2011 is GONE!!!

Another year has flown by, we are all older and hopefully wiser, however...we are not any faster. The office here in Chiang Mai has been closed since Dec. 23 and will reopen again on Tuesday, Jan. 3rd.

Pook went home to LopBuri for Christmas with her family. Everybody else stayed here in town and rested and enjoyed cool weather. It is nice to wake up of natural causes. No alarm clock to jolt you into consciousness , just coasting awake as the sun filters through the window. Really nice.

As many of you may have noticed, the world did not come to an end at the dawning of 2012 like the Mayan calendar predicted. The Mayans practiced human sacrifice which proves that they didn't have their act together anyway, so why would anybody listen to them? So now, since the world didn't actually come to an end, it is time to plan for the year ahead. I was waiting till today to actually begin planning just in case, but now it is time to get it in gear. I only have 3 and a half hours to get 2012 mapped out. Here are my plans so far. Tomorrow morning I plan to get up, Lord willing.

The next part may take a little more time to sort out. However, the following day is Tuesday and the office opens back up which means back to the alarm clock jolting. We do not know what 2012 holds for any of us, but we can look back on 2011 and see God's hand of blessing and provision in our ministry and in our personal lives and in the lives of our family, friends, and co-workers.

Pook saw both of her parents accept Christ as Savior, Tom and my granddaughter, Kaylee, was saved in 2011. Thousands of Burmese Bibles went to their home. The illustrated Bible story book saw several new languages translated, one of which was Russian. The devil fought that Russian translation for all he was worth, but God had the last word and it was finally finished after almost a 3 year-long struggle to get it translated and proofread. Our Pakistani translators finally won their refugee status victory with the UNHCR, and are now on the fast track to relocation. They are growing spiritually by leaps and bounds and have real joy in the Lord. The persecution they have suffered in Pakistan is unfathomable to those of us who have never had to walk that path.

These victories were certainly not without struggles. The whole team here has been through the wringer with health issues, financial problems, and all the other things that satan throws in the path of those who are striving to serve God. But God has seen us through and we are looking ahead to 2012 with the anticipation that He will do the same again this year.

We do actually have a few plans for the upcoming year. We plan to expand our video ministry and are now purchasing the equipment to do this. This is a real step of faith, because the equipment to do this is not cheap. We are waiting on the Lord to see what and/or who He will send our way this year to help with this. We, of course, will always be striving to get the printed Word into countries where it is desperately needed. That project has been our life for over 33 years, and we are plowing forward with that, as we always have.

I will write more a little later, possibly this week or next. Until then I will answer a question that is asked me all the time by almost everybody. Everybody wants to know what we need and what they should pray for. I tell everybody the same thing. We need health, and strength to carry on, please pray for that. However, on the physical level I would like for you to pray for us to have a dependable vehicle. We have a van that is on its last leg and a car that goes into the auto shop yet again on Tuesday. Neither of these vehicles is dependable enough to leave town in, so we have to rent a vehicle every time we need a border run for visas or shipment of literature. So, please pray that the Lord would provide us with a good vehicle of His choosing that will meet the needs that we have.

Talk to y'all later on down the trail.