Family

When Calvin was going to be born, we planned on my parents flying in to Thailand to see the baby, but then Covid hit and that had to be postponed. Now Calvin is 2 and a half years old, and finally, Grandma and Grandpa, and Uncle Zach too got the opportunity to come vacation in Thailand for a couple weeks. I'm sure you have seen plenty of pictures already, but if not, check out my profile, and the gallery down below. We spent a week in Krabi visiting islands, and seeing all God's beautiful creation in Thailand. Calvin enjoyed his time with grandparents. Its been a long time since i have seen my folks and my brother, and maybe its just me, or maybe its men in general, but i have trouble expressing how i feel, but now, even after everyone has flown home, i am left with a warmness that is family. Distance is difficult, but i love my family, and i know they love me and support me and my work here. The conscience decision of staying here in Thailand to continue in labor for Thailand really manifests when I had to watch them fly off without me, but, i just have to look down at my beautiful son and at my lovely wife and remember that even though my visa says "nonimmigrant", this is where i belong. My prayer is that God's Kingdom come, his will be done in Thailand as it is in heaven, and i ask that my Thai family, and American family will work together to this end, for God's name's sake. 

Transportation 

So about 9 years ago i asked for support to buy a motorcycle that would be suitable for ministry in both city and country. There were 2 supporters who gave me some money to buy the motorcycle when i really didn't have anything. That little motorcycle has kept kicking all these years and is better than new now. I don't think i could bring myself to sell it actually, mainly because motorbikes are so necessary in this city, and even though fang has her own, if something happens, we will need a backup, but also because its great for handling the steep country back roads and fruit picking trails in the mountains that fangs bike just can't take. But both of our vehicles are very small motorbikes. We plan on having more children, and we will need a bigger vehicle. Currently Calvin stands in front holding onto the mirrors. Its not the most ideal situation, though quite normal here. Its certainly not safe but we often don't have a choice. A vehicle would allow us to go pick up things that we need for ministry, work, home, and would save a huge amount on delivery because delivery fees are going way up post-covid. I really wish we had a picture of how many groceries we can fit on a motorbike, which is what we used to have to do before covid. For ministry, mainly a vehicle would allow us to go pick people up and bring them to our meeting if they mentioned transportation as an issue. 

So an aunt of fangs has decided to sell her fathers suv which is a Malaysian import. Its a nice 4x4 mini suv that is really in quite good condition. The vehicle has not been driven too often, and has very low milage, and has never been wrecked. They as selling it for 65,000 baht which is about 2000 dollars, which is a very very good deal, normally vehicles in Thailand sell for 2 or 3 times the amount they do in the states, but this appears to be a good deal. Coming from family, we can trust the previous owner. The horn is broken, and the aircon doesn't work anymore, but these can be repaired. My grandmother has donated a 1000 dollars towards this vehicle, and i am left with a 1000 dollars to pay. If you one of those who likes to support for a specific cause, this is the opportunity. The vehicle is called a Perodua Kembara 4x4 if you are curious. This would allow us to move forward swiftly in our ministry, and businesses, as well as supporting our family's needs. I do plan on putting gospel stickers all over the vehicle, as well as our business logos, and will probably buy a roof rack and bumper gaurds in the future if we are able to. Feel free to send me a message or talk to my parents as well, they were able to see it and see it in action. Thanks again.

Plans

I want to do a couple tracts, i think i might do one called 3 hills to die on, and another called the 3rd gender and homosexuality, as i have not done a tract about this yet, it is a very common issue in Thailand. I will include some statistics and additional information as well as to leave someone without excuse. I plan on focusing more on organization if i can this month. I will also work on the website tracts that i started on the past couple months. I'll do what is can do as efficiently as i can. I feel refreshed after vacation and ready to get back to work. Thankyou for everyone who continually prays for us and our effort here. Thankyou to those of you who have supported us, and continue to support us. 

​Merry Christmas and Happy New Years! I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday time spent with family. We are getting ready for my family coming to visit for the first time. My parents and one of my brothers Zach are going to fly in mid January. We will spend some time in Krabi on vacation, and some time here in Nakhon. We have lots planned. I am most excited about Calvin getting to meet his grandparents and uncle though. I also really look forward to showing my parents everything that is Thailand and actually walking them through what we do and what life is like here. Its been a while since we have met in person, but i am thankful for video chat, that helps a lot. I have managed to get by this holiday season and prepare everything for when my folks come, but its pretty close financially. Right now we are still paying half on rent because of covid, and they have not asked us to start paying the full amount yet, but i fear that when they do we will be in a real pickle. If you can consider supporting us monthly, that would help a lot. I would be able to do more ministry and not have to worry so much about making extra money on the side. Right now i have 2 supporters who have faithfully supported me with enough to pay our bills. I hope that they continue to support us, but i just don't know what the future holds. This is the most difficult part of being a missionary, asking for help and trusting God to provide. If you can support us, please go to reformation.thaitracts.org and there is a link to help get you set up. Now on to the newsletter

Family

We have been sick on and off but not too bad for the past couple months. We still have the sniffles but we are doing ok. Calvin is still not talking much but he manages to say a few things using his abcs like when he wants to learn his abcs again, he says "ac's" and when he wants vitamin c he says "c" and when he wants to sing he says "see" without the ng unfortunately. So as you see, communication can be difficult, when he gets frustrated he just grabs me by the neck and try's to strangle me… really, not joking, no doubt he's our kid, he is like the terrifying combination of both of our personalities rolled up into one. But he is very very happy almost all the time. Took Calvin to the local church and he loved singing along. He seemed to like the preaching too. I pray someday the boy plants churches himself. I think he will be more effective than me, if people accept him as Thai… which i honestly don't know about, but i hope they do. 

Fang has and aunt who is selling a 4x4 suv for very cheap, and it is in almost perfect condition. We really want to hop on the opportunity but we will need to borrow money from family and pay them back, so please consider supporting us, a vehicle would be a great resource for our business' and our ministry, also a growing family, we don't know when we will have another child, but we can't drive everyone around on motorbikes, thats not safe and not ideal. That being said, we have to do what we have to do, and if God only provides motorcycles, then thats how we have to get around. 

Tracts

This month i finished up the parable card printing, and the printer broke, one repairman tried to charge me an arm and a leg to repair it, but then i remembered it might still be under warranty, so i found the center and they repaired it for free, and i finished printing the cards, had to make changes to the printing layout a dozen times, and none of them were easy. Fortunately i think i got it perfect now, so i can use this template for later batches. I started to update one of my tracts into an online interactive tract, so do check that out. It takes time, but i did hit multiple birds with one stone, the verses are all images that can be downloaded and shared, and this makes for a more useful tract that could be used for a sermon, or in your phone, or sharing verses to your friend. I think we all like the feature in the bible app that does this, so i wanted to take that idea and make those kind of typographic images in thai, it takes a while but i think i can do 10 a day if i get a tad quicker. Then i can turn all the tracts ive done so far into these interactive online versions. 

I need to update the islam tract, so ive started working on an addition. I need to explain the christian cults in arabia and their texts that the rest of christianity rejected, that the quran quotes almost word for word sometimes. This is an easy thing to start, but not so easy to make comprehensive. And eventually ill have to make all these available in english, which i can, but just have to format them and upload. 

I started to outline a childrens book, about real christmas, explaining the true meaning of christmas, and all the christmas traditions and their likely origins, including the story of st. nick. I think a book like this is needed in english, but even more so in thai, where christmas is not celebrated, but is still enjoyed at schools and so on, i think their is an opportunity to rectify the culture of christmas and take it back from the coca-cola company. 

Building

I finished up some log stools and only have to give them their final sanding and finish, this is mainly to clean up the place before my folks come. I filled in a hole with concrete that mice were able to get into the storage room through, but there are more potential spots so ill have to fill the entire length of that wall in between the roof frame and the bricks. Its amazing how these mice can scale a completely flat wall. Fortunately i have a dozen traps waiting for them and they never get very far. We actually haven't had problems for a few months, but here they come again, maybe its cold outside. 

So every newyears i take the time to look at the philosophy of work efficiency. I have tried splitting up work on different days, but recently ive given more thought to splitting it up hourly instead of daily. This is mainly because what happens day to day can be very hard to predict, and also because doing something for too long can take the joy out of it. So my split up looks something like 2 hours for family focus time (will include homeschooling, i know this is hopeful but i want calvins homeschooling to be very independent and his work, so that 2 hours is me and his mom helping, but may end up being 2 hours with dad, 2 hours with mom, and some help from grandma), then 2 hours for writing (mostly tracts), then 2 hours for building (im going to try to keep a focus on efficiency and what will yield the highest profit per hour, in addition to work needed around the house, which i should mostly be done with in a year), then 1 full hour lesson prep (preparing repeatable lessons will be useful for homeschooling as well, this time is probably more for creating actual teaching resources i can't buy rather than traditional lesson prep), then 2 hours teaching (on average, some days more, some less), and 2 hours of rest with the family in the evening before bed. This leaves a few hours to spare, which is important, because i never know when im going to get stuck in an hour long conversation with someone. I don't want to avoid these conversations, which i sometimes have the bad habit of doing if i have a lot of work to do. This is just what i think will work for this coming year. These are just averages, i won't be following the clock exactly but just for the sake of due diligence. 

Conclusion

When God calls you do do something, do it, and do it with all your heart, even if you don't know exactly how everything will fit together. Trust God, and he will provide, the worker deserves his wages, Gods servants will not starve. (i eat well thanks to my wife, but paying the bills is the hard one) This coming year i am hopeful that we will be fruitful and productive in our work, spreading the good news and blessing those around us, our fellow missionaries, our fellow believers, our customers, our students. Thankyou for your continued prayer and support. Fang says thankyou too and Calvin says "a oo".