FLOODING DISASTER UPDATE IN THAILAND – September 14, 2024

 Dear Family, Friends, Partners in Ministry,

Thank you for your prayers over the last three weeks. Many things that we never imagined would ever happened here in this city of Chiangrai, have already happened and many hundreds of thousands of people in this part of God’s world have experienced a tremendous flood disaster that seems to now have reached it’s tipping point.  

As I shared in my last update on August 22, Thailand is in the heart of South East Asia and has been our home for over 25 years now. It is one of those countries that is absolutely beautiful from one end of the country to the other end of the country. We start with the beautiful beaches in the South and move all the way up to the breathtaking views on the mountains in the far Northern part of Thailand where we live.

But what is important for you to know today, is that all of this country is part of what we call the “tropics.” The tropics have what we call a “rainy season” where it rains for long periods of time. 

We are in one of those rainy seasons and it has been raining almost every day for the last two months and sometimes it rains for hours on end. When that happens, we have both “flash flooding” and “major flooding.”

The waters seem to be receding and we are now in the phase where hundreds of homes have been washed away, thousands of homes have been invaded by flood waters, and who knows how much damage has been done.

NTIM has always tried to be one of those “first responders” to natural disasters when they occur having helped with earthquakes, hail storms, wind storms, flooding and many other types of emergencies. It has also been good to work with Baan Eden this year as they have coordinated efforts to make food packs for distribution and many from our church have helped them in these efforts as well.

At 6:30 this morning, one of my staff and I were at Macro beginning to purchase extra supplies to pack and distribute to those in need. Shortly after that, about a dozen of our church folks met together at Baan Athitaan Church to begin another round of packing supplies and getting ready to begin some of the cleaning efforts and go out to some of the houses that were damaged the most and begin to get the dirt and muck out of their houses.

Here are a few of the pictures from this mornings cleaning efforts where we were able to break out into two teams and clean 3 houses.

I am confident that none of these homes that have been flood affected have any kind of “flood insurance” and all of this damage will be “out of pocket.” We cannot help everyone, but we can help some. We would love for you to pray about helping us by giving to NTIM during this Emergency Crisis so what we can provide some assistance to those who have been affected in our realm of influence and in the name of our Savior. 

These are times when “acts of kindness” can go a very long way in breaking down resistance to the gospel of Christ as we do things that reflect the love and compassion of Christ in ways that reach the heart.