Learning Thai

For a while last year we hosted a weekly time of prayer and Bible study at our house. The attendance fluctuated erratically but for a while we seemed to have some momentum. However some people moved away, others lost interest and we eventually discontinued the meetings, figuring that we’d try again after our three months in the States. Well, we’ve been slow in restarting these but have lately felt like it was time to do that. At our first meeting only our family showed up, so we prayed and read the Bible with the kids. But last night, at our second meeting, our landlord, Lung Seri, joined us. He was one of the original members of the Bible study but had excused himself after a number of months because of trouble he was having with his eye. We weren’t sure what he was thinking about God during this interval, but last night he seemed to come back to the Bible with the same level of interest. We read part of Psalm 16 and talked about how God’s presence is always with us, how He is the provider of all good things in our lives, how He prompts our conscience to convict us of sin.

Studying the Bible with Lung Seri in Thai is always interesting. Unfortunately there is no recent Thai translation of the Thai Old Testament – and some of the language is unnecessarily difficult. Lung Seri cares a lot about the way sentences sound. When a simple truth is well-written it really connects with him and he appreciates the wisdom and beauty of those. Other times he is confused by the wording or tells me that it would sound a lot better to Thai people if it were written slightly differently. So last night we went through Psalm 16 a couple of times with Lung Seri making suggestions for improvement along the way and checking to make sure I thought that these revisions of scripture were appropriate.

It was very encouraging to us to read and pray with him. He is still on the path towards Jesus and we’re glad for every opportunity we have to share that journey with him. We are also grateful for his friendship to us and our children. He’s our “Thai Grandpa” and does a great job of paying special attention to the kids. Last night he sat on the floor with Silas and played with his animal flashcards. And just like a real grandparent he was very impressed with how many animals Silas could name and kept congratulating him on being so smart.
Thanks for joining us in praying for Lung Seri and for our Monday evening prayer times. If any you want to pray at the same time we do that would be great. For most of you that ill be every Monday at 8:00 a.m. (Eastern Daylight Savings Time.)

-Tom