A brief update: three reasons for much praise and prayer …

Next week (Nov. 19-23) about 70 Cambodian church leaders from 5 ethnic groups will meet for the fall session of the Ratanakiri Pastors School. We’ll continue working through our new Biblical Theology curriculum, focusing this time on the books of Samuel and Kings. Please pray, both for teachers and students. All of us need stamina during these long, warm days, but especially our teachers. For our students, pray that each one will read the Bible with increasing regularity, delight, skill, faith and obedience; then that they would lead their churches to do the same.

Please thank God with me for providing yet another needle in the haystack. Can On (pronounced like it’s written) is my new Lao language helper and meets every qualification I’ve been asking for. Thank you, brothers and sisters, for praying him my way. Now, please pray (1) for profitable language sessions together and (2) for On’s conversion.

me with Can On (photobomb by Martin Luther: pray that Can On too will discover justification by faith)

In October, our dearest friends, the Boomershines (some of them, at least) spent 10 days with us here in Stung Treng, feeding both our souls and bodies. Such joy.

Dear gospel partners,

In a most delightful departure from the norm here, the past couple months have been a wonderful, steady balance of (1) study and (2) ministry. Below are some ways you can pray for these spheres of our life here.

Lao study

Are you ready for this? I’m encouraged about my progress with Lao study thus far! No, I haven’t been hacked, but God is helping me chart a course of study that’s right for me, and I have reason to hope that it’s an effective one. However, I still do not have a regular language helper. Please do pray that I could find someone willing and available to meet with me daily. Finding a reliable helper here in the province has been anything but easy and source of real frustration as certain traits of Cambodian culture appear to conspire against me. Pray for wisdom and success.

If the search is not productive soon, I’ll spend another week studying in Laos later this month. While this is indeed helpful, it’s less than ideal as the language spoken here in Stung Treng has some major vocabulary differences from the language spoken in the country of Laos.

Gospel ministry

Each week, I’m teaching an introductory Bible study to three different groups of people, all of whom you’ve met before in our updates. Here is how you can pray for each one.

Bible study #1

Tuu, Rhit, Pi-set, and Moni

• Pray for Pi-set’s conversion. He is very attentive and asks some good questions. He says he is waiting for God to show him a miracle before he commits to Christ.
• Pray for Moni, Rhit, and Tuu to grow in the their grasp of the gospel and in their commitment to the church, daily Bible reading, and prayer.

Bible study #2

Eng and her mother, Yeng

Yeng and her daughter Eng are a delight, particularly in recent weeks as they’ve been greeting me with a kilo of one of my all-time favorite foods, fresh okra from their garden. Even more delightful is their hunger for the Word. A few months ago, I gave Yeng a simple MP3 player loaded with an audio Bible (Yeng’s eyesight makes reading difficult). In about a month, she had listened to Genesis—Song of Songs and the entire NT! I just love it when I’m teaching and Yeng pipes up with some minor detail of the story! Recently, as we were surveying the OT, I commented that when we get to some passages like Leviticus with its lengthy, detailed descriptions of various ceremonies, it can be kind of tedious. Yeng quickly shot back—No, it’s not! Praise God for this hunger, and pray for Yeng’s village, that God would save her neighbors and raise up a church there.

Parts of Yeng’s village are currently flooded, including these last few hundred yards to her house. Last week, Eng touched a live electrical wire (not visible in the pic but hanging in the water a little way down the road) to her house and was knocked unconscious for a minute. Thankfully, she escaped with only a 1-inch hole burned deep into her hand.

Bible study #3

Though not yet believers, Sopiap and her daughter Aym (mid-20’s) are also a joy. They too will sometimes receive me with whatever delicacy happens to be on their menu for the day. Recently, Sopiap’s husband Kun, piled high a bowl full of Pia, a dish consisting primarily of unpurged cow intestines, and set it before me with a knowing smile. Unlike the Apostle John, I found the food bitter to my tongue, but thankfully, no problem for my stomach.

Pray that Sopiap and Aym would understand the gospel and embrace Christ. Pray also for the handful of grandkids and other relatives who come and go each week while I’m teaching, many of them stopping to listen.

In addition to these scheduled ministry opportunities, pray for the many other unscheduled chances for sowing seeds: in the lives of neighbors, our landlord, and others who come seeking aid.

The home front

After an all-too-brief summer break, the new school year kicked off on July 31. Our one-room school house is hosting 4 grades, 6 students, and 2 teachers this year. The first two weeks have given us enough time to work out the kinks and we’re finding a good rhythm now. Thank you for praying for our kids—as they study God’s world (science, math, logic, etc.), may they do so with reverence and awe; as they study God’s deeds in the world and man’s responses to those deeds (history, literature, art, etc.), may they ever side with God over against every other competitor for their allegiance and affection. Pray also for Bonnie Ruth and Brooke as they manage their teaching loads along with all their many other responsibilities.

Imagine driving through Manhattan at 200 MPH and being asked to report on what you saw. That’s how our last month has felt, but I’ll do my best to share some of the pics we got, even if they are a bit blurry.

May Pastors School

First, the Ratanakiri Pastors School (May 13-18) was the most exciting week of my Cambodian life. God answered all of your and our prayers for me, my fellow teachers, and our students. My greatest desire was that our men would grow in both their commitment and ability to read Scripture, and we’re confident this happened. My teammates, JD, Brian, and Josh, as well as several other missionaries and local pastors, made major contributions. JD’s role was particularly important. I’ve never known a teacher more capable of making big truths accessible to people with little or no theological training; JD took my material and made it fit our guys perfectly. I thank God often for the opportunity to be mentored by a teacher with this kind of gift.

Our session began in Genesis, with God’s glorious plan to administer his good creation through the lordship of man. We ended in Judges, with Israel a second Sodom facing annihilation both from within and without. In the next session (November), we’ll see how David and his offspring both succeed and fail in resolving this horrible situation. You can start praying for that session now.

Lao church planting initiative

Immediately after Bible school, a team of gospel workers—both SE Asian and American—met for three days in our home to pray and strategize about reaching the Lao population of Stung Treng province. I could easily fill this and several more updates with life stories—from the amazing to the amusing—that I heard that week. But again, these are a few snapshots taken at 200 MPH:

• Many of these brothers and sisters were refugees during the Khmer Rouge era, spending time in the camps in Thailand before being relocated to the US.
• Joe (Khmer) and Kay (Lao) met in the 1970’s as refugees in Oregon. A widower and father of five young children, Joe proposed to Kay via English (second language for both) the day after they met, and Kay became a mother of five overnight. Kay would later learn Khmer at age 65(!) when she and Joe returned to serve full-time in Cambodia. As the only one in our meeting who knew both Khmer and Lao, Kay was a most important player. Oh for half the energy of this 75-year old lady!
• Aachaan (from a neighboring SE Asian country) taught himself to read by studying the Bible. After his conversion, he and twenty-one other Christians spent two years in prison for their faith.
• Bounoeuy is a long-time partner with us in the Pastors School. The day before our meeting, he had used his slingshot to kill a King Cobra that was poised to strike. I realized this week that such stories are the tip of Bounoeuy’s iceberg, actually.

But the best part of these stories was hearing one testimony after another that went something like this: “I began praying for the Lao population of Stung Treng X years ago, when no one else was doing anything about it.” And that’s one thing that our comparatively monotonous life story has in common with these giants. When JD visited us in our home in Wisconsin in 2008, he told us that somebody needed to target the Lao of northeast Cambodia. We began praying and asking you to pray—10 years ago. And we also thought we were the only ones doing so! But God has been stirring up pray-ers from all over and largely unbeknownst to one another. Does this not give you hope that God is indeed intent on answering these prayers? Press on, brothers and sisters. We are confident that your and our labors of prayer are not in vain.

(Yes, this pic really is blurry, intentionally so.)

So where do we go from here? For now, we keep praying. Specifically, we need laborers who can preach the gospel in Lao. The five Lao speakers in our meeting hope to return to Stung Treng every two to three months for a few days to continue making contact with a village near the border. But their work obligations at home prevent them from more frequent visits. Living here in Stung Treng gives me much easier access to the Lao population here, but I don’t yet speak (much) Lao. So as I pray, I must keep studying …

Lao study

Immediately after our meetings, I crossed the border to spend a week studying language. Thank you for praying for this. I accomplished both of my goals: (1) I quickly regained the reading/writing that I had lost from two years ago and (2) confirmed that my understanding of Lao tones is correct. Please continue praying for my language study. This week I’ll begin looking again for a Lao speaker who can meet with me daily.

Visit from Mom and Dad

Finally, and speaking of giants, this unusually busy month ended in the most satisfying way imaginable, with a visit from my youthful, globetrotting parents. It’s no overstatement to say that I can trace nearly every blessing of my daily experience to their decades of prayer and godly example. So we were thrilled to share with them another week of our lives and the many good things God is doing here.

Thank you, brothers and sisters, for your labors with us. Because Christ lives, they are not in vain.

Here’s a big-picture view of our next month—things we’re praying for and anticipating.

Making God big and the Bible “small”

For the past year, I’ve been devoting nearly all of my time to preparing the curriculum for this year’s two sessions of the Ratanakiri Pastors School. The dry-season session is next week, May 13-18. I’ll be joining my teammates and about 70 church leaders in Ratanakiri province to work through Genesis – Judges together. Our goal is that these courses would make the Bible, particularly the Old Testament, less formidable and more accessible for our students. One of my long-standing requests to God is that he would raise up a generation of Bible readers–Christians who spend their free time just reading the Bible! But this won’t happen as long as such large sections of Scripture continue to intimidate and bewilder them. Please pray for our students, most of whom do indeed have a high commitment to Scripture, that God would reward that commitment by revealing himself to them more deeply, beginning next week. Pray for their churches and families also, that they too would benefit from pastors and fathers who are saturated with God’s words. Pray for me and my teammates as we teach next week. The days grow long and hot this time of year, so we need physical, spiritual, and mental stamina. Finally, please pray also for Bonnie Ruth and the kids as they hold the fort while I’m away.

The unreached Lao of Stung Treng

The week after Bible school (May 22-24), several Cambodian and Laotian pastors will be traveling to Stung Treng for several days of prayer and strategizing about how to reach the 50,000+ unreached Laotians who live here. When we arrived in Stung Treng two years ago, we were unaware of any efforts to target the Lao-speaking population here. This meeting next week is just one of multiple new Loatian-targeting initiatives that have popped up in the past two years. This gives us hope that God is indeed hearing our prayers and is indeed working to gather the Lao, even when we are occupied with other tasks. Praise God for this encouragement and that he doesn’t depend on us! Please also pray that this meeting would be profitable for all of us.

Language again! (Lao)

The week after that, I’ll be heading across the border for a week of focused language study, in an effort to jump-start the little bit of Lao that I had picked up in our first months in Stung Treng. Please pray for a quick re-acquisition of all I’ve forgotten and for much progress beyond that also. Again, remember Bonnie Ruth and the kids.

Another highlight!

Finally, the week after that, my globe-trotting parents will be making their second Southeast Asian tour in as many years. We can hardly believe they’re getting to come again, and the halls are already bedecked with paper chains counting down the days.

Please join me, dear friends, in praising the Lord and in asking him for additional help and blessing.

Answers to your prayers …

I just returned from Phnom Penh with ten 1-year visas in hand, as well as an agreement with a sister organization that is helping us obtain these for the next few years. Praise the Lord for this answer to your prayers.

Several months ago, you also began praying for additional teaching opportunities for me here in Stung Treng. For about a month now, I’ve been meeting weekly with two small groups to teach an introductory overview of the Bible. The first group is an elderly lady and her daughter, the only Christians in their village (about 20 minutes from our town). We meet every Tuesday evening. The second group is four young adults, three of whom are new believers and one an interested non-Christian. Praise the Lord for these opportunities and pray for fruit in the lives of these dear people.

And please keep praying

I continue to spend most of my work hours preparing the curriculum for this year’s Pastors School sessions in Ratanakiri. Please pray for me, that I would understand the text of Scripture and be able to communicate its message to my students. My teammate JD who is working with me in this project expressed our goal like this: “to make God big, and the Bible small.” While that first part is transparent enough, perhaps you’re not so sure about making the Bible small. What we mean is that due to its size, age, and cultural distance from us, the Bible can be an overwhelming and intimidating book, particularly the Old Testament. And if we in the highly literate, highly educated West feel this way, how much more our brothers and sisters with limited literacy and formal education. Our prayer is that this material would be a tool by which our students can increasingly access the whole Bible and thereby know the God who reveals himself there.

I am thoroughly enjoying the work of preparing this material … when I can get to it. In recent months, I’ve spent inordinate amounts of time dealing with other necessities such as passports/visas/driver licenses/etc. This, combined with unexpected visits, constant noise, and an earlier-than-last-year hot season, make progress painfully slow. Pray that I will make the best use of the time I have and that I will receive every “interruption” joyfully as from God’s hand.

Pray for peace in Cambodia. As this summer’s national election approaches, the ruling party continues to muscle its way forward by any means necessary. Additionally, US-Cambodian relations are strained at present. Pray for both the population generally, and for us as foreigners residing here, particularly American foreigners. We believe there is yet much work to do before the Cambodian church as a whole can thrive without the assistance of missionaries.

Culture notes

A few anecdotes to inform, amuse, and burden …

The whole neighborhood turned out earlier this month to watch the Super Blue Blood Moon. The neighbors refer to an eclipse as “Rahu [a legendary monster] catches/swallows the moon.” Traditionally, when the eclipse begins, Cambodians bang on their fruit trees and shout, “Help the moon! Help the moon!” The subsequent harvest depends on whether Rahu swallows the moon completely, spits it back out, or perhaps expels the moon sideways! One neighbor said that a pregnant woman must not look at the eclipse or her child will have defects. Another neighbor assured me that these are mere superstitions that Cambodians perpetuate in good fun.

…

A few months ago, Judson and Salem were the junior attendants (Khmer “angel children”) in our neighbor’s wedding. Then last month, Judson and Eden participated in the wedding of our friends, Pi-set and Srey Non, both committed Christians. I had several opportunities to talk with Pi-set and his mother about differences and similarities between his wedding (as a Christian) and a traditional Buddhist wedding in Cambodia (like our neighbor’s). For the uninitiated westerner, both weddings would appear equally strange. But there were important differences. Most fundamentally, Pi-set and Srey Non had no priests chanting blessings, nor did they make any offerings to ancestors and other spirits, both a staple at any Khmer wedding. While I would consider this the most important difference, it is certainly not what caught the attention of nearly any Cambodian attending the wedding, including the bride and groom. From the guests’ perspective, a wedding in Cambodia is first and foremost an opportunity to get drunk. It’s no secret that Cambodians love cheap beer and lots of it. A “Khme-nglish” proverb here says, “Why to drink if not to drunk?!” In other words, the typical Cambodian simply does not have a category for “social drinking.” So when a Christian decides that his wedding will not include idolatrous offerings or the blessings of pagan priests, no one seems to care. I asked Pi-set and his mom about this multiple times—their many non-Christian relatives didn’t mind at all. But to have a wedding with no beer? That was indeed scandalous and a cause for real persecution toward Pi-set and his mother.

…

While I’m thinking about alcohol in Cambodia … This recent article describes the sad lives of waitresses in Cambodia’s thousands of Karaoke clubs. One of the girls interviewed in this piece (named Thyda) first describes the rampant sexual abuse the waitresses endure. Then she says,

I had to drink every day to keep my clients happy, because my duty was to make my clients happy, even though on some days I was sick. I still had to smile and drink ….  I was always drunk and I sometimes woke up still drunk, then I’d go to work and have to continue drinking….

Thyda reports having to drink 6-12 cans of beer per day—just to keep her customers happy.

The sexual abuse is indeed tragic and horrifying. But it’s not surprising. Nor is it surprising that customers drink to get drunk. But what I’m still trying to comprehend is the urgency that you join me in my drunkenness; otherwise, I won’t be happy, and it’s your fault! And you must join me in my drunkenness—a beer or two for you is not enough! After 6.5 years in Cambodia and attending many different celebrations (from weddings, to birthday parties, to holiday events), I assure you that I’m not misrepresenting the common mindset. When we drink we must get drunk, and when we get drunk, you must join us—only then are we all happy! Perhaps this impulse stems in part from the strong sense of community for which Asian cultures are well known. Regardless, it does make me appreciative toward the total abstinence of most Cambodian Christians that I know.

Pastors School

Thank you for praying for the Ratanakiri Pastors School. The Lord did all that we asked of him and more. Our time together happened to coincide with the 500^th anniversary of Luther’s posting his Theses, so JD took the opportunity to teach a series of brief Church History lessons on the Reformation and the history of Bible translation. Other than a very basic skeleton of Cambodian history, most of our students have never studied the past (theirs or anyone else’s), so this was both new ground and a highlight for us all. I’m already looking forward to several years from now when Church History comes up in the curriculum—these men will eat it up. Since many of our students are assisting with the various Bible translation projects in Ratanakiri, the history of Bible translation seemed to be particularly enlightening and motivating. To see pics of our week together, click here and here.

Visas

Immediately after the Bible school, I made a “quick” trip to Phnom Penh for a meeting where I received some very encouraging news about our visa situation. As I understand it, we will be able to continue receiving our visas as before. While you and we have been praying, actually long before that, the Lord was at work via the faithfulness of a fellow missionary in Phnom Penh, who for 20+ years has been building a relationship with a key official in the Ministry of Cults and Religions. Though not a Christian, this official understands the nature and purpose of our work and is committed to helping us secure the visas that we need for continued ministry here. Praise God for both of these his servants, and thank you for your prayers for this matter.

Writing project

Now that I’m home from the Pastors School and the Phnom Penh meeting, my attention turns full-time to preparing the curriculum for the Spring session of the Pastors School. Please pray for us—we’ve begun the project already, enough for me to feel somewhat overwhelmed—so please pray for …

• Insight: both into the text of Scripture and the audience that we’re writing for
• Focus: freedom from the multitude of distractions that surrounds us
• Stamina: both physical and mental
• Joy: that the glorious truths we’re working with would indeed ignite our hearts with love for God and his people

This Sunday-Friday, Oct. 29-Nov. 3, I’ll be joining several other missionaries to teach a group of about seventy pastors, future pastors and women teachers in Ratanakiri province. Our theme for the week will be “Theology for Worship (part 2).” Please pray for us:

• For teachers: clarity of expression and appropriate applications to the lives and ministries of our students
• For students: mental focus during the long hours of lecture and discussion; spiritual receptiveness to the glory of what we are studying–may this study indeed result in praise
• For all: good health, physical stamina, and joy from the Spirit
• For Bonnie Ruth, the kids, and Brooke as they hold the ship without me for the week

Faith and vocation

We recently requested your prayer for two crises, one of faith, one of vocation. Your outpouring of encouraging emails and assurances of continued and increasing prayer have been an immense boon. Thank you. One of our partners wrote about the visa crisis that she put a sticky note on her Visa card reminding her to pray for our situation every time she used it! Our response: “Shop ’til you drop: spend and be spent!”

Here’s the latest on both matters. The new restrictions on visas are explicitly designed to target people who draw a salary from within country but who are not paying taxes. Thus it makes sense that we should be exempt; nevertheless, we’ve been lumped into the same big category. However, we are hopeful and have reason to believe that the Ministry who grants our visas will indeed allow us to proceed as before, (though probably not without a fair amount of extra time and paperwork).  Please continue to pray that we will find favor with the authorities as our renewal date gets closer (early February).

Second, the months leading up to my last update were difficult both spiritually and physically for me. Multiple factors contributed to a season of discouragement, and for the most part, our circumstances remain unchanged. But my outlook, energy level, eagerness to pursue my calling here, and interest in the people around me have improved dramatically. And that, almost immediately after Bonnie Ruth’s call for prayer. Thank you, dear brothers and sisters, for fulfilling your role as rope holders, praying both for the peoples of Cambodia and for the ones you have sent here to win them.

Upcoming Pastors School

Most of my time right now is occupied preparing to teach in the next session of the Ratanakiri Pastors School, Oct. 29-Nov. 3. We will be covering Part 2 of an introduction to Systematic Theology, using the newly-translated Big Truths for Young Hearts (“Theology for Churches and Families” in Khmer). Please pray for me, my fellow teachers, and the church leaders who will meet that week. The Pastors School is one the primary reasons for our being in Cambodia; we see it as an essential means for strengthening and expanding the church among multiple people groups of northeast Cambodia.

Related to this, please pray for more opportunities for me to teach and preach here in Stung Treng. For one reason or another, such opportunities have been rare. I need such opportunities (for my own continued development); and we’re convinced from Scripture that the people around us need it as well.

Gospel opportunities

Leenaa and her two boys

Please pray for spiritual light in the lives of Leenaa (pictured above) and Sopiap (below). Leenaa is one of our many next-door neighbors. She and her three kids (11-year-old, Chet-traa is one of Judson’s favorite playmates) often show up at our house right at dinner time 😉 so we’ve been using these opportunities to share Christ with her. Like most Cambodians, Leenaa listens politely. Sopiap (whose medical and spiritual needs you’ve prayed for before) listens willingly as I share the gospel with her during our weekly visits; she even asks an occasional question.. Pray that both Sopiap and Leenaa would embrace the gospel personally.

Sopiap with one of her grandkids

Sopiap’s house has been flooded for the past month due to extra rains and poor drainage

Culture notes

A few anecdotes to inform, amuse, and burden …

The other day I was with Judson in a rice shop being peppered with the usual litany of Cambodian questions for me as a foreigner: What do you eat there? What’s the weather like? How many kids are you allowed to have? How much money does the government pay you per kid? Then came another common question: are you happier in America or Cambodia? When I said that I actually liked living in both places, a lady told me that here it’s better because we have freedom and there you don’t. Taken aback somewhat, I asked what she meant. Her explanation: People in America have to work, here we don’t!

…

Recently I was sitting in a secluded spot by the Sekong River that flows through our town when a man and woman in their mid- to late-twenties drove up on a moped. The woman disappeared into the woods while the man walked over about twenty feet from me and began to relieve himself (which is totally normal here) … directly onto his foot (which is a first for me)! Yep, and this was no accident either: emptied his entire bladder, right onto his propped-up foot. He then walked my way and sat down about ten feet from me, propped up his dripping foot, pulled out his phone and began to take a video … of me! As if I were the one who might be the subject of a Nat Geo documentary! Well, with the help of Google, I learned such practice has a long tradition (traceable to the Aztecs) in natural medicine. Sure enough, to top it all off (quite literally, actually), the woman shortly reappeared with a poultice of leaves she had gathered and applied it to her man’s foot.

The Sekong River during rainy season

…

Another first for me … Recently I visited a Christian friend (Cambodian) who currently lives in Laos but returned to Cambodia to renew his passport. He told me of a Christian family in his church there whose brother passed away. In the video he showed me, you can hear the family wailing all around as the coffin is taken away from the house on a cart being pulled by a walk-behind tractor, surrounded by a small crowd of people. What was so unusual was that the people taking the coffin were actually “kidnapping” the corpse, forcefully taking him from his Christian family in order to perform the traditional ceremonies that would ensure appeasement from the various spirits. While this is certainly a first in my experience, the fear that drives the kidnappers in this story is everywhere evident around us here in Cambodia. Please pray for true freedom, not from a hard day’s work, but from the fear that subjugates the peoples of SE Asia.

Please pray for our visa situation. For years missionaries in Cambodia have been able to purchase what is called a Regular Visa (valid for 1 year). But beginning this month, the government will require a document called a work permit that proves valid employment in Cambodia. Because we do not receive a local salary we will be denied a permit and thus denied a visa. The Ministry of Religion understands this problem, and tells us that they’re working on a solution, but it’s unlikely to come in time for us or our teammates to renew our visas (ours expires early February, 2018). Numerous other missionaries from dozens of missions boards across the country are also affected. Please pray for wisdom for us as we research our options, and favor in the eyes of the authorities.