Campus and Coffee House

Yesterday was a slower-paced day for us here at New Community. We spent the morning talking with Dave and Melanie about the John Piper sermon "Doing Missions: When Dying is Gain." We went to campus in early afternoon to talk with groups of students and invite them to the coffee house put on by the summer interns at the office. The coffee house was a blast! We played group games, ate food, did kareoke, sang songs, and our group performed a dance to "I Am Free" by Jon Egan. The language barrier was a little difficult, but there were enough people who knew enough Thai and enough people who knew enough English that we could converse on some level. This morning we heard at devotions that some people from the coffeehouse and from English camp are planning to come to church tomorrow for the first time! "Kareoke was very fun," says Katy. "It was a fun way to share the Gospel and meet new people. It was a good time of fellowship with friends and people we didn't know," says Cara.

Erica lost at a game, so she had to sing the Fried Chicken Dance song with the rest of the losers :)

Singing "All in All," which many of the Thai knew as well

Performing our dance

This morning we had devotions with the JoyKids staff. They run a kids club at Mahathai 1 and 3 on Saturday mornings. (Mahathai is the name of the poorer neighborhoods. There are 5 of them, and New Community focuses on 1 and 3.) During the singing, we recognized a few of the tunes and were able to lift our voices with our Thai brothers and sisters in Christ. It was incredible to hear the mix of languages but yet know that we are praising the same God and seeking to know Him more. For me, it was one of the most moving moments of the trip.

We went to JoyKids and had a lot of fun hanging out with the kids that we saw at VBS all week. They were so excited to see us again that they were running down the street after the truck as it passed. We did a skit for them and they taught us the "som tom dance" - a dance about making papaya salad, which was hilarious. We also colored, which the kids LOVE. "It was a great way to wrap up our time at Mahathai," says Sam.

Pet loves to check out pictures of himself on the camera

Jane and Sam sing "Deep and Wide"

This afternoon, we are getting ready to go out to Mahathai one last time to take the girls there out for dinner and kareoke. We are going to do their hair, dress up, and talk about true beauty and their identity in Christ. Please pray for these girls as some of them are the only ones in their families who are Christian.