This past month our team has had the extreme privilege to live and serve alongside an amazing missionary family, the Supanarats. This family formally works for the organization YWAM, Youth With A Mission, which trains missionaries throughout the world. But when you ask the Supanarats about their title or job description, they simply say “we serve God.”
Team Gladiators with the Supanarat family. Mama Ram on the right holding baby Nation, Papa Nan (aka Nonny) in the back in a blue soccer/football jersey.
A few years ago, Ram and Nan Supanarat started this family with their firstborn daughter, Asia, followed by another daughter, Nation. But during these first years of child rearing they also acquired kids they hadn’t quite expected. Ram and Nan have been incredibly intentional about listening to the Lord’s voice and yielding to his prompting calls. So as they met these kids they couldn’t help but take action.
Bottom left to right: Asia (3), Naomi (5); Middle: Paul (7), Tip (12); Top: Nation (1), Nan (father), Ram (mother), Yud (16), Paw (grandfather)
Ram and Nan first met Yud (pronounced You’d) while conducting English classes at a local school. As they got to know her, they discovered she was living with one of her family friends who had a history of sexual abusing others. Yud needed a safer environment, but she had nowhere else to go. And so with open hearts and an open home, Ram and Nan invited her into their family. Tip lived in a rough family, with parents in and out of jail and no stable home. She had been found by another family, but they could not give her the attention she needed to undo the years of instability. Ram and Nan knew God had a place for her in their home with Yud, thus she became a part of the family. In Jan 2014, Paul and Naomi were welcomed into their home. Ram and Nan had heard from others that these siblings had been living on streets, eating garbage and scrounging to survive. Neither child had ever been to school and their parents lacked the ability to raise them. Ram and Nan were broken over the plight of Paul and Naomi, and they too were grafted into the family.
Saturday morning Jesus time – worship, Bible study and learning from Mom & Dad
From the day Ram and Nan met these kids they have poured out God’s love on them. Yud, Tip, Paul, and Naomi have experienced the gospel through Ram and Nan in words and action and as a result have accepted Jesus as their Savior. The Lord has used Ram and Nan to speak truth over Yud, Tip, Paul and Naomi – “You are worth it.” “You are capable of being loved” “No matter what you’ve done or what has been done to you, I love you unconditionally.” It’s beautiful to hear and see how these kids have blossomed in this home, beginning to believe the truth in their worth and identity in Christ. Yet, as so many parents know, raising a family is far from easy. Ram and Nan haven’t escaped the troubles of raising a 16 year old vying for peer acceptance in wrong places, or the heartache of reshaping the heart and mind of a sexually abused boy, or the perseverance of peeling back the layers of an emotionally hardened young girl. They also had the uncommon challenge of raising kids who are much older than their own. Additionally, fostering kids in Thailand doesn’t yield any financial benefits like our programs in the US. They must work or fund raise by other efforts to meet the family needs. Despite the countless challenges that parenting these children presents, Ram and Nan continue to choose these kids every day and pray incessantly for a heart from God to raise this unconventional family.
A rare smiling moment caught with Tip, my ‘poo-ying soo-ay!’ (Thai for beautiful girl)
Before coming to Thailand, I don’t think I ever believed that raising a family was not in itself a ministry. But, since meeting the Supanarats, I have discovered that raising a family can be one of the most substantial and long lasting ministries. When the Great Commission instructs us to make disciples of all nations, it’s asking us to make some bold commitments to relationships. And many of us, myself included, have often limited discipleship to peer relations. But why can’t discipleship be for the next generation? Why can’t it be for the children, whether born of our flesh and blood or the children God longs to adopt into his family? I now believe it absolutely can be.
So, hats off to God fearing parents all around the world – the ones who desire to disciple their children with a heart from the Lord. You are living out your calling in a way that radically shapes the spiritual trajectory of the next generation. And most of all, thank you Mom and Dad for all the years you chose me, for encouraging my heart to reflect the Lord, and for making me into a disciple of Jesus. May it be my prayer now to pay it forward.
