two things:
1. Prayer: God will provide the funds, but prayer is the catalyst for that to happen. Please join me in that. And also, just as importantly, pray for the outreaches. Funds don't matter without prayer cover to go on the trips, and if for some reason God decides not to provide the funds then my friends here still need the prayer cover. There is no such thing as wasted prayer, so please join me in praying for these things.

2. Consider giving. This is not to those who are already supporting me. I'm not asking for more from any of you. This is for those who have thought about it, but haven't. I'm asking each of you to listen to your heart. If God prompts you, give. If he doesn't, don't. I'm not asking for pity gifts, just for each person reading this to allow God to use him or her or them if He wants to.

Again, thank you all for staying with me through this in your thoughts and prayers. Thanks as well to each of you that responds to my emails with words of encouragement, they are very welcome and lift my spirit each time. Love and peace.

Repentence - Rapid ministry - Rest

Hello again all. I realize the once a month thing means a long time between blogs, but it ensures two things. One, I focus my time on being at the DTS (discipleship training school) and two, I actually have something to write about! Again, this will be more of a week by week thing so I can keep my thoughts in line. Now to pick up right where we left off:

Week 6:
Repentance and Fear of the Lord. Guy named Paul Wilcox came and spoke, originally from Australia/South America (he's an MK). As you would expect it was pretty intense. But good. We started out by looking at the nature of God vs the nature of Sin. Basically the idea of that was if you understand what Sin actually is, you will fully understand why God can not allow it in His presence. To make that clear, understanding Sin, NOT all the different ways we can sin, but what the essence of Sin is. Also the differences between Trial and Testings, and the differences between God's testings and Satan's testings. Also the difference between confession and repentance and why we must do both. We ended the week with a time of confession, and then celebration of our freedom in Christ. Good stuff, Good stuff. That Saturday I received a call from a friend saying that he was going to take care of the money I needed so that I could continue in the DTS. So thanks to God for providing and thanks to my friend for being willing to be used by God to provide that.

Week 7:
Outreach!!! We spent half the day Sunday in prayer and intercession, then went out for out first outreach. It was two weeks, but we did two different things for each week. The first week we went to a village quite close to the mai city of Chiang Rai (actually closer than the base we stay at). There is a ministry there called MMF. The are expanding their campus to include housing and a conference center to save money on putting people up and renting space to hold conferences as their ministry has grown. So the majority of our group during the day helped out building a removable shelter so that they can make their own bricks and not worry about rain. The other part (self included) went to teach English/Thai to the children of Burmese migrant workers at a school that the ministry partners with. We also painted their playground equipment to make it look nicer. On Thursday evening, we invited all the churches in the area to come and spend a night in worship, which went really well. We sang, we danced (we stole things ;-P), and then several of our people shared and we ended the night praying as a large group. Great stuff. Then on Saturday we loaded up and went to Chiang Khong Thailand, which brings us too...

Week 8:
So we all rode a bus to Chiang Khong, but then split into two smaller groups to go to our respective sites. The other group rode in the back of a truck for an hour to Chiang San, while my group rode in the back of a truck 20 minutes to a village just outside of town. It was up in the mountains and very very beautiful (I guess now would be the time to point out that my main camera is broken, no phones were allowed on outreach, so I have no pictures, go to my facebook and look for pics that I have been tagged in, sorry). The other group painted all week. Our group was a little bit different. It was a challenging, but good week. We got there Saturday evening, and then found out we were in charge of Church Sunday morning. So we prepared for that, I got to teach the adult bible study one of the parable of Jesus in a fun style that I like. Also, we did the drama, danced and we had two testimonies and our leader shared the main message. (again, we decide who is going to speak through prayer) After church we rested a bit, then in the evening walked around the village meeting some of the people there. This was how we found out about the witch doctors that live in the village and don't like the Christians and pray to the spirits they worship continuously against the church there. So there was a lot of spiritual warfare going on that week.

The church was adding on a covered area to cook food, for the kids to play to put stuff when it rains, etc., So the guys in our group helped with that. But the leader of the church had found one small job for the girls, that was completed rapidly, so the girls spend most of the rest of the week praying which was great. We were only there until Thursday (technically Friday morning cause that's when we left), but we managed to finish the add on, have some times of great worship, both with the church and as a group. I had the chance to teach much of the church one style of intercession. We also got to hike to a beautiful two level (actually three, but you couldn't see the third from the bottom or second level) waterfall. I climbed it and jumped of and nearly broke my butt bone (worth it). Also picked up some sort of infection between my toes. Right now soaking my feet in this sodium solution that dyes my feet brown and my nails like a brownish purple color (s0 cute!). But all in all it was a great two weeks.

Week 9:
This past week has been rest and debrief. Each day we have met together for a few hours just to talk about everything that has been happening, both on outreach and the first month and a half of DTS to see how everyone is tracking. It has been wonderful.

I also found out where we are going for our first outreach... but I'm not sure how much I can post online about it, so I will send out a mid month update giving full details about that. Also, I made a mistake in my last post. In the prayer request section, I put that i was missing $1,1oo in tuition, which, yes, was true, but that was how far I was away from meeting the 50% paid before first out reach. So for my prayer request section, I will outline what's gonna be happening as far as that goes. Lectures start new next week, and if I have scheduled myself right, I should be writing my next blog the Saturday before the next outreach. Thank you all for keeping up with me month to month! Love you all.

Prayer Requests

~ Smooth transition back to lectures and going all day ~
~ That God would continue teaching me about him and bringing my character in line with His ~
~ Wisdom for what to do about my visa (more about that in the Post Script) ~
~ Funds for my visa ~
~ Appx $1000 for tuition before September 31st ~
~ Appx $1000 for tuition before October 31st, then the School will be paid for ~
~ We resume going to the university next week, please pray for the students we encounter ~
~ Annie will be coming to visit next week, I'm excited!!! but please pray for her safety as she travels, and that I don't allow myself to get to distracted by it during lecture next week ~
~ That God will reveal to me in His timing what I am going to be doing after DTS, and patience for me to wait on that timing. Ok, mostly the second half because we all already know that God will take care of the first ;-) :-P ~

Thank you again for taking care of me through prayers and through finances. Thank you for reading these blogs and responding to me about them (it really does encourage me to keep writing them). God bless you all

P.S. - September 5th or thereabouts, my current 3 month visa runs out. It will cost me approximately $300 dollars to go to Laos and get a new one. Or I might just go to Mae Sai the next few weeks to get my temporary 2 week visa until major out reach which will begin in Nov. So, do I pay the $300 for a visa that is too long as I'll only get 2 months use out of it and have to miss part of my lectures to get, or do I travel to Mae Sai every other Saturday until we leave the country. I am calculating the cost effectiveness of both options, and praying that God will show me what to do about it. So same as above, please pray for wisdom for what to do, as well as the funds to do it.