Then Peter began to speak: “I now realize how true it is that God does not show favoritism but accepts from every nation the one who fears him and does what is right.
(Acts 10:34-35, NIV)
In the past year, I’ve been feeling like God had been calling me to Thailand, and now I’m actually here!
Leaving Home
Before coming here, I had been doing the second placement of my Unreached Network Internship year, where I helped another Church to explore the potential for starting up an English language cafe ministry. I was able to use what I’d learnt from my teacher training from my first placement to suggest suitable activities for this sort of learning environment, and contacted local organisations to determine the need for such a cafe. I loved getting to know members of this church through this placement, and it helped to prepare me for my current placement: helping out a church in Thailand with their English language school.
I found it bittersweet to be leaving my families behind; both my natural family and my church family. My church home group held a send-off for me at a Thai restaurant, and I had the opportunity to be prayed for by the wider church community before leaving.
My family flew out with me to Thailand, and we were able to have a holiday together before my time volunteering officially started. Saying goodbye to my dad was very difficult, with me tearing up as I got into the taxi with my mum to start making my way to my new home for the next six months. It was a bit less difficult saying goodbye to my mum, as I knew I would be seeing her in a few weeks, as she’s decided to stay in Thailand travelling for a while. I’ve been keeping in contact with my family since starting here, and things have gotten so much easier as time has gone by. Establishing a close community where I’m staying has been key to avoiding home sickness, though there are times where I do miss everyone back in the UK and my routine there.
A New Culture
I’m not sure whether it’s just due to natural maturing as years go by, or if it’s because I’ve been learning so much about different cultures in my Unreached Network Internship studies, but I’ve found I’m now much more aware of cultural differences between the West and Thailand than I used to be. An example is noticing the communal atmosphere here; the UK is much more individualistic, but here there is a much bigger emphasis on community. I’ve been told the culture here is people-oriented rather than task-oriented, as it is in the West, and my experiences here have reflected this:
- Being late to most meetings seems much less of a problem here, which became very apparent to me one day when we had an English conversation class. The three of us who lead these classes went to lunch with a couple of others from the church, and ended up being half an hour late to the class. We messaged the class to let them know, and it didn’t seem like anyone was concerned about it, whereas in the UK, being in the same situation would have seemed rude and would have caused me so much anxiety.
- I’ve noticed that it’s normalised here to borrow a friend’s car if they’re not using it at that moment. My experience is that in the UK, asking to borrow someone’s car can be quite awkward, but here, as long as there is established trust within your relationship with the other person, it doesn’t seem to be a problem at all.
What I’ve Been Doing
While out here, I’m volunteering with teaching English to primary school aged children at the Church’s language school. It’s my first time really working with children of this age, and I’d known they were going to have a lot more energy than the adults I’d been used to teaching, but still found myself surprised by just how much energy some of them had. I’ve found it to be a great experience though, with the children being much less worried about making mistakes when learning than adults tend to, and I’ve found it rewarding when I’ve found games that they really enjoy to help them with their English.
I attended a Thai Church service for the first time when I officially arrived in the city I’ll be staying at, and it was so beautiful. The Church I’m volunteering with has recently gone from having one service to two: one in English and one in Thai. I have attended both, and seeing local Thai people worshipping God in their own language, in a country where only 1-2% of the population are Christians (so far!), has made me so emotional.
Songkran (Thai New Year) was celebrated from 13th April to 15th April this year. It is typically observed through water fights, where participants would shoot each other with water guns or throw buckets of water at each other. Thai Buddhists would also traditionally celebrate by visiting a temple in the morning and pouring scented water over a statue of buddha to represent cleansing. As a church though, we celebrated Songkran on the 14th of April by throwing water at consenting cars, motorbikes, and people who came past our church building. Some of us got on the back of one church member’s pickup truck to find others who were also participating in the water fights. This was so much fun, and by the end of the day, we were all completely soaked, and tired in the best way possible.
What Has God Been Doing Here Recently?
I believe God is doing so much, but I’d really like to share what we’ve been seeing God do this past week:
One morning last week, we had a women’s prayer meeting where we ended up praying for three workers at our Church’s cafe who didn’t know Jesus, and that very evening, one of them gave his life to Jesus! I don’t think any of us were expecting God to work that quickly, but it was a beautiful reminder that we can be expectant when we pray, because we serve an incredible God. The next day, there was an opportunity for the gospel to be preached to one of the friends of a youth member at church, and it looks like he also accepted Jesus as his Saviour that same day! And this past Sunday, we had three baptisms, including for the man who works in the cafe! Praise God!
What I’ve Been Learning On My Course
Over these past couple of months, we’ve had some very interesting teaching modules, which included learning about the lifestyle of a go-er, and storytelling and orality. We had a speaker from Uganda talk to us about his experiences serving the Lord, and his humility and obedience to God’s call really struck me. I asked him what to do if we’re not hearing from God, and his answer was to be obedient – obeying Him in the small things and getting used to the sound of His voice. He also acknowledged that God speaks to each of us in different ways, which was an encouraging reminder of what I’d been taught earlier on in the programme.
I found the module on orality and story-telling also very interesting. We had another speaker talk to us about how to use those as tools to reach people with the gospel when their preferred method of gaining information isn’t through text, but through oral means. Even when people can read and write, there are many who still learn best in this way. Because of this, it’s a good idea to practice story-telling using stories from the Bible to engage listeners more, so that they reach them more effectively than if we were to just point them to read the stories in the Bible – we could, in a sense, dive into the stories together.
What’s Next?
A good friend from my home church will be visiting me, and is arriving later today! I’m really excited to see her again and to introduce her to the Thai Church and culture.
It’s very likely I’ll be taking on more classes starting next week, and we’ll be preparing for our English summer camp by having meetings discussing that too. At the moment we have over 20 kids signed up, and counting.
I’m looking forward to learning even more about the Thai culture and growing in deeper relationships with my new friends and the wider community. I’ve found this experience to be such a blessing so far, and I’m looking forward to seeing what God continues to do in this city!
If you would like to pray for me, I’d be grateful for prayer for the following:
- Preparedness: As it looks like I will be taking on more classes next week, I’d be very grateful for prayers that I will have the wisdom to prepare for these classes well so that my students will be able to learn effectively.
- Discipleship: Please pray that we as a church will be able to disciple those who have recently come to Christ well, and that they will find a family in all of us.
- Confidence: I’ve been growing in confidence since being here, but I’m still finding it hard to open up and be myself even among those I know I can trust as I’m still struggling with a fear of people and rejection. My mentor and I will be doing prayer sessions starting soon to hopefully get to the root of this fear and to ask God to remove it by His grace – please pray that God will bring to my attention anything He wants me to process through these sessions.
Thank you so much for all your prayers and support. If there’s anything I can pray for for you too, please let me know!
Crossing Cultures with God 
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