Hey everyone!! Things are going good here in Thailand. We have all been so busy with taking care of the family, a new baby, home schooling, and all the responsibilities of life. Thank You Jesus for a vehicle, which is also an added responsibility, but a very welcomed one. I am so thankful to the Lord for His provision! This was such a testimony to us and the children and such a faith builder. We knew that it was all in His perfect timing and I believe that it was. I am thankful for the time and the grace for riding our motorcycles. I learned so much about our city, I learned a lot about the culture, and now that I am driving a car, I realize that I have learned how to drive better here in the middle of hundreds of motorcycles!! I know what the drivers are thinking.
The children and I have started visiting the World Vision School on Fridays and are teaching them English. There are about 15 children, they live on the railroad tracks in tin homes among lots of trash. The families just ‘squat’ here as this is government property and they do not have to buy it. It is such a sad situation. The school that we visit is run by two thai ladies who are Christians and were once funded by ‘World Vision Outreach’. I understand that now(from my limited understanding of thai) they are receiving NO funding from this organization. We are trying to provide their rice for them each month. There ‘school’ is in such pitiful shape that someone keeps crawling in through a hole in the bathroom and stealing the rice!
One day when we arrived there was a little baby sitting in a walker sucking on an empty beer bottle while his ‘grandmother’ was sorting trash. I was so heart-broken for this child. After the recent flooding on this side of the world, there was a man sitting in his ‘backyard’, knee deep in water with trash floating around him, smoking a cigarette. I gazed into his eyes and could see such hopelessness. I have such a huge vision for this area, but of course I must do only what I can at this time. There are not enough workers. Wouldn’t it be great to be able to help these people find jobs or to teach them a trade, help them build a home, or move out of this garbage dump!! I have to constantly remind myself that I have 4 wonderful children of my own and that I must care for them first, not to mention my husband and myself.
That leads me to say that we all do need prayer and more of it. We have all been sick, at least one of us, for 4 weeks now. It is so rainy and hot here that any cut, blister, mosquito bite, etc… is taking weeks to heal. John and I are constantly reminded to put God first, marriage second, then our children, then family, then friends, THEN this ministry. Sometimes that is difficult to our flesh. We long to see the thai people won to Christ, we long to speak the language, but we also know that our ministry is only going to be as strong as our family is. We must constantly work on our marriage and our family life and not get priorities out of line.
The children are really thriving and that is such a blessing for us to see. They are all sooooo precious and each day our hearts have more and more love for them. I never imagined that I would have 4 such awesome children. Madaline is doing so well in school, she just amazes me. She has a pet rabbit and is so responsible with her. She is taking ballet and doing a beautiful job. We have been watching You Tube videos of different ballets and she is so motivated to practice. John and Madaline are taking art classes together on Saturdays and then John gets to ‘date’ her after the class. To see Madaline’s glowing face as she jumped in the car with ‘daddy’ last Saturday, made my week. Isn’t that how God is to us? He takes care of us and gives us ‘special’ attention! Lake is reading so well, I love that part of home schooling, so far it is one of my favorite, watching them learn to read! He is so excited and runs to tell me everything he reads. He is really wanting to take Taekowondo, and we plan on enrolling him soon. Lake has such an amazing imagination, playful heart, and is the ‘jokester’ of the family so far (other than his daddy!). He is always the one who says, ‘okay, cut it out’, if any altercations arise. Gabe is still into any and every creepy crawly he can get his hands on. He is such the helper, he loves to juice all of my carrots in the mornings (that is such a huge help to me, by the time he is finished I can have breakfast on the table J)! He loves his letters and enjoys sounding them out throughout every day! And last, but not least, Moriah has got to be one of the most gentle babies ever! She ceases to amaze me! Her smile is one of a kind and her laugh just brings immediate joy to the moment! I love them all so much and am so thankful to God for the blessing that they are to my life. I cannot believe that He has rewarded me with such precious children!
I did want you guys to know that I keep a blog and if you would like more frequent updates please email me at john_lovorn@hotmail.com. I am glad to add you to the email list. It is easier for us to update via internet than through mail. There are photographs as well. Facebook is probably the most up to date information on our lives here.
Thank you all once again, from the bottom of my heart for all of you prayers and support to the calling here in Thailand. We can’t wait until the day we get to see you all again face to face. Until then, I love you and pray that the blessings of the Lord overtake you.
Sandy Lovorn
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