Praise to the Lord

"I will always thank the LORD; I will never stop praising him. I will praise Him for what He has done; may all who are oppressed listen and be glad! Proclaim with me the LORD's greatness; let us praise His name together!" Psalm 34:1-3

I want to praise the Lord and I don't want any glory or praise for it. I have been wanting to share this information since it happened but have really struggled in my heart with true motives. I am a sinful human and we humans (for the most part) like praise and like to hear what a good job we're doing and perhaps especially if we are missionaries or pastors...we are often tempted to write a good prayer letter or, in this case, blog post, so that all you back home will know that WE are doing a "good job." Well, this, of course, is rubbish and is sinful. Taking any glory of the work here is sinful. Only God is worthy of the glory. I don't want all of you out there who read my posts to think I am bragging or in any way taking glory for what happens in this land (and that goes for our entire team). We, as a team, recognize that it's ONLY by God's grace that we see any fruit of the labor here. I also want to clarify that when I share a testimony of God's faithfulness here it's not to show what a great person I am...because I am not a great person, just a regular 'ol gal who God sometimes chooses to use as His tool, despite my weakness and unfaithfulness to Him. With all that said, I proceed with this post. Please do not look at the messengers but only the ONE who is worthy of the praise due His name.

Last Friday I took the boys and our Thai intern, Tang, to the park. I met up with a friend of mine that I've been getting to know over the past couple months. She has a son a little older than PJ and he is a very sweet little boy. If you recall the first time I met her she had a lot of questions about Christianity and (http://henrysinthailand.blogspot.com/2007/01/encouraged.html)Catholicism. I answered the best I could with what I remembered from my Christian terminology. Well, last week, I introduced my friend to Tang (the intern from Bangkok Bible College). She opened right up to Tang just like she did with me and started to ask her a bunch of questions...and Tang could answer SOOO much better than me! And, Tang, having a tremendous heart for evangelism shared the Gospel with my friend...right there sitting on the sidewalk beside the playground area. Tang had brought along with her a small booklet of pictures that walks a person thru the Gospel. It was incredible to witness and as I looked after the boys I prayed and prayed that the Spirit of God would work. My friend hasn't received Christ yet, but she did bring her son to Joy Kids the next day and joined the English class I am teaching on Saturday mornings!
It turns out my friend had seen "The DaVinci Code." Tang told me this on our way home. It all made a bit more sense at that point because my friend isn't Catholic. I was annoyed when I heard she had seen that movie but then I stopped and thanked God for the opportunity He provided thru such a horrible movie. Had she not seen it, would she have these questions? I don't know but once again God shows us He is still in control and can use evil for good...just like with Joseph way back in the OT and just like Adam and Eve when they disobeyed and got kicked out of the Garden...God had a much bigger plan, didn't He?

Well, I know many of you are faithfully praying for the Thais. Please continue to pray. God is working and we, as a team, are encouraged at what HE is doing here. Pray for hearts to be softened and ready for the Good Seed of the Gospel to take root. Pray that it lands on good soil. Pray for our interns and Thai staff as well. They share the Gospel so naturally, pray that we foreigners can learn from them. Pray also for all of us to be bold and yet humble as we share. God is SOOO good. Praise the Lord with us!