Together Again - if only briefly

I was very tired.

My plane from Hanoi to Bangkok, left late, and after getting to the hotel in Bangkok, I spent the first while dispatching mosquitoes, so I finally got to bed at 00:45.  Then I left the hotel at 6 am to go back to the airport. So I only had about 4 hours sleep.

Getting to Chiang Rai, I needed to do some shopping before the 2 hour drive home.  Then I needed to get some materials ready before our "kids" showed up at 3.

But there was no way I wanted to miss this.  Three young woman who just graduated from High School were coming to our afternoon gathering where we study English and the Bible and it would be the last time having them together with us for a while.   Coupled with this is the fact that we had not even seen them much lately because one of them had been away for the semester and the others had been busy with college entrance exams and interviews-a very time consuming activity here in Thailand. Now it was time to celebrate their graduation from high school.





Ching is is the comedian of the three and makes sure there is always laughter.  She wants is to be a teacher and her hope is to go to a university in the the Bangkok area.

Lai is one of 5 students on a special scholarship where she has attended a school (that is under the patronage of the princess) in the Bangkok area for her senior year.  Two of those five people will be selected to study English and perhaps another subject in India.  If she is selected to go to India, she will leave in May.  If not, her scholarship will allow her to study in Bangkok.  She returns to Bangkok this week for more interviews and tests.

June has been one of the most faithful participants in our Saturday afternoon sessions this past year.  She wants to be a lawyer and hopes to do her pre-law studies in Chiang Mai.

Because of these three young woman and others like them, Saturday afternoons have been one of our favorite times of the week.  And while it was really great to be together again, it was hard to say goodbye afterwards because we likely won't all be together again.

As we presented them with a small gift, one of them noted that there was nothing they give to us in return as a way of saying thanks.  But perhaps it is us who should be thanking them for helping bring joy to our lives and giving us something to look forward to each week.

We will certainly miss them.

And I would say to them, if you want to show thanks to us, you can do it like this:

• study hard (เรียนอย่างขยัน)
• use your life to bless others (ใช้ชีวิตเปินพรให้คนอื่นๆ)
• follow Jesus (ติดตามพระเยซู)

For the past few weeks, we have been talking about "true love".  One of the scriptures we have looked at during these studies is the two great commandments, which contain the second two items in the list above.

³⁷And (Jesus) said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.  ³⁸This is the great and first commandment.  ³⁹And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” - Matthew 22:37-39 (ESV) 

พระเยซูทรงตอบเขาว่า “จงรักองค์พระผู้เป็นเจ้าของท่านด้วยสุดใจของท่านด้วยสุดจิตของท่าน  และด้วยสุดความคิดของท่าน  นั่นแหละเป็นพระบัญญัติข้อสำคัญอันดับแรก  ข้อที่สองก็เหมือนกัน คือ จงรักเพื่อนบ้านเหมือนรักตนเอง” - มัทธิว 22:37-40