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January 26, 2007
Dear Friends,
.....AND THE RAINS CAME
The months of September and October have been unusually wet and
rainy with record breaking floods throughout the central part of
Thailand including Bangkok!! More people have died this year than in the
past 10 years as a result of the floods. The Chaoprayaa River was a
great danger to all of Bangkok, so the rising waters were being diverted
to other cities to save the economic hub of the country. As a result
many other provinces were intentionally flooded for economic reasons.
Personally, as missionaries, it did affect our lives somewhat as we
walked through knee deep water often going to the market and even to the
malls at times. Teen camp was a bit soggy and our kitchen at home was
constantly full of water. But praise the Lord……
THE COUP
In the midst of this time, as Rick was teaching Bible classes in Chiang
Rai, Tammy got a call at the church asking if all was O.K. from our home
church. She assured them we were just having a lot of rain but they were
just fine. Then they asked what about all the military tanks in the
streets of Bangkok… Well its funny when you don’t even know what is
going on in your own city and people on the other side of the world call
to let you know.
Actually, we did have a coup and the next few days military presence was
everywhere with machine guns in the streets and tanks at all major
intersections. All businesses, universities, and governmental offices
were forced to close. Public gatherings of more than five were
forbidden. But within the week, everything was back to normal; only the
Prime Minister was kicked out of office. Even now a military general is
in control as “Prime Minister” until an election is held this coming
year.
We were thankful that the Lord had a plan in all that took place and
there were no serious problems as a result.
TEEN CAMP
Teen camp was absolutely great this year. We are so thankful for the
support we received especially for camp. It was a great blessing to see
almost 100 teens this year attend camp from 7 different fellowship
churches. The youth groups within the churches were definitely
strengthened but the greatest results were seeing 12 young people accept
Christ!! We had 5 from our own church that accepted Christ and 4 are
still very actively coming and being discipled. One is struggling with
parents who won’t allow her to come so please be praying for her. Her
name is Dtaew.
HANDICAP OLYMPICS
Directly following camp, the national handicap games were held
in Suphanburi Province. Our church sent a team of 35 athletes which
participated in soccer, ping pong, field and track, thagaw, bay thong,
badminton, and swimming. Our translators that work with the deaf were
used quite often during the sporting events and it was a great time to
meet official referees who travel internationally to the Olympic Games.
Many were interested in our church in Bangkok and also in coming to
improve their English skills for when they travel abroad. Our deaf
Christian athletes had a great time of witnessing also as they met new
friends. We praise the Lord for each opportunity that He allows us to
reach out and personally witness and meet new people.
NOVEMBER (THE CALM BEFORE THE STORM)
 As
December approached we had more and more places begin to contact the
church to come talk about the true meaning of Christmas. During the
month of November we prepared a drama which included
a mini- Christmas concert. After hours of practice it was preformed in
three major shopping stores located in two of the Largest Malls in
Bangkok, the central prison for the province of Nakhompathom, one
governmental school attached to a Buddhist Temple, a deaf school as well
as and in our church.
 With
less than 0.5% of the countries’ 60 million people knowing the true
meaning of Christmas; this is a tremendous opportunity to open doors for
witnessing in public. Next month, we will send more information about
how God has blessed in these outreaches
Please continue to pray for the work of the Lord here in Thailand.
Sincerely in Christ,
Ricky Salmon
Email address is
salmonth@truemail.co.th
Sending church:
Temple Baptist Church
Pastor LeRoy Eldridge
1400 N. Washington Ave
Titusville, FL 32796
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