Celebrating 18 Years In Thailand - Update on Land - January 13, 2017

Today is a very special day in my life and I before I tell you about that, let me tell you want I want to do in this update. I want to do two thing: 1) I want to ask you to celebrate with us 18 years in Thailand and 2) I want to give you an update on our “Beach Head Vision” and land situation.

1. CELEBRATING 18 YEARS OF “Life” and “ministry” in Thailand.

It is with a deep sense of humility and gratefulness to God, to my family, to my friends, to my church family at “Shades Mountain,” to our partner churches, to my Thai church family including my awesome Thai staff, to all the people who have worked with me over the years, to all the great volunteers that have come to help, and to all those who believe in us and the work we are doing and have become “donors” and “financial partners in ministry,” and last but not least to those who faithfully bring us before the great throne of grace on a regular basis and some even on a daily basis, it is with this sense of humility and gratefulness to God and to you that today, January 13, 2017, the Johnson family celebrates 18 years of “life” and “ministry” in Southeast Asia in the beautiful country of Thailand. What an awesome journey and adventure of faith it has been for all of us but especially for me.

On this day, 18 years ago, on January 13, 1999. Hope, me, Jessica (9 years old at the time), Elizabeth (6 years old at the time), Joshua (1 year old at the time), and Caleb (in mommy’s tummy 7 months already at the time) landed at the airport in Bangkok, Thailand for the beginning of an incredibly life changing awesome journey of joining God in His desire to make disciples from dozens of unreached people groups that are currently living in the geographical area that today we call Northern Thailand. In years past Northern Thailand was known by many other names including the famous Lanna Kingdom which ruled this part of God’s world many hundreds of years ago.

Over these 18 years in Thailand, we have seen God’s hand of leadership and blessings, and have seen God at work in unprecedented ways to bring the light of the gospel of Jesus and to light up this part of God’s world through the power of the Spirit of God and the Word of God. We have seen hundreds of people from dozens and dozens of unreached people groups become the first persons in their entire families to become followers of Jesus. We have had the chance to disciple and mentor many of these folks and equip them and see them grow and live out their faith for the glory of God and for the advancement of His kingdom.

I truly am humbled that God would chose and allow this unworthy broken vessel to be “remade new again” and be allowed the honor of joining the King of Kings and Lord of Lord in helping to further His Kingdom in this place, among these peoples, and in such a time as this.

Please celebrate with us these awesome 18 years but do not think that we are too old or that God is finished with us yet. I personally believe that God is really just getting started and is moving us more into a deeper level of training, and equipping than we have had before which leads me to share with you the second part of what I wanted to share regarding the Vision and land update.

2. BEACH HEAD VISION and LAND update.  

Please bear with me and let me “tell the story” especially for those of you who are new to our work and have not heard about our vision for the days ahead. I am “wordy” but I like to paint the picture with words.

As we have shared many times before, we are seeing God’s hand at work in the heart of South East Asia changing peoples’ lives like never before. God is giving us great access through our English language platform to some of the least reached peoples in all of Asia and your donations and partnership with us are truly making an impact for the Kingdom of God.

Many of you have been praying about our land situation and in our last update we announced the good news that on June 20^, 2016, we signed a contract to purchase a piece of land that we believe is right for us. We have made a deposit on the land and the owner has started the process of getting all the paperwork in order to transfer ownership to our foundation so that we can complete Phase I of our Beach Head Vision.

However, we have entered a time that is “FRUSTRATING” to say the least, even for some of you who have given toward this very worthy cause. It is now January 13, 2017, 7 months since the date that we signed the contract and we are still waiting on the department of land to transfer the ownership of land to our foundation here in Thailand. One of the extremely frustrating things for me is in knowing that we have partners in ministry already in Alabama and Mississippi who have committed to helping us with our labor and construction of this beach head facility and who are ready, willing, and some even "chomping at the bid” (which we are very grateful for) to schedule a time to come and begin that aspect of partnership and yet…. I cannot give any schedule because the land department has not approved the land transfer yet.

I don’t know all the reasons why it is taking so long but I do know this: God is ruler over all the affairs of men and sometimes God allows circumstance to come that cause us to “wait” in order to test us and to see if we are going to either 1) push the door down with our own strength and effort or 2) allow that frustration to lead us to do some self reflection on what are possible reasons that God has allowed the situation to be such and maybe one of those reasons is like what Henry Blackaby calls in his book Experiencing God when he talks about a “Crisis of Belief.”  

This crisis of belief allows us the opportunity to make any major adjustments in the way we have been doing things and to seek God and then to watch God do what only God can do. That is where I believe that we are today. We met with the owner of the land yesterday and had a very good meeting. In the meeting, she shared with us that the government is building a new highway on the edges of the developer’s property and the government even asked the developer for a portion of land. What I interpreted from that information was that this property that is now under contract to us and is close to this piece of land where the government wants to build a highway, will give our facility greater visibility and greater access once the road is built.

I think God is working behind the scenes but we must, must, must be patient and let God do what He wants to do. We have all the money we need to buy this land, but we do not have any money set aside today for construction which is part of Phase II. Maybe God wants us to do our part in putting this on the radar of our partners in ministry like you. 

What started out with a small group of 8 believers in the Johnson home implementing a “dream” and “vision” of an English language school as a platform to bless the community and to facilitate the planting of a strong purpose driven community church some 16 years ago, has blossomed into a growing, thriving, community focused church called Baan Athitaan Church. Our church today is made up of people from over 23 identifiable people groups and involved in outreach/evangelistic ministries related to teaching English through Grace Language School (GLS), reaching out to university students, caring for those affected by HIV/AIDS, caring and ministering to various children’s homes, reaching out to the community and neighboring countries, reaching out through a growing soccer ministry, serving as a first responder church to natural disasters, and most importantly, making disciples of all the peoples and nations God brings across our path.

NEED FOR MORE PERMANENCY AND LOWER OVERHEAD COSTS

We have been very intentional these past 16 years after we finished language school in Bangkok and moved up North to Chiang Rai to focus upon evangelism, discipleship and building the people of God into a family. We have yet to purchase a piece of property and put up a physical structure of our own. We have spent the last 16 years investing our people and resources into making disciples, building a flock and creating various outreach platforms and ministries. As I have shared with you before, we  sense that it is God’s timing to now say to the darkness that ‘we are here to stay’ through the purchase of land and then by building a multi-purpose facility that will facilitate a greater ability to reach the nations for Jesus and that will strengthen the integrity of our outreach platforms.

All of you who know me well know that I am committed to doing what God wants to be done and will do it with all of my strength. I am very careful to be a good steward of the finances that you have entrusted to us to manage.

We are at a time of celebration of 18 years in Thailand but we are also at a time where we must not falter and must move toward advancing the kingdom of God in Thailand and we cannot do that without you (through your prayers, your donations, and your volunteer trips) and we cannot do that without the blessing and leadership of God.

WE ARE SO THANKFUL FOR ALL THE GENEROUS DONATIONS THAT HAVE CAME IN OVER THE PAST COUPLE OF YEARS THAT HAVE GIVEN US THE OPPORTUNITY TO PURCHASE THIS LAND WITHOUT ANY DEBT. Once the land purchase has been finalized, we will begin Phase II of raising support for the building process and begin making plans for teams to come over from the US to help us build. If you have not given and would like to give toward phase II, we are taking donations for Phase II that will go toward building expenses.

Please pray for us as we seek to follow the leadership of our Lord in moving this process toward what we believe is God’s Beachhead Vision for NTIM’s future through finalizing the purchase of this new piece of property and in beginning the Phase 2 process of raising money for construction and planning volunteer construction teams coming to help us build. Here is an example of how we would ask you to pray today.

Prayer Example: “Lord, we have been reminded today of some of the ways You are at work building Your kingdom in Northern Thailand. We thank You for calling the Johnsons to Thailand many years ago and we celebrate with them their 18 years of serving You there. We thank You for allowing us as partners in ministry to be a part of seeing many young people from various unreached people groups give their hearts to Jesus. We thank You for allowing us to see how You are using 1^st generation believers to reach and disciple other 1^st generation believers. We thank You for Grace Language School and how you are using them to reach out not only to various Thai peoples but to Chinese peoples and Laotian peoples, and Burmese peoples and many others. We do sense that it is Your time for them to establish a more permanent beach head and to say to the forces of darkness that Your work through NTIM is there to stay. We thank You for graciously providing NTIM with the needed resources in money to purchase this land and pray for You to continue to lead them as they go through the final details of the land transfer. Please guide them as well once they finish the land transfer process as they seek to begin phase 2. Please provide them the needed resources to not only have land..but to have a building that can be utilized for Your purposes in that part of Your world. We pray this in Jesus name and for His glory. Amen.”

P.S. We started a new sermon series that we believe will be a blessing to your life as well and wanted to make you aware of it and ask that you listen and get a feel for one aspect of “church life” at Baan Athitaan Church. Here is the link to our first sermon on study of the fruit of the Spirit…. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w2cas-H-qxI

Your Servants to the Nations in and Around Northern Thailand,

Michael for the Team

Donations can be sent to:
Northern Thailand Impact Ministry (NTIM),

P.O. Box 26115, Birmingham, AL 35260 USA
or given online at our main website:
www.gontim.org 

NTIM is a non-profit 501(c)(3)charitable organization based in the USA. We are committed to connecting people in need with people who care and are focused in the heart of Southeast Asia where poverty is high, education is low, needs are great, darkness is everywhere, and the love and message of Jesus is needed to transform lives.

Reaching, Teaching, Discipling, Equipping, Training, and Serving People in God’s World in the heart of Southeast Asia through acts of love and compassionate is what NTIM and our ministry team is all about.