Over the past few days we stayed in teh mountains at a church. In there mountains near Burma the poeple are Karen, a tribe that is in Thailand and Burma. They don’t speak Thai and the culture is different from mainstream Thai culture. That paster at this church Praphan has about twenty children from surrounding villages staying with him during the week. He stakes them to school and then on the weekends they go home.
While we were there we went to some of these villages to visit the homes door to door, visit schools, hold evening services and do programs in schools. The door to door visits were difficult. We broke up into groups and had a translator. We would go in to their homes, introduce ourselves and then tell them we came from America to share the love of God with them. Each of these villages that we went to had a pastor and many of them had believers. The othersi nteh villages were Buddhist. I remember one house we went to where the grandfather walked from his house to talk to us. We told him why we were there and we asked about his family. He had come from Burma thirty years earlier, his family were all Christians but he was Buddhist. He told us it didn’t matter what he believed because he didn’t have much longer to live. Vikki explained the gospel to him and he listened closely and before we left he told us he was glad we’d come from America tp tell him about Jesus. We didn’t try to make anyone pray a prayer for salvation. There were pastors there to continue what we started and to desciple.
Many of the Karen people are animists and are plagued by demonic forces. They are very fearful. I nthe same village we prayed for a sick baby whose wrists, ankles and neck were tied tightly with string. Praphan told us that thisshowed to attack that this baby was under. When we went into homes we told them about Gods deliverance from fear and many were receptive to that.
During the time we stayed i nteh mountains we were so blessed by the love and hospitality shown to us. When we stayed in the villages they ave up their beds and served us every meal, waiting ot eat until we were finished. We couldn’t speak their language but they would constantly bow and smile. One of the things that blesses me most is how we can worship together singing the same songs in different languages. I’m so excited to tell members of hte body of Christ in America about their Karen brothers and sisters.
