Dear Friends,
HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY! Thank you for supporting and praying for Thailand, which means land of freedom.
SARAH AND THE KIDS are on an unofficial visit back to California; they will be back home on August 19. “Unofficial” means they did not use GP funds; Sarah’s sister purchased the plane tickets for them. They do not have a car or a cell phone; if you would like to visit them please plan to pick them up and drop them off. I’m pretty much out of Bangkok most of the summer working with visiting mission teams. I am happy to host them, and still try to maintain my weekly ministry duties.
LOTS OF VISITORS
My brother, Daniel (see photo above), who teaches Old Testament at Covenant Seminary (St. Louis) visited on June 1 – 6 and taught an entire class (30 hours of class time) in our seminary, while I acted as the sole translator; that’s my dad’s idea of a good family reunion.
A team from Pilgrim Church in New Jersey visited on June 2 – 12, teaching English, playing with the orphans, visiting a village of the Karen hilltribes near Myanmar, and also taking our center a step closer to going green with a gift of three push reel lawn mowers. See the photo on the left by Rev. Joseph Chu. Next step, wind mills and solar panels! Their senior pastor, Rev. Paul Yang, is the chairman of the international board for GP.
GP Thai had our annual conference (ARESCO) in Cha-Am, a beach city in southern Thailand, from June 15 – 17. Against my express wishes, they decided to make me the GP Thai Field Coordinator, which means I’ll have to cut down on my regular ministry duties; my job description is the run errands for the Field Director.
A group of 12 high school students and graduate student TA’s from Washington Leadership Academy (Dr. Myung-Ken Lee, Mercy Corps) visited on June 13 – 19. They taught English and played with the orphans, but also devoted a lot of time for field visits and seminars, and even a research paper at the end; the program was designed to encourage students to learn some of the international issues NGO’s are concerned with in Thailand, and apply what they learn here; some have started high school clubs in the past. See the photo above right by Christina Yoon.
I’m in the middle of helping my parents host a 120-member international mega-team of church leaders from Bangladesh, India, Indonesia, Korea, the Philippines and Thailand; they are here from June 29 – July 15. We’re doing a lot of simultaneous translations. A team from OM/Doulos ship will be in Chonburi Center from August 17 – 23, hanging out with the seminary students (English Camp, basically) and leading our weekly services and outreach events. Then a team from New York Presbyterian Church will visit on August 4 – 15 (Rev. Daevid Yoon, English Ministry).
GLOBAL THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY: I am teaching Ecclesiology and Eschatology, as well as Beginning New Testament Greek. It’s fun to teach Greek in Thai; you should try it. Special thanks to John Chen for the helpful digital resources.
Please pray that God will help the various teams to learn about His work here.
In Christ,
Paul Kim
Wednesday, July 8, 2009
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
thailand mission trip
thank you to everyone who supported our mission trip. we had an amazing experience teaching english in a public school, serving the chonburi mission center, and serving in a rural "karen" village.
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
memorial day picnic
more pics at: http://share.shutterfly.com/share/received/welcome.sfly?fid=1806ade32968103326cd1d30d33b21f1&sid=0AbtWrNu5bsmLG-g
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
letter from Missionary Paul Kim
HOW ARE YOU? We are thankful for your continued support, emails, finances, and God knows, your precious prayers. We know that many of you are not in a very financially secure situation, and feel blessed to have your financial support. Widows, senior citizens, and even young missionaries are among some of our regular financial supporters. Besides a few cautious months, we feel happy that the economic downturn hasn’t forced us to change course in any major way.
SICAP CENTER IN SAMAR ISLAND is a wonderful place where young people are trained to serve God’s kingdom as teachers of the Bible. GP missionaries Daniel and Ruth have devoted over 12 years in directing Samar Integrated Community Advancement Project; and they invited me to speak at the seminary’s graduation service last month. Besides the ministry component itself, I felt blessed in the fellowship we shared, and in listening to their stories about how God proved faithful to them and their ministry over the years; and also Ruth’s cooking! I also had a chance to meet some of the other GP missionaries in the Philippines, including Konic Moon and his family that we had trained with back in 2005 in Kuala Lumpur.
ELI SPENT ONE YEAR serving Thailand in many many ways. After one month in language school, he spent eight months hanging out with the orphans in Chonburi Mission Center and teaching English in two local schools; he also spent all weekend with the church in the center for outreach and Sunday school. He got to learn a lot about missions. In the last three months in Bangkok he served in various ministries, including a slum community, Bangkok Refugee Center, administrative support for a ministry center for prostitutes, and OLC (Outreach Language Center). He lost a lot of weight and left two weeks ago, and we miss him dearly.
GLOBAL THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY will begin our new school year later this month, and I will continue to teach all day every Monday; I expect to start earlier and stay later, teaching more classes in that one day. I will also continue my ministry with OLC, including a biweekly business English session during lunch. Sarah has stopped leading the Friday lunch group, and is focusing on adding Timothy for homeschool. We still enjoy our involvement with Newsong Bangkok. Paul had a great eye-opening experience in an historical meeting of about 4,000 Thai church leaders last week, demonstrating their unity and the focus in sharing the love of Jesus Christ in every single district all over Thailand. Three teams are planning to visit this summer, including Pilgrim Church from NJ on June 2-10 (Rev. Joseph Chu, English Ministry), Washington Leadership Academy on June 13-19 (Dr. Myung Ken Lee, Mercy Corps), and New York Presbyterian Church on August 4-15 (Rev. Daevid Yoon, English Ministry).
Please pray for a long term solution for the political issues in Thailand.
Please pray that:
1. God will continue to equip us as we strive to equip the Thai leaders.
2. God will help all of us be more globally aware as we partner with each other in foreign missions.
3. God will use Chonburi Mission Center in a way that would help the local Thai community.
In Christ,
Paul, with Sarah, Lydia and Timothy
SICAP CENTER IN SAMAR ISLAND is a wonderful place where young people are trained to serve God’s kingdom as teachers of the Bible. GP missionaries Daniel and Ruth have devoted over 12 years in directing Samar Integrated Community Advancement Project; and they invited me to speak at the seminary’s graduation service last month. Besides the ministry component itself, I felt blessed in the fellowship we shared, and in listening to their stories about how God proved faithful to them and their ministry over the years; and also Ruth’s cooking! I also had a chance to meet some of the other GP missionaries in the Philippines, including Konic Moon and his family that we had trained with back in 2005 in Kuala Lumpur.
ELI SPENT ONE YEAR serving Thailand in many many ways. After one month in language school, he spent eight months hanging out with the orphans in Chonburi Mission Center and teaching English in two local schools; he also spent all weekend with the church in the center for outreach and Sunday school. He got to learn a lot about missions. In the last three months in Bangkok he served in various ministries, including a slum community, Bangkok Refugee Center, administrative support for a ministry center for prostitutes, and OLC (Outreach Language Center). He lost a lot of weight and left two weeks ago, and we miss him dearly.
GLOBAL THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY will begin our new school year later this month, and I will continue to teach all day every Monday; I expect to start earlier and stay later, teaching more classes in that one day. I will also continue my ministry with OLC, including a biweekly business English session during lunch. Sarah has stopped leading the Friday lunch group, and is focusing on adding Timothy for homeschool. We still enjoy our involvement with Newsong Bangkok. Paul had a great eye-opening experience in an historical meeting of about 4,000 Thai church leaders last week, demonstrating their unity and the focus in sharing the love of Jesus Christ in every single district all over Thailand. Three teams are planning to visit this summer, including Pilgrim Church from NJ on June 2-10 (Rev. Joseph Chu, English Ministry), Washington Leadership Academy on June 13-19 (Dr. Myung Ken Lee, Mercy Corps), and New York Presbyterian Church on August 4-15 (Rev. Daevid Yoon, English Ministry).
Please pray for a long term solution for the political issues in Thailand.
Please pray that:
1. God will continue to equip us as we strive to equip the Thai leaders.
2. God will help all of us be more globally aware as we partner with each other in foreign missions.
3. God will use Chonburi Mission Center in a way that would help the local Thai community.
In Christ,
Paul, with Sarah, Lydia and Timothy
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
mission trip: yucatan mexico, april 12-19
last week, six of our church members went on a mission trip in yucatan, mexico. we spent the first three days leading a retreat for jovenes (young adults) at mesias church. we expected 20 jovenes, but over 50 showed up. we spent the next three days assisting the leadership of a youth conference for over 100 students. the highlight of the trip was doing evangelism in the parks late at night.
more pics at: share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=0AbtWrNu5bsmLG2A
Tuesday, April 7, 2009
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
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