Welcome to PlaaPlaaPlaa!

So you may be wondering why PlaaPlaaPlaa? What are those strange fish symbols above? What is ปลา and what does it mean? In short, this is a blog site, so surely there's going to be plenty of rambling. Unfortunately BlahBlahBlah was already taken, so I had to settle for the 'Plaa'. But there's actually more to it then just ramblings. The first fish symbol is actually a Christian symbol meaning ICTHUS - a greek acronymn which means "Jesus Christ is God's Son, the Saviour". The other strange letters you see in the last fish is actually the thai word for fish which funnily enough is pronounced "Plaa". So when you put it all together, this site is going to be my ramblings in telling people about how Jesus Christ is God's Son, the Saviour in Thailand (with plenty of good stories about food in between). Happy reading.

Friday, February 29, 2008

Pi Dai

Thanks for all of your prayers for Pi Dai and his family. I can't even begin to imagine what they're going through right now, but it was nice to be able to go visit him and his family at their house in Samoeng. What we thought was going to be an hours drive out to their house, ended up being 2 1/2hrs - 80km of REALLY windy roads through the mountains. But it was worth it i reckon. To show his family that their Christian brothers and sisters do care for them and are thinking and praying for them. I'm not so sure that many of his family are christian, so hopefully our visit was also a good witness to them.

When we went out there, we got to pray for the family, spend some time chatting (well, i sat and listened), and got to eat some of the sweetest strawberries i've ever eaten (as they live right near some strawberry fields). It was encouraging to see a small community of people there bonding together at this time making crepe paper flowers and other decorations which will be used for the funeral. In so many ways, it was really surreal being out there and being a part of their preparation time (as brief as it was), but something that really touched me and challenged me to be trusting in God and wanting to encourage others to do the same, no matter how tough life gets. There are just so many things that we don't understand about the way that God does things, but i hope and pray that through our sufferings, God will be strengthening us to trust him more and to look forward and long for the day that Jesus returns - when there will be no more crying, mourning or pain.


Pi Dai's house in Sameong


praying for the family


Norng Dar's coffin


The view from Pi Dai's house

For those who are praying:
- please keep on praying for Pi Dai and his family (he's also got 7month old twins and another child - i think about 3yrs old)
- pray for our church as we try to keep on encouraging him, even though there is some distance now
- pray that each of us will continue to look forward to the day when Jesus returns and to live our lives in light of that, and to make the most of every opportunity, cos we really don't know what's around the corner