A village transformed…
Ray’s truck took a beating as we ventured up the mountainside to a small village tucked far off the beaten path in northern Thailand. I actually that we had stepped back in time when we finally made it to this primitive village, seemingly untouched by time…but stories quickly told a different history.
Rapee and her husband’s involvement in this village started many years ago. When they started coming to this village, they found a village consumed by the enemy. The villagers weren’t raising food for crops, they were raising opium…and they were all addicts to this dangerous drug. They were addicted to opium and morphine, the elders of the village had the kids raising it and administering it to them as they could no longer help themselves. Witchcraft casted a dark shadow across the village as well…causing further darkness in this seemingly innocent village. Story after story came from Rapee’s mouth as she unraveled the story of their involvement of transforming this village. It sounded more like stories from a drug rehabilitation center than stories from a small village in Thailand…though as I hear more, it’s all too common of a story for this region that is plagued by oppression from the B/urma / M/ynamar army. Rapee told stories of people coming off of addictions, and the wicked visions and physical effects of coming off of long term drug addictions. She told stories of witchdoctors and their long term involvement in this “untouched by time” primitive village. She refused to give up though. She and her husband were convinced that they could help this village survive a transformation, and she continued to evangelize and spread the good news of Jesus to these people, as well as raising up a community that would sustain itself. Many victories later, and the help of many missions teams, this village has been transformed.
This man is 110 years old….
Eight years ago Ray and Candice (our local contacts here) came to this village with their connections with YWAM with the mission to build a church for the village. Ray told a story of his encounter with witchcraft in the village just 8 years ago. He was sleeping in a back room of the “house” we stayed in. The local witchdoctor was not happy with the new church being built…obviously. Ray awoke in the middle of the night to a huge black spider above him, a spider larger than him…which obviously freaked him out…so he yelled for the spider to leave in Jesus’ name…and it disappeared. He has several other stories of attacks from the enemy in these small villages. As teams continued to come alongside Rapee and Pastor, the village continued to become transformed. They taught the village to farm rice and vegetables rather than opium…they taught them about Jesus, they believed in the villagers.
Today the entire community claims to be Christian. Had I not heard the stories of the past being plagued with drugs I would have never guessed it. As I write this blog, I hear someone crushing rice (it’s a process that does something to the rice…but I don’t understand what they’re doing…sorry) with a wooden contraption that is made seemingly by hand. I hear Thailand cowbells…carved out of wood. I see huts with thatch roofs, dirt paths, people walking everywhere. But I see more…I see people interacting with each other, which just a few years ago was unheard of as the villagers didn’t trust each other at all…but now they do. I see happy people. I see people wanting to tell you stories of the past. I see a church, that was planted just 8 years ago, yet has transformed the entire community…even the witchdoctor has turned ways and told his story at church the other day. I see kids laughing and playing in the dirt…like kids should do. I saw many if not most of the community come together on the church work day to help maintain the church building and property. I see a community that has come together to become better…I see God’s love and grace come alive. I see Christ’s examples lived out.
While there are still a lot of needs for this village, a village with nearly no economic outlook as of today, with little education, with no actual pastor for the church…there are still a lot of needs for this community, but God has finally got a strong foothold here…and the community has captured my heart.
More pics…
The Church…on work day…the whole community showed up!
Girl at the church
Yeah, that’s ME playing the guitar!
The kids loved the new mud slide!
I love Thai cowbells…they’re made of wood!
We taught kids to make balloon animals
The kids LOVED making balloon animals!
The church after we finished painting and replacing some roof tiles
The village
Our awesome sweet servant translator super host Rapee…Oh, I’ll miss her.
Oh, and there are lots more pictures at
http://www.markstratmann.com!!!! I understand there was troubles with it the past week or so…I THINK it’s working again! Tech glitches in no-man’s-land Thailand are sometimes hard to fix! I’m still in need of some support as well, please pray about helping me finish this trip fully funded! Click SUPPORT ME! on the upper left corner of this page!!!
