We and the children and staff of Blessing Home wish you a
Merry Christmas and a Blessed New Year!
On Friday, we celebrated Christmas at Blessing Home with our
annual Christmas Family Outreach. As
always, the place was packed to overflowing, and we could not fit everyone in
the room. The children were divided into
4 groups to sing and dance, because it would be impossible to get all of them
in the room at one time. Also the volunteers
had to leave the room and go outside or upstairs to make room for the families
and guardians of the children. But that
is OK, the more the merrier, especially in Thai culture.
The staff at Blessing Home prepared costumes for the
children on a shoestring budget. We are
always amazed at how far they can make a little money stretch. They made the costumes out of brightly
colored garbage bags. The “hula” skirts
and shirts were made by shredding plastic bags with a nail and then weaving the
shredded plastic at the top to form neon “grass” outfits. They looked great. Teacher Pui is incredibly talented and
creative, and we are blessed that she serves on the staff of Blessing
Home.
Church volunteers came midday to start preparations for the
Christmas outreach. We praise God for
volunteers from Life Center UMC of Pattaya who sacrificed to come put this
outreach on. And for many of them, it
was a great sacrifice. For example, one
of the volunteers, Aun, has a tiny beauty shop in downtown Pattaya (when we say
tiny, it is about 5 foot by 10 foot).
Aun gave up earning her living on a Friday, her busiest day, to serve at
Blessing Home by styling the hair and doing makeup for the children. We know that Aun’s sacrifice to the Lord,
giving up her most profitable day at her beauty shop, was a sacrifice that will
cause her to have to skip many meals over the next week so she can pay her
bills. This is true of many of the Thai
church volunteers. They sacrifice deeply
for the Lord, giving out of their need rather than out of surplus. It is a great honor to serve beside these
Thai volunteers, they are an inspiration to us.
Without church volunteers, the ministry of Blessing Home
would not be possible. We are greatly
indebted to Teacher Amporn, who is Pastor Banya’s wife. She volunteers everyday at Blessing Home,
because there is not enough funds to pay her salary. She prepares delicious and nutritious food
for the children everyday, visits in the homes and neighborhoods of the
children every week. Every church, every
ministry has people like Amporn and Aun whose volunteer service makes an
eternal difference. For New Years Day,
it should be a time where we look around at who give themselves sacrificially
to make the ministries of the church happen.
Tell them how grateful you are for their ministry. There are so many times that Sunday School
teachers, children’s ministry workers, and other volunteers at church could
really use the uplifting words of God’s people, so they know they are
appreciated and that they are making a difference for God’s Kingdom.
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| Church volunteers at Blessing Home's "Beauty Shop" - doing the hair and makeup for the children and helping them into their costumes |
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| Church volunteers preparing dinner |
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| The Christmas Family Outreach is always a huge event at Blessing Home with a crowd that overflows |
After the children had finished their singing and dancing, there was a gift ceremony where children
picked numbers out of a hat to win a prize that had that number. Every child received a random gift as well as
a tin of cookies and a toy elephant. The
toy elephants were made by the women of Campbellsville First UMC in
Kentucky. The elephants are a token of
God’s love that the children will take home so they have something to hug at
night while they sleep.
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| A Blessing Home child with her elephant, a gift from Campbellsville First UMC |
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| Missionary Christine Villa, Teacher Amporn and her husband Pastor Banya with one of the boys |
At the end, we all ate Pad Thai (Thai stir-fried noodles)
and oranges together. There is always
lots of food, so we send the extra food home with the children and their
families so they have something to eat for breakfast the next day.
We thank you for your support of Blessing Home, which saves
and protects children from Human Trafficking in the sex and drug trades. Without your help, many of these children
would have no hope.
We are getting closer to the goal of $144,000 for a new
building for Blessing Home. We have now
received over $95,000.
Donations may be sent by mail or by internet.
Please make your checks out to TMM and send them to:
TMM
P.O. Box 56
Mannsville, KY 42758
Or donate through the TMM website at thailandmethodist.org
