The Mays’ Weblog

Dear all,
I am taking the opportunity to write to you from Prachuap, several hours south of Bangkok, where we are staying at the OMF guest house with the Olivers, Crannages and the Wests, who are visiting from Angmering. It is very hot here and I am pleased to be sitting in the air-conditioned computer room for a bit.
I shall not bore you with our holiday details, as they are much the same as any other spring break at a tropical paradise Thailand beach, but will tell you instead about some of the encouraging happenings at school. The week before last was set aside as the annual spiritual emphasis week. This is a week in which special time is set aside to bring challenge and development to students’ faith. Every day there was an hour set aside for the guest speaker to speak to all the students together on a developing theme which in this case was that of becoming mature in our ability to love one others and allow ourselves to be loved by others as God intends. e had spent some time previous to this praying that God would open hearts and minds during this time. The students asked for additional evening sessions on two of the days in which they divided in to smaller groups and chatted and prayed for one another. This was entirely student-driven; it is wonderful to see the passion there is to grasp hold of what God has as he transforms lives and anoints individuals for his purpose.

The last day of the week was set aside for ministry to others in the community. I am a 9th grade (14-15yrs) sponsor and so escorted them to a nearby school where we have some links and we spent the day doing a variety of tasks; cleaning and painting the outside wall, replanting the garden area, repaving the playground, teaching English and running games and craft activities for the kindergarten and preschool children who are not on their summer holiday at the moment. The boys in my group worked very hard getting the wall finished and I was proud to be there alongside them. It looked great.

On the following day we had a celebration to end the month of prayer and fasting in the school and this was a really great time. there are a number of different churches in Chiang Mai which staff, students and parents attend and so we do not get to worship together as a rule so this was a special time and as we shared communion together I felt again what a blessing it was to enjoy such unity within this group, from different countries and denominations yet with a shared vision and faith.

On a practical note, we are still very short of teachers for many areas as the school grows. In the science department we need two more teachers for next year, without which courses simply will not run; we cannot stretch existing resources (me included) any further! See www.gisthailand.org for updated details.

Well, bye again for now,

Andrew

This entry was posted on Wednesday, April 4th, 2007 at 14:46 and is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.