First of many sad goodbyes

Nephew's 1st Birthday Party

My nephew had her first birthday party yesterday which is big in Korean culture. A sad and teary moment was when we had to say goodbye to my brother, sister-in-law and nephew as they are moving to Brisbane on Monday and we won't see them again before we go to Thailand. It was the first of many sad goodbyes.

Photos of people at Cornerstone so we can remember you

Today was our last Sunday at Cornerstone. I was bit incoherent unable to control my emotions when I saw my wife starting to cry while we were sharing with the congregation during announcements. When the minister called me up again later in the service and asked us for our immediate prayer needs, all I could get out was to pray for our quiet-times and the kids. I could have said so much more but I was all chocked up and wasn't really able to put a sentence together.

• Please pray for good and meaningful farewells
• Praise God for 3 great years at Cornerstone and Cornerstone North
  

Crickey! Less than 4 weeks to GO!

• 1 week before we move (and this is what my study looks like! A lot of work in the next week)
• 2 weeks before our commissioning service
• 2 weeks before our Son's operation
• 3 weeks and we will (God willing) be on a plane to Singapore for training and orientation and then to Thailand.

We are getting a little bit stressed with lots of things to do. I organised a mail redirect today, send of a couple of change of address forms. The real estate agent will be coming through any minute with prospective tenants to take over where we have been living.
We've just come back from a wonderful holiday with Rich's family in the Central Coast. This is our two boys with their cousin Esther.

• Please pray for the packing up of the house that it will all get done without too much stress.
• Praise God for the week we had with Rich's family on holiday
  

Parenting Dilemma

These are all the parenting books we have been reading through to gain wisdom in parenting. Is there a more joyful yet frustrating task? We've just completed an 18 week course (2 hours a week), "Growing Kids God's Way" which has been really helpful. This is course developed by Gary & Anne Marie Ezzo whose teaching on parenting have divided many Christian parents and writers. Although 18 weeks was a long time, it was definately worth it, for us and more importantly for our children.

• Please pray for wisdom, patience and grace as we parent our two children, especially with the disruptions which are involved in moving to another country and culture coming up.
  

Summer Camp Memories

TC Treestump 1997 - Star Wars Theme

TC Film Night 1998 - Men in Black

Year 9 Boys 1998

TC male leaders 1998

I spoke at Christchurch St Ives' youth group summer camp on Sunday morning and it brought back many memories from the past (see above). The camp had about 200 kids! Some of the leaders were kids who were in TC when I was a leader - it was a surreal but encouraging experience. May all these kids remain excited about God as they are now.

Are you missing a tyre?

The door bell rang this morning at 8am which I thought was a bit odd but it could have been my wife's parents. However, when I opened the door it wasn't anyone I recognised. She asked me whether the blue Honda parked outside our house was mine and when I confirmed that it was, she advised me that my car was missing a tyre and she thought it was in her front yard. When I went outside and looked at my car I couldn't believe it. Overnight someone had taken our tyre off and dumped it about 100 metres down the road. Don't know who or why someone would do this. There was another car which had it's wheel taken off too. Perhaps it was a prank by some unruly youths in the street, or the option is that they stole the tyre to fit on their own car but then found that it didn't fit so dumped it in the neighbour's front yard. It was fortunate that my wife's parents didn't live too far and my father-in-law could go to an auto shop to get 4 new bolts so that I could put the tyre back on. It was annoying but at least I didn't have to buy a new tyre and we were still about to get to church on time.

Bangkok Bombings

Bomb Site at Klong Toey Markets

CSI investigators combing another bomb site

On New Years Eve 8 bombs went off in Bangkok in various locations, killing 3 people and injuring 40 people including 9 foreigners. No one has claimed responsibility for these bombings though speculation shifts between disgruntled politicians who lost power in the recent coup and Muslim insurgents. Many mission agencies have based their regional offices in Thailand because it was considered one of the safer countries in the volatile South East Asian region. This perception may no longer hold.

• Please pray for peace in Thailand
• Please pray for our safety, the safety of other Christian workers and for the Thai people who may be at the wrong place at the wrong time
  

Garden Update

Here's some recent photos from my garden. It's getting a bit overgrown and needs a bit of work, but I've been busy doing other things.
I think this is a watermelon. Won't be sure until it grows a bit bigger and it is ready to cut and eat.
I've been able to pick one or two strawberries a week so far, but as each week passes more and more strawberries are appearing. Yummy! I'll be a bit sad to say goodbye to the garden.

Immunisations: Very expensive and Painful

Luca and I had our first series of vaccinations yesterday. Luca has to have 11 injections all up! I went first and had my Japanese Encephalitis and Rabies vaccinations to show Luca that it was all o.k. Seeing me have my vaccinations he even said "My Turn" and got a little upset when the doctor didn't get his needle ready quickly enough. After his first injection though, he wasn't so keen and the next three shots were much more traumatic, especially the last one where he was able to get his hand from under my grip and he pulled the needle out! Therefore, the doctor had to do the last one again. Poor kid. Poor mum and dad too. Vaccinations are not cheap. Japanese Encephalitis is $300 and so is Rabies. For Luca and I, it has cost over $1400 for our vaccinations so far.

• Please pray that the remaining vaccinations will be given without too much trauma.
• Please pray for the health of our children. Luca had a bad viral illness this week which meant one trip to the emergency department at 4am on Wednesday morning.
  

Wiggles Concert

We took our son to the Wiggles concert today for a treat. Unfortunately, he didn't seem to enjoy the concert that much and I had to take him out 10 minutes before the end. We don't know if it was because of the loud music or because he was feeling unwell. When he went to the Colin Buchannan concert last year he cried there also and didn't enjoy it. Hmmmm.
This is the back of Jeff, one of the wiggles as he went past near us!

Call for more workers

A group of our friends gathered in our backyard as we shared and encouraged each other as all of us will be serving God overseas in the next two months, in places such as the Middle East, Indonesia, China, Ecuador, India, Spain and us in Thailand. It has not be an easy road for many of us as Satan tries to keep us from going. But we reminded ourselves of the needs and God's vision for the lost and so we were encouraged to press on.

The head of OMF in Thailand wrote in his latest update,

"Thailand is more open now than at any other time in recent history! Thai people are turning to Jesus as they are becoming disillusioned with Buddhism and their political leaders. We need more workers to take advantage of the opportunities that exist now, especially in the Buddhist heartlands of Central, South and North-East Thailand where there are whole districts without a single church."

He requested prayer for new workers as there are presently no new candidates (long term) on the horizon after 2007.

• Please pray for more workers in these needy areas