Summer fun with our Rice Seeds kids.
Special thanks to the DTS team from YWAM Skien (Norway), who have loved the kids and planned wonderful activities for them throughout the past 3 weeks!
Thursday, 12 April 2012
Saturday, 3 March 2012
B-Boy Ratchaburi
Taylor is an 18 year old American who finished his DTS with YWAM in Bangkok. He decided to come and spend some time serving with us in Ratchaburi before returning home to continue on with his university degree. We love having volunteers like Taylor and have been really blessed by his openness and willingness to serve the community in Ratchaburi. Taylor has also found something that he is passionate about that we were not yet involved in and he has taken the chance to dive in and start a brand new ministry all on his own. Taylor speaks of his experience with YWAM Ratchaburi below:
"My favorite ministry that I am involved with is the break-dancing ministry that I started. During my DTS my outreach team went to Pitsanulok and we got the chance to evangelize and fellowship with a local break-dancing crew. God blessed my time there very much and gave me opportunities to develop relationships and speak truth into a few lives. Coming to Racthaburi I was sad that I wouldn’t be getting the chance to work with break-dancers. Little did I know God had another plan. My first week here I saw a break-dancing crew and exchanged numbers and now I go and spend time with them four times a week.
My time with them has been amazing. In such a short time I have been able to build strong relationships with many of them. They are beginning to open up to me about struggles in their lives, and God has given me opportunities to show His love to them. This week I had a dinner with them. At the dinner I had a chance to share the gospel with them as well as give my testimony. I got to know them better and look forward to more opportunities to share with them.
Please keep my friends in your prayers and pray that God gives me opportunities and courage to share his amazing love to them."
If, like Taylor, you are looking for a place to volunteer, consider coming to spend some time with us here at YWAM Ratchaburi.
Tuesday, 28 February 2012
YWAM Ratchaburi Office Building
On the 9th of March 2007, YWAM Ratchaburi started renting our office building. Almost 5 years later, we are still renting the very same building.
It has been a blessing to have such a wonderful place to host teams and volunteers, and we have been especially blessed by the fact that the rent is very cheap and has never increased in the 5 years that we have been in it.
We feel that it is time that we begin to look at buying a building in the same block, rather than continually renting the one that we have been in for the past 5 years. The housing complex is currently fixing them up and buyers get a newly renovated building as opposed to one that is in dire need of quite a lot of repair (like the one that we currently rent).
After 5 years of teams and volunteers passing through Ratchaburi and graciously sleeping on the floor, in the searing heat of Thailand with only one ceiling fan per room, we would like to be able to have a place of our own that we can make our special place of blessing for teams.
Teams and volunteers work really hard while they serve with us - loving the poor, the young, the old, the imprisoned, the foreigner, and the persecuted in Ratchaburi. They serve the local church and work alongside the local government. They come with hearts to be a blessing, and to show the love of Jesus to the people in Ratchaburi province and the surrounding provinces.
To buy a new building, it will cost us 1,500,000Baht (US$50,000). While this amount seems impossible to us, we know that if God is in it, nothing is impossible.
Please believe with us for this building - that many more teams may be blessed while serving here in Ratchaburi!
It has been a blessing to have such a wonderful place to host teams and volunteers, and we have been especially blessed by the fact that the rent is very cheap and has never increased in the 5 years that we have been in it.
We feel that it is time that we begin to look at buying a building in the same block, rather than continually renting the one that we have been in for the past 5 years. The housing complex is currently fixing them up and buyers get a newly renovated building as opposed to one that is in dire need of quite a lot of repair (like the one that we currently rent).
After 5 years of teams and volunteers passing through Ratchaburi and graciously sleeping on the floor, in the searing heat of Thailand with only one ceiling fan per room, we would like to be able to have a place of our own that we can make our special place of blessing for teams.
Teams and volunteers work really hard while they serve with us - loving the poor, the young, the old, the imprisoned, the foreigner, and the persecuted in Ratchaburi. They serve the local church and work alongside the local government. They come with hearts to be a blessing, and to show the love of Jesus to the people in Ratchaburi province and the surrounding provinces.
To buy a new building, it will cost us 1,500,000Baht (US$50,000). While this amount seems impossible to us, we know that if God is in it, nothing is impossible.
Please believe with us for this building - that many more teams may be blessed while serving here in Ratchaburi!
Tuesday, 21 February 2012
Prison DTS - To know Him and make Him known
To know God and make Him known. Simple. True.
But what does it mean for someone who is a believer, imprisoned for something that they did before they knew anything about Jesus Christ? Can they still know God intimately? Can they make Him known?
The answer can be found in Glory Church – located inside the Ratchaburi Prison in Thailand. Many believers gather together to worship God every week. The prisoners themselves run the service. They speak passionately of their efforts to share the hope that they have found in the Gospel with their fellow inmates. The church was started by the inmates a short while after YWAM Ratchaburi had been running a church-like fellowship around once every month.
YWAM Ratchaburi has been ministering in the Ratchaburi prison for almost 2 years now. Initially a small group of believers attended, but the group grew really fast, with people giving their lives to Jesus every time the YWAM group came to visit. Apart from the church style fellowship that YWAM runs in the prison on a monthly basis, YWAM also organizes concerts to be able to reach more of the inmates with the message of the Gospel – with more than 1000 inmates being allowed to attend at a time. After one such concert it was reported back to the YWAM team that “Christian fever” had taken over the prison – it was all anyone could talk about.
Where would you go to grow more in your faith if you were in a prison? If you were one of the leaders of Glory church inside the Ratchaburi prison, where would you gain more teaching? How would you learn more so that you could help the other disciples to grow?
This June-August, YWAM Ratchaburi will be bringing a PDTS (Prison Discipleship Training School) into the Ratchaburi prison. We will be opening it up to receive 50 inmates - 50 inmates who have the opportunity to touch the lives of 4,500 men and 1,000 women while they are inside the walls of the prison, and countless numbers once they are released.
But what does it mean for someone who is a believer, imprisoned for something that they did before they knew anything about Jesus Christ? Can they still know God intimately? Can they make Him known?
The answer can be found in Glory Church – located inside the Ratchaburi Prison in Thailand. Many believers gather together to worship God every week. The prisoners themselves run the service. They speak passionately of their efforts to share the hope that they have found in the Gospel with their fellow inmates. The church was started by the inmates a short while after YWAM Ratchaburi had been running a church-like fellowship around once every month.
YWAM Ratchaburi has been ministering in the Ratchaburi prison for almost 2 years now. Initially a small group of believers attended, but the group grew really fast, with people giving their lives to Jesus every time the YWAM group came to visit. Apart from the church style fellowship that YWAM runs in the prison on a monthly basis, YWAM also organizes concerts to be able to reach more of the inmates with the message of the Gospel – with more than 1000 inmates being allowed to attend at a time. After one such concert it was reported back to the YWAM team that “Christian fever” had taken over the prison – it was all anyone could talk about.
Where would you go to grow more in your faith if you were in a prison? If you were one of the leaders of Glory church inside the Ratchaburi prison, where would you gain more teaching? How would you learn more so that you could help the other disciples to grow?
This June-August, YWAM Ratchaburi will be bringing a PDTS (Prison Discipleship Training School) into the Ratchaburi prison. We will be opening it up to receive 50 inmates - 50 inmates who have the opportunity to touch the lives of 4,500 men and 1,000 women while they are inside the walls of the prison, and countless numbers once they are released.
We need sponsors who will come alongside us to help these 50 inmates to see this P-DTS become a reality. The running costs of the DTS will be around 230,000Baht –for 50 inmates that’s only 4,600Baht (US$150) per inmate. Would you be interested to sponsor one of our brothers or sisters to do their P-DTS? You could be a part of their story – helping them to live each day to know Him and make Him known.
Friday, 13 January 2012
Christmas is love in action
Christmas is love in action. Every time we love, every time we give, it's Christmas.
Five years ago, God put a vision in our hearts for YWAM Ratchaburi. 'YWAM Ratchaburi exists to see every generation in Ratchaburi touched by the love of Jesus'. A vision so broad, but yet so evidently in His plan for us as we look back now at all the different areas that He has lead us to minister to over the past five years. It was evident even in the short span of one month as we ran our yearly Christmas outreach over the month of December.
In the nine Christmas parties and three days of Christmas carolling that we were involved in this past December, we were able to reach out to Burmese laborers, a Karen Hill Tribe, patients and staff in the Ratchaburi hospital, churches and the communities surrounding them, people at the famous floating market in Ratchaburi, government officials, prisoners, schools, and people in Ratchaburi town.
Rich and poor. Well known and unknown. Young and old. Thai and non-Thai. God loves them all and opens doors for us to minister to them. He truly is amazing and we'd like to thank Him for allowing us to be a part of His plan here. May every generation in Ratchaburi truly be touched by His love. To God be all the glory!
In the nine Christmas parties and three days of Christmas carolling that we were involved in this past December, we were able to reach out to Burmese laborers, a Karen Hill Tribe, patients and staff in the Ratchaburi hospital, churches and the communities surrounding them, people at the famous floating market in Ratchaburi, government officials, prisoners, schools, and people in Ratchaburi town.
Rich and poor. Well known and unknown. Young and old. Thai and non-Thai. God loves them all and opens doors for us to minister to them. He truly is amazing and we'd like to thank Him for allowing us to be a part of His plan here. May every generation in Ratchaburi truly be touched by His love. To God be all the glory!
Friday, 25 November 2011
Christmas 2011
“And the Grinch, with his Grinch-feet ice cold in the snow,
stood puzzling and puzzling, how could it be so? It came without ribbons.
It came without tags. It came without packages, boxes or bags.
And he puzzled and puzzled 'till his puzzler was sore.
Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn't before.
What if Christmas, he thought, doesn't come from a store.
What if Christmas, perhaps, means a little bit more.” Dr Seuss
What does Christmas really mean? It certainly doesn't come from a store - although in many parts of the world today, you would think otherwise. In Thailand, the Christmas trees are already up in the stores. Dancing Santa Clauses with fake snow, reindeer and twinkling lights. Christmas really does mean so much more than all of that - and each year, we take the month of December to bring the real meaning of Christmas to people in Thailand.
This year we will be hosting a number of Christmas parties - in the Burmese community near to where we live, in the local prison - and possibly in a Karen village and a school. We also always help to facilitate many other Christmas parties run by other people and churches. This year will be the second year in a row that the churches in Ratchaburi will gather together to hold an evangelistic Christmas event in Ratchaburi town and we are excited to be a part of it.
Would you like to help us to give a special gift to a Burmese or Karen family this year? Would you like to help us to bring hope to one of the inmates in the local prison? We know that Christmas is so much more -will you help us to bring the message of light to those who are walking in the darkness?
Please pray for us this December. If you would like to make a donation towards any one of the Christmas parties, please contact us, or give online here.
Wednesday, 23 November 2011
Identity and dreams - Camping trip Nov 2011
Identity and dreams. Finding ones identity in Christ and dreaming God's dreams. This was the theme of our third camping trip this past 18-20 November.
In beautiful surroundings with new and old friends, the kids enjoyed a special weekend of fun and games, and learning more about their Savior. 40 kids - from Thai, Burmese and Cambodian origin and 40 adults from many different nations supervising!
Thank you so much for those who helped to make this camp happen.
Our prayer is that each of these special lives will grow closer to God. Will you pray for them too?
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