Newsletter from Tore and his family working in Northern Thailand among the Shan people from Myanmar
We wish you a happy and blessed New Year!
A lot has happened out here in Northern Thailand, and we have had a busy start to the new year.
This newsletter will be about a successful Christmas party before lockdown, new staffs and a special meeting.
- Read more of the Newsletter under!
- Read more about the Shan People and our ministry on this site
On Saturday the 19th of December we had our Christmas party at our weekend school.
It was very successful.
We had games, snacks and food in the morning with a about 40 children, and in the evening we had a larger meeting with food, dance, testimony, and gave gifts to around 80 people.
My wife, Mawkkham, shared the Good News and prayed for over 20 people. We gave out 40 jackets and 30 mats as Christmas presents this Christmas.
The day after our Christmas party, there was a case of Covid in the area here in northern Thailand. There was one person who came from the neighboring town and went south and tested positive.
They shut the city down and checked in the immediate area she came from. Some of the children and teachers at our daughters’ school are from this city, so our children’s school was closed until after Christmas.
We are grateful that we got to have our Christmas party before this happened.
On Saturday we had a special experience again, and a busy day.
It started with an older Shan widow, about 60-70 years old, (it is often a bit difficult to know the age, they often do not know themselves, but she is over 60) we have gotten in touch with, called Mawkkham. She was crying, because her daughter had left her, and she was alone.
She had become a Christian for about 10 months ago, and she has been baptized. We got in touch with her through someone in Chiang Mai, those who had led her to salvation and baptized her, and we were asked if we could follow her up.
But on Saturday morning we felt we should see her, because of the conversation with Mawkkham and since she was having a hard time, and we told her that we would come.
We found a babysitter for our children, and left as fast as we could, because we also had to pick up children at our weekend school at 12 o’clock.
When we arrived in the city we called the woman again, but it was difficult to understand where in the city she lived. After much searching and back and forth, plus some prayers, we finally found her.
She was very happy to see us and we had about half an hour with her, and encouraged and prayed for her, before we had to hurry back.
Now we know where she lives, so it will be easier to visit her again one day.
We called the next day and then she told us that the neighbors did not like us coming, because they did not know us, and were afraid of Covid. So we will probably have to wait until Covid cases in Thailand have subsided a bit again before we will get the opportunity to visit her.
Feel free to pray for her and the situation, we would like to give her a mat and some food next time we visit her.
The Covid situation calmed down a bit over the New Year, but lately there has been a new increase of Covid cases here in Thailand, and many things have been shut down again. There are around 150-270 people per day now who are infected, its not too bad though and we hope it soon will get better again.
In Thailand, they will gradually start with the Covid-19 vaccination next month, but they will not start with a lot of vaccination before May, and I’m not sure when it will be available to foreigners, as we are (this applies to my wife too, she is from Myanmar).So I’m not sure when I’ll be able to take a trip to Norway?
We had a great start of our weekend school this year, and we still have around 25 children we teach on the weekends, but we decided to close our weekend school on last Sunday, until the end of the month now, maybe longer? For there is a lot that has been shut down again here, but it is not a full lockdown like it was in April last year.
We were supposed to have Children’s Day on Saturday too, which is a big day in Thailand, but we had to tone it all down due to the Covid situation.
We were able to give out teddy bears and some sweets for the children. (see the picture)
New Staff/Co-Workers
We also have a Shan couple who have started our work with us now. They started on the first of January.
They have already helped us for a year as volunteers, and we have known them for a couple of years, but they became part of our team now on the first of January. It also means that we want to give them support.
Finding regular donors for our ministry is a great prayer need we have right now.
As of today, we have one regular donor who gives us about 150USD a month, specifically for the ministry, but we need at least 700USD a month to run our ministry.
A small testimony: This month we needed to have 400 USD for our ministry, on Monday I checked if some money had come in, and surprisingly it was exactly 400USD there, someone had given us 250USD during the weekend, so God is faithful.
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If you would like to Donate you can use PayPal or Buy Me a Coffee
We also have a Thai Bank account you can transfer money too. Feel free to contact us for details.
Donate To Our Ministry?
If you specifically donate to the ministry, you will help us with this:
Saturday and Sunday school for 25-30 children. We give them food on Sundays.- Rent of land we have the ministry on
- Support/salary for local helpers and staff
- Arrange meetings and parties, such as Christmas parties. (we have a meeting in the evening one Sunday a month)
- Aid – Provides food and clothing for the poor
- Expenses for transport and miscellaneous
- We need a ministry car
Saturday and Sunday school for 25-30 children. We give them food on Sundays.Ministry Car
We also have a great need for a car that we can use in the ministry (I know I have mentioned this quite a few times). We already have a car we can buy for 3,500 USD, but we still lack some funds (we have about half of it).
We also need to register it, insurance, some repairs etc. (so around 4,000 USD in total).
This would relieve us a lot! Some days, like last Saturday and during Christmas, can be quite stressful with just one car.
Feel free to think about whether you should support the ministry!
It does not necessarily have to be money, but pray for us and if you have ideas or you have opportunities to share about us to others again, feel free to do!
If you want to donate please feel free to contact us!
If you would like to Donate you can use PayPal or Buy Me a Coffee
We also have a Thai Bank account you can transfer money too. Feel free to contact us for details.
Watch a short video from the ministry under!
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Remember that you can give a Donation. Read more about it here!
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