Relief

It is with huge relief that we have just heard in our office that the Red shirt leaders have surrendered themselves to police and the protest in Bangkok is being encouraged to disperse. For calm Chaingmai, tension has been mounting but quietly, although I did drive past a barricade outside Wat Phra Singh yesterday. Still, nothing like Bangkok here.
After watching this morning scenes of army tanks going into barricades, I was getting nervous about seeing a repeat of Tianneman square. Although I do believe that the Thai people are generally more humane than that, I also know that people involved in these politics really, really believe in their cause, to the point of laying down their lives for it.
So I am thankful that the Red leaders gave themselves up to avoid loss of life. In some ways, protesting shows that at least people believe they have a voice, and it's almost a step towards democracy. I pray that the road is peaceful in the future.

News article

Excerpt from a short interview with Rick Warren

The article below was pretty inspirational to me so I thought I'd pass it on.
In an interview by Paul Bradshaw with Rick Warren, author of The Purpose Driven Life, Rick Warren said:
People ask me, What is the purpose of life? And I respond, In a nutshell, life is preparation for eternity. We were made to last forever, and God wants us to be with Him in Heaven. One day my heart is going to stop, and that will be the end of my body - but not the end of me. I may live 60 to 100 years on earth, but I am going to spend trillion of years in eternity. This is the warm-up act, the dress rehearsal. God wants us to practice on earth what we will do forever in eternity. We were made by God and for God, and until you figure that out, life isn't going to make sense.

Life is a series of problems: Either you are in one now, you're just coming out of one or you're getting ready to go into another one. The reason for this is that God is more interested in your character than your comfort. God is more interested in making your life holy than He is in making your life happy. We can be reasonably happy here on earth, but that's not the goal of life: The goal is to grow in character, In Christ-likeness.

This past year has been the greatest year of my life but also the toughest, with my wife, Kay, getting cancer. I used to think that life was hills and valleys - you go through a dark time, then you got to the mountaintop, back and forth. I don't believe that anymore. Rather than life being hills and valleys, I believ'e that it's kind of like two rails on a railroad track, and at all times you have something good and something bad in your life. No matter how good things are in your life, there is always something bad that needs to be worked on.

And no matter how bad things are in your life, there is always something good you can thank God for. You can focus on your purposes, or you can focus on your problems. If you focus on your problems, you're going into self-centeredness, "which is my problem, my issues, my pain."
But one of the easiest ways to get rid of pain is to get your focus off yourself and onto God and others.

We discovered quickly that in spite of the prayers of hundreds of thousands of people, God was not going to heal Kay or make it easy for her. It has been very difficult for her, and yet God has strengthened her character, given her a ministry of helping other people, given her a testimony, drawn her closer to Him and to people...You have to learn to deal with both the good and the bad of life.

Actually, sometimes learning to deal with the good is harder. For instance, this past year, all of a sudden, when the book sold 15 million copies, it made me instanfly very wealthy. It also brought a lot of notoriety that I had never had to deal with before.

I don't think God gives you money or notoriety for you to own ego or for you to live a life of ease. So I began to ask God what He wanted me to do with this money, notoriety and influence. He gave me two different passages that helped me decide what to do, Corinthians 9 and Psalm 72.

First, in spite of all the money coming in, we would not change our lifestyle one bit. We made no major purchases. Second, about midway through last year, I stopped taking a salary from the church. Third, we set up foundations to fund an initiative we call The Peace Plan - to plant churches, equip leaders, assist the poor, care for the sick, and educate the next generation. Fourth, I added up all that the church had paid me in the 24 years since I started the church, and I gave it all back. It was liberating to be able to serve God for free.

We need to ask ourselves: Am I going to live for possessions? Popularity? Am I going to be driven by pressures? Guilt? Bitterness? Materialism? Or am I going to be driven by God's purposes (for my life)?

When I get up in the morning, I sit on the side of my bed and say, God, if I don't get anything else done today, I want to know You more and love You better...God didn't put me on earth just to fulfil a to-do list. He's more interested in what I am than what I do. That's why we're called human beings, not human doings.

Chiangmai Smog

It's March and a thick smog is over the city of chiangmai - thanks to the farmers burning fields in order to grow a special mushroom (allegedly) or to clear land. Strangely, it has cooled down the weather...cause not even the sun penetrates!
Along with choking smog, there's been a fair bit of gloom over the last two weeks. In last sunday's service, pastor Jonathan mentioned in one of his wandering sermons that in the Christian life we go through periods of spiritual rest (the equivalent of sipping coconuts on the beach in phuket) and sometimes periods where we have to buckle up and fight.
I think I'm definitely in the latter stage sadly. Oh I miss the days where it was all about resting in God! I've been having dreams like the one where people are doing rituals to call up Satan to come and kill me, which was pretty disturbing. Some things in life have been pretty unsettling too and on top of that, I have a fever and I need to recover before Friday's flight out!
This has been a rather depressing post, but on the other hand, even in movie plots, there's always a down time with many obstacles before the big breakthrough/climax. It probably means the enemy is not happy with what I am going to work on next, which is kind of encouraging!

Bangkok Riots to come?

I post this on, it's an email I received from the Chiangmai Prayer Network.
Dear Praying of Chiang mai and Thailand,
On February 26, 2010, the Supreme Court ordered to seize 46 billion baht from 76 billion in frozen assets belonging to ex-premier Thaksin Shinawatra's family.
What’s next?
Pro-Thaksin protesters (Red-shirt) announced to hold a three-day Mass Rally (March 12-14, 2010, staring this Friday. The highlight will be on Sunday at Sanam Luang, Bangkok.
1. To demand a House dissolution and a snap election
2. To destabilize the government and proclaim their support for former premier Thaksin Shinawatra
2. The red shirts claimed that it is mobilizing at least a million supporters nationwide to join the mass rally March 14 aiming at bringing down the Abhisit Vejjajiva government.
3. To cause a paralysis to Bangkok traffic and have also targeted to attack key government installations located in the capital. This will likely cause huge inconveniences and tempers might flare up to trigger riots.
4. With Maoist tactics of the "forest surrounding the town", protesters from the provinces will move from their home towns to the capital by farm and pickup trucks, plus buses to put pressure on the government.
5. Nobody knows how long the demonstration will last and how serious the situation will be - but the government is prepared for a worst-case scenario of violence and riots.
6. The red shirts did not rule out the possibility of copying the yellow-shirt group's tactics, including seizing government offices as well as Suvarnabhumi Airport, the source said.
7. The bottom line was to stir a chaotic situation until the government loses control.
The Cabinet on Tuesday, March 9, 2010 approved the enforcement of the internal security law on March 11-to-23 in the face of the red-shirt rally.

PRAYER POINTS:
1. The Lord to bring peace into the situation and that there will be no violence, injuries or loss of life. (Isaiah 60:18)
2. The Lord to give wisdom and strategies to the government how to solve problems (Psalm 20:7)
3. The Lord to protect innocent citizens (Psalm 10:12-14)
4. The Lord to supernaturally expose to the government authorities secrets plans to hurt the country. (Mark 4:22)
5. The Prince of Peace to confuse the evil plots of those who are obsessed with inflicting fear, confusion and violence. Pray for the Holy Spirit to move powerfully in bringing the Light of the Gospel of Christ to those who are being held prisoner in darkness. (Isaiah 9:6, Colossians 1:13)
6. Laborers to be sent out into the communities and to preach the Gospel. Pray for them to see and receive Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord. Pray for them to become zealous witnesses for His glory. (Psalm 9:37,38)
7. The Kingdom of God to come in power, bringing a tremendous harvest of souls as the Thai put their faith in Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord. (Matthew 6:10)
Thank you for your continual prayer for the Nation of Thailand.
Blessings,
Bless Chiang Mai Prayer Network

The cost of living

I was just thinking about how so many people may be thinking of moving into missions here, but are concerned about being able to afford living overseas. 'If only they realised how cheap it is' I thought, and then decided to blog about it. I still get a warm glow every time I pay for a meal and it comes to under $1.
So here's some of the costs of living in Chiangmai, Thailand. I put it in US dollars and I know the currencies fluctuate, but you'll get the idea.

Rent per month- $122
Average Thai meal- $0.92
Average Western meal - $7.65
Language Class per hour- $6.12
A full bike tank of petrol- $9
A hair cut - $4.50
A basket of fruit & veges from the market- $2.45
An hour's massage - $3.67
Can of coke - $0.43
A T-shirt - $3
To go to the movies - $4
Check-up at the doctors - $4.50
To get your house cleaned - $9
To get your bike washed - $1
To catch public transport around town one way - $0.60
Electricity bill last month - $12
Randomly watching an elephant walk down a main street in town - priceless


Oh yeah, these prices make me happy.

What does Christianity look like today?

Sourced from the World Christian Atlas at the launch presentation by Todd Johnson at Payap University:

• The majority of Christianity is shifting to the 'global south'- the continents of Africa and Asia
• A 1/3rd of the world has been Christian for the last 100 years. But in 1910 80% of them were American or European- meaning that Christianity was majority Western. 1910 was a very optimistic time as people expected life to get better and technology to solve world problems. Then the World Wars happened and the Great Depression and disillusionment grew. Now in 2010, Westerners count for only 40% of Christians. However, thanks to early Missionaries, Christianity has become associated with Western culture even though it's a minority.
• The statistical centre of Christianity is in Mali, Africa.
• In 1910, only 1 southern country, Brazil was in the top 10 countries for having a majority Christian population, today 7 of the top 10 are southern countries.
• Top 5 mother tongues (the language you speak from birth) of the world today- Spanish first, then English, Portugese, Russian, Mandarin.
• 60% of the worlds Christians living in the south count for 17% of church wealth. That means wealth in the church is very unevenly spread.
• 86% of Christian evangelism is done in areas already Christian.
• Trends in Christianity today are Secularisation (old churches being renovated into condos) and Spiritualisation (faith without reason).
• Christianity in the West suffers an image problem. It is not attractive.- a quote from Moong Jeng Lee
• The shift of Christianity from north to south happened when missionaries were forced to leave southern mission fields and local churches stepped up to the plate. an example of this is China, where the house-church movement exploded after all foreigners were expelled from the country. Also at the same time Europe and America were becoming more secular.
• Only of 14% Muslims actually know a Christian personally. A slight problem for incarnational ministry in the style that Jesus preferred.
• However the most responsive people to Christianity come from majority non-christian areas.
• Most of the world are Muslims or Christians. In Asia, the Phillipines is the only majority Christian.
• Over the last 100 years in Asia, folk religion has been dying out but Islam and agnosticism is rising. In Asia most of the Christians are in the Phillipines, Indonesia and then Vietnam.
• As Christianity is no longer a Western dominated religion demographically the question is is: "Is christianity going to be like Mangoes or bananas?"
  Bananas are yellow on the outside, white on the inside. Mangoes are yellow on the outside and yellow inside.

Loren in Korea

In the 70's Loren went to Korea which was such a poor country that at a meeting with 2,000 people not a single one owned a vehicle (in a country of 80 million there were only 16,000 drivers licenses)- but Loren told them God has told him they would become a huge mission sending nation. Koreans said 'How is this possible, we can't even get passports?'...and look at them now!