Bay's video.

This is a video that Bay (one of our friends here) made for Youth Church Canada. Nathanael is Bay's translator, Bay would want me to tell you his voice is much deeper than Nathanael's. :)

S.U.V.

Pre-outing prayer time:)

  We recently rented a small Thai SUV.
  It is such a blessing for getting work supplies for the office and for family outings. Driving in Thailand is quite a bit different than driving in North America. The break definitely plays a less important roll over here... its all about the accelerator and the weave. Eleora LOVES "our motorcycle"! She takes riding very seriously and has a hard time taking off her helmet to eat and sleep.

Pretending to be locals.

An action shot.

An underground scooter parking lot.

Pi Lek.

Lek's Bar on Soi (Street) 7.

  Sarah, Ying, Maè (Ying's Mom) and I have been spending Friday afternoons at 'Lek' bar. Lek is a fiery 58 yr. old Thai woman with a huge heart and a very strong English accent. She has been married to her British husband Charlie for 21 years and when she talks to us, I hear Charlie, not the tiny Thai lady sitting in front of me.

   To make a long story very, very short, Lek and Charlie own a bar along one of the beaches in Pattaya. Not many people have been coming for a while now, maybe because their bar is a rock n' roll and beer kind of bar, not a naked Thai women one. (Lek is looking for someone to take the lease over for her bar if any of you are interested).

   My understanding is that Lek started attending "True Friends Church" (the one we are working with), after an encounter with a group of girls from the USA. As the story goes ( this is as true as I could interpret) an American girl named Nicki showed up at Lek's bar one evening to pray for Lek's daughter in law. The girl was with a group from a prophecy school in The US who had been planning a trip to Thailand and before leaving the girl had a dream about a bar in Thailand where someone was sick. Upon arriving in Pattaya they started the treasure hunt for what turned out to be Lek's bar. Nikki introduced herself to Lek and asked if she could share her story - of the dream and wanting to pray for the sick person in her dream- if there was one. Lek's daughter in law was dying of cancer and they excepted prayer. Lek said "Even 'Chalee' (who is a Buddhist) couldn't deny that God must have brought those people to us".  Slowly a relationship began to develop between Lek, Ying and Maè. Ying spent a lot of time with Lek's daughter in law who wasn't open to hearing about Jesus until a day or two before she died when she excepted Christ. The story is bitter sweet. Lek can't speak a word about her daughter-in-law without crying and even from the outside I am left wondering why God didn't choose to heal her. On the up side, Lek has an amazing group of friends from the church and she is sharing her new hope in Christ with her family and the many hopeless people she encounters on a daily basis.

Lek, Myself and Ma`e having a cuddle.

   So, that's a bit about Lek. I love her a lot and I look forward to Friday afternoon with the ladies. Sarah and I are supposed to be doing ministry while we are at Lek's bar on Friday's. Bridges to the Nations was wanting to set up another outreach location and meeting at Lek's was killing two birds with one stone. A free place to hang out for a type of women's 'friendship circle' while supporting Lek's business by buying water and soda.  Sarah and I helping with the new ministry usually ends up more like us going to school. The ladies teach us about Thai culture, how to speak Thai, how to eat Thai food:), etc. It's great!
We have a few 'events' planned at the bar before we go and Ying and Maè are going to continue meeting there with Lek and any women who show up for 'friendshiip circle'.

The ladies chatting.

The 'Friendship' circle.

Kids say the darndest things...

 "Can we just bring it home with us? I will feed it and let it sleep in my bed, somebody needs to take care of it!" - Eleora, about EVERY stray cat and dog we encounter.

"Look at that man Mommy, He is very dark, looks like he just came down the chimney."- Abby, one of her favorite movies is Mary Poppins.

"Hey, can somebody build a fire in here? I'm freezing!"- Eleora, upon entering a friends air conditioned apartment.

"Look at that BIG MOON, it's white, just like me!"- Eleora, the day she realized she is Caucasian.



"Dear God, please send a tiger to eat the person who took my Daddy's wallet."- Eleora, praying one evening after Nathanael LOST his wallet.

"Maybe we should buy something for someone who is English"- Eleora, while souvenir shopping.

"Look Mommy, that man looks like a lady" -Abby, about long haired men.

These little ladies keep us laughing!

Quick update.

  Sorry we haven't been updating. Sick girls are very time consuming! Eleora and Abby are ( hopefully ) on the tail end of "pink choke" and "diareeda" aka: vomiting and diarrhea.  The poor little guys were hit pretty hard, by it and Eleora is still struggleing to get back to normal (Prayer request).
They may have gotten themselves sick off of these tasty treats?

  Lucas and I are working on a building project renovating the 'welcome center' that we are working with here in Pattaya. We have torn up most of the old tile in the center.  The project has started to slow down a bit due to waiting on supplies but we are moving forward.

  We have a random un-scheduled things that we do, but besides that this is what our schedule looks like. On Sunday we go to True Friend Church.  Monday is sometimes a day off and we have been working on the Welcome Center.  Tuesday Welcome Center.  Wednesday we go to a prayer meeting in the morning  at the Tamar Center (A local center that runs a training program for woman exiting prostitution) and then we go to Dong Tan beach to feed , pray for and help out the homeless on the beach. Thursday another Welcome Center day. On Friday Sarah and Jade go down to a local bar and minister to the ladies around that area. There are other things that are always coming up, but that is a general look at our weeks.

  On Febuary 6th the Church is hosting an evangelism/ healing minister. Please pray that God would be Glorified and that many people would come to Jesus through this.

  I know that Jade has a lot to say but with sick girls and patchy internet communicating has been tricky. Stay tuned for one of her updates soon!

dirty little feet.

Eleora sweet dreaming on Dadda's lap.

                                    
   Kids are dirty in general. These days, Eleora is filthy. Especially her chubby little feet. Gross filthy, other people's filth and raw chicken gizzards filthy, not the earthy, forest, kid friendly kind. I think I'm OK with it though. I think... I'll decide for sure when my brain starts to fully function in the proper time zone.


 I recently found myself thinking, "raw sewage doesn't smell so bad, I kind of like it." I'm interpreting that as God's grace. We are so blessed. Everything from 30 plus hours of travel feeling like a flight across the USA, to easily finding plain chicken and rice to feed Eleora and Abby. It's really comforting knowing you are where God wants you even if you don't know why He wants you there.

We made it.

   
   Pattaya is a desperate place. You can't turn a blind eye to poverty, pain or perversion. There is no where to run. As I sit here in the stairwell of our room I can hear a European man conversing with his Thai prize. Ugliness has won some major territory in this town, but not all of it! 


  We met with the Thai Staff of "Bridges to the Nations today".  I have tears in my eyes and goosebumps just thinking about these darling people and their testimonies.  They are full of hope and are doing something about Ugliness that has tried to ruin each of their lives and the lives of their people. I have so much to say about Bay, Zhangy, Ying and Ying's mother (Everyone calls her Thai Mother Teresa so I haven't picked up on her name yet).  I want to share their visions and stories with you all. I will as soon as I get my facts straight and a picture of them:) 

Best buddies. Reunited for the 1st time since the womb.

   Our prayers have been answered and we are empty of ourselves right now. We are feeling pretty useless actually. Really wanting to be helpful servants but waiting patiently- trying to at least- until we can do what will be most useful for our Thai friends. Letting go of how we think things should look, how WE think we should be serving. It's really good for us white control freaks. It's awesome to be in a land where all we have is dependence on God's provision and direction. The kind of awesome that is uncomfortable and piercing. You know you will survive and be more refined when it is all over but in the moment you just want some whole grain toast, a nice mattress and clean little feet.
-Jade

Our jet lagged little chicken resting on her
new buddy who arrived 4 days before us.

Abby sharing her trolley w/ Eleora (who she calls
"Sweet Hawt" in her darling British accent).

Thanks for praying

Some quality airport time.

We made it!
After 36+ hours of travel we finally arrived in Thailand. 13 hours from USA to China, 9 hours in China and another 8 to Bangkok. We are so thankful for all of you that are praying for us because that trip was a cinch.  It had the potential to be one of the most exhausting trips of our lives, but it was actually quite pleasant.
We met up with the Trzebiatowskis and the Nelsons in Bangkok where we had a introduction to 'Bridges to the Nations' and some ministry related info.
We ( the Trebs and the Mullers) got to kick around Bangkok for 2 days.  After one of our meetings we went to "JJ market", "JJ's" is the worlds largest market... overwhelming.
Today we got an early start, as we transitioned to Pattya.  This will be an amazing city one day because there are people of hope here. We went to the church that we will be working with here. There is a lot of life and hope in that church for this city. We are so excited to serve these guys.
  I saw a t-shirt today that paints a good picture of what this city is based in.  It read, "Good boys go to heaven; bad boys go to Pattya."
-Nathanael