Archive | July, 2011

HUGE Announcement and Answer to Prayer!

I am VERY excited to announce one HUGE answer to prayer today!

One of our biggest desires and goals during deputation is to see laborers raised up to go around the world with the Gospel, and specifically to Thailand, but of course we didn’t know HOW the Lord was going to use us, IF we were going to be able to see the fruit ourselves, or IF we were just going to sow seeds and not actually see the harvest.

But, I am excited to be able to announce today that the Lord is leading another family to work in Thailand!!

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I have enjoyed getting to know Ahmet and Rachel Hernandez more and more over the last couple of years, and I am thrilled in how the Lord is directing their lives.

Ahmet is currently on staff at Grace Baptist Church and school in Zachary, LA but they announced to their church this Sunday their intentions to begin planning and heading toward Thailand as missionaries!

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I ask that you would begin to pray for them and for next couple of months and years as they begin this transition. They have 3 wonderful kids that they will be taking with them and he says that they are more excited than he is, but it is going to be a lot of work!

Thank you so much for praying for us and praying with us for laborers! Your prayers have been answered, now pray for more!


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July Prayer Letter

Deputation Update
After 10 months of deputation we are now at 40% of our needed monthly support for Thailand! The first part of June we spent up north in Indiana, Ohio, Kentucky, and then we came back south to meetings in Tennessee, North Carolina, and Georgia. We have now traveled over 37,000 miles on deputation and had meetings in 15 states. It has been fun to say the least.

Again the Lord has been blessing and bringing in support from unexpected places. Seems like the Lord wants us to be in Thailand as well, and that is encouraging!

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Ordained to the Gospel Ministry
It was a great honor of mine to be ordained on June 23rd by my church and 15 other ordained ministers that sat on my ordination council.

I am very glad that the Lord has put me into the ministry, called me to preach, and directed us to Thailand and I count it a great privilege to have friends in the ministry that would demonstrate confidence in me by laying hands on me and commend me to the Lord.

Setup Fund
Our next step toward Thailand is rapidly approaching and we are working at having enough for the big costs of moving permanently to the other side of the world. Any funds received that are designated toward our ‘Setup Fund’ will go directly toward these costs. If you would like to give toward that just make sure you have it designated ‘Setup Fund.”

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VisionTour Thailand 2012 Update
We currently have 27 people that have indicated strong interest in joining us as we take a trip to Thailand next year. One of our goals on deputation is to see more laborers raised up for the field and we are praying that this will be something that the Lord will use to call more into the field of labor.

If you are interested in more information, go to projectthailand.net/trip.

Thank you for praying and supporting us. Pray that the Lord would use us as we travel and especially that he would raise up laborers for Thailand.

Yours for the Gospel in Thailand, 
Philip and Lori Bassham


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George Mueller’s 6 Steps to Determine the Will of God

I have found this method helpful to me in several points in my life and just came across it again recently.

Here is more about George on Wikipedia

1. I seek to get my heart into such a state that it has no will of its own in a given matter. When you’re ready to do the Lord’s will, whatever it may be, nine-tenths of the difficulties are overcome.

2. Having done this, I don’t leave the result to feeling or simply impression. If I do so, I leave myself liable to great delusion.

3. I seek the will of the Spirit of God through, or in connection with, God’s Word. The Spirit and the Word must be combined. If I look to the Spirit alone without the Word, I lay myself open to great delusions also. If the Spirit guides us, He’ll do it according to the Scriptures, not contrary to them.

4. Next, I take into account providential circumstances. These often plainly indicate God’s will in connection with His Word and Spirit.

5. I ask God in prayer to reveal His will to me.

6. Thus, through prayer, the study of the Word, and reflection, I come to a deliberate judgment, according to the best of my ability and knowledge.

If my mind is thus at peace, and continues after two or three more petitions, I proceed accordingly.

I have found this method always effective in trivial or important issues.


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Really Tough Problems in America [Humor]

As opposed to the third-world, that is…

Come with us on the VisionTour to Thailand next year and see some of the real issues around the world.

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The Complex and Messy Problem of Trafficking and Prostitution in Thailand

There have been complex problems throughout history that have been overcome, but they were not overcome in a day. The complexities and corruptions spread like a vine that weaves itself throughout an entire society.

 

Slavery in the U.S. was one of the issues of the 4 year long Civil War. William Wilberforce dedicated his life in Britain to abolish the slave trade.

 

This type of deep-rooted pandemic is very similar to the situation in Thailand today.

 

The commodity is not labor as much as it is sex. And it is an ugly mess.

 

A Christian worker in Thailand recently travelled to different hubs of activity across Thailand, and brings this report: 

(Edited. For the full version click here

Recently, I set out to visit a few key locations to meet with some key Westerners who are working on the ground to bring real solutions to this problem in Thailand. 

I talked with them about the issues and complexities surrounding these issues, the rise in number of people bringing awareness and wanting to help, and their sometimes misguided presuppostions and actions that end up doing more harm than good. 

My first stop was a border town in Thailand near Myanmar (Burma). 

 

• Children were often being sold by their parents or relatives for as little as $15 us or less.
• Strategies have to be worked out to where those helping are not perpetuating a problem by “buying the children” from the prospective traffickers.
• Finding the ones who need help is much more complex and requires the groups to be on the ground, learning some language, ministering among the people, and forming trusted contacts in the right places at the right time.
• Corruption in certain levels of government make it almost impossible to effectively work through local law enforcement.
• There are female “recruiters” who are sent to canvass poor areas and find children to purchase.  Families need education.
• Rescuing children means that you are now responsible for them until and through adulthood.
• Some NGO’s can help the children but are not doing anything to introduce them to Jesus and care for their hearts even though they would consider themselves “Christian” in background.

 

 

My next stop was the big capital city of Bangkok

 

• There are women who are working in Bangkok who are not trafficked and are not under compulsion, but they are trapped in prostitution and kept in it through the cycles of poverty, debt, domestic violence, and care of their relatives back home
• Helping women who have been trafficked is a highly dangerous and complex work that very few are actually involved in doing.
• Many people are raising “awareness” about human trafficking, but many times the resources do not make it to the few on the ground who are doing the work.  Do your homework before you support.
• Help is offered to women, but sometimes there are many factors that keep them from receiving the help.  Intimidation and threats of death to the women’s family members back home are some things used against them.
• Most of the women working in the sex industry in Bangkok are from the Northeast of Thailand, the poorest part where their parents may earn less than $5 a day for a hard day’s work.  However, these daughters can make $30 is less than an hour.  The issue of poverty and job creation has to be dealt with if this situation will ever change. Demand must cease as well.
• Men coming to Thailand are not just old white foreign men, but men from every nation.  I also saw many deformed and handicapped men.  Their need is not always simply for sex.  They are coming to fill deficits in their own hearts.

 

My last stop was in the infamous port city of Pattaya.

 

• Pattaya, and its surrounding areas, are part normal Thailand and part “sin city.”
• Men from many nations are everywhere looking at women as if they were truly a product to be bought and sold.
• Teens were offering me drugs on the streets in broad day light and prostituting themselves.  I witnessed an elderly European man making a deal for sex with a 15 year old boy who was also trying to work his 14 year old sister into the deal.
• I saw women who looked like they were grandmothers, wearing heavy makeup, and prostituting themselves.  I saw many girls who I knew were Isaan, on the streets being watched over by their pimps who were my age.

 

In every place I visited and ministered, I learned that there are no easy solutions, no easy answers to the problems.  Many well meaning people have wanted to do something about the problem, but they have not yet fully understood the complex local issues involved. 

 

 

A solution: Churches that will love and rescue people out of sin through the transforming power of the Gospel.
Read more on missions at bcwe.org.

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