Wednesday 07 Jul
Glenn and Liz seek new ways to be a blessing.
When Glenn and Liz moved to Chiang Rai, their biggest aim was to develop relationships and an understandable status within their community. Liz writes, "
We wanted the local people to know we were there to connect and show love. Glenn started his role at the local government school teaching English, and we slowly started to build connections. Our vision is to share Jesus with people here and one day see a vibrant community of believers following Jesus. Our prayer right now is to ask God to show us how we can ‘break in’ to this community and show them His love.”
Directly across from their house is an abandoned property. It’s dark, dirty and filled with decaying furniture. One day Liz was hanging up the washing and she felt God say that He would redeem this space for them to be a blessing to this community. That He would give it new life!
That was two years ago. Liz continues, “I remember excitedly telling Glenn and our teammates about what God had told me. They encouraged us to listen to His promptings and enquire about the house, and that we would be shown when or if it was right for us to rent it. In the coming weeks we met with the owner, and she showed us inside the building. We tried to negotiate renting the house but the owner decided that she would wait and see if she could sell it.”
When they returned from Home Assignment late last year, they were excited to connect again with their friends. Liz spent the day with a local friend and at one point her friend said,
“I have been thinking about it and I think that your family could be a huge blessing to this community if you taught English to the local kids”. Liz and Glenn prayed about it and decided that they would ask the owner again about the house. They had a vision to use the space to open an English Language Centre (ELC) for the community.
Liz writes, “A few days later we met with the owner again. This time it felt different. She agreed to let us rent the house! Over the past two months while we haven’t really been allowed to leave the house much (due to COVID-19), it has been the perfect time to spend time bringing the abandoned house back to life both physically through cleaning and painting and spiritually through prayer and worship music.”
As Glenn was working on the property, a woman from the community stopped to say, “Wow, the house looks so much brighter now! Before it was so dark, but now it is bright.”
Pray with Glenn and Liz as they prepare to start teaching English in this building. Pray that God will use this as an opportunity for them to build deeper connections and share Jesus with people in their community. Pray in particular for their growing relationship with their new landlord.
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