Day Camp is Done!

We can't believe it!!

Five intense days in increasing heat have come to a close in a big and beautiful way.

Our ESL Day Camp is done, with more memories and connections made than we'll be able to process for quite some time. Despite having three Team members down and out with dehydration - all have more or less recovered by now - God moved in and through us, in all our language, climate and cultural limitations, to create a beautiful thing. Kids were loved in Jesus' name. And it was a beautiful thing.

When Suradet first broached the subject of doing a combined English Day Camp, it seemed like an idea that was too crazy wonderful to be possible. Bring a Team all the way from Canada to teach some English to kids who live in the general vicinity of our Thai family, in Maeon, just north of Chiang Mai? What a big undertaking!! Suradet and I had made a strong connection. Other smaller Teams had come and had their hearts won over. But a big Team with a job to do?

The time made sense, though. Our visits up to this point had been thoroughly relational in nature. More like family coming to visit than a traditional missions trip. Our times here afforded us the opprotunity to get to know Suradet and Yupa and the kids, and to see them in action, doing what God had called them to do. We needed to learn from them. And we did - and we still do.

This venture succeeded largely because we took our time to quietly be in this time and space with them, listening, learning, being served in gentle ways, long before we could make any solid contribution to ministry here.

And now, it's done. The first attempt. God came through. So much fun. So much English! And....and....one teenage boy made a decision for Christ!!!

I am so proud of our Team. Dedicated servants, even with the strangeness and heat. Way to go!!!! No doubt in my mind that God has been honoured!!!

We are resting for the rest of this day. Then the next part of the adventure begins.


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