Thank
you so much for your prayers and support during this past year. God had been faithful to us once again this
year and we are grateful that you all have allowed God to use you to be a
blessing to us and help us reach the people of Thailand with the Gospel.
We
are praising the Lord that we were able to move to the city of Phitsanulok (pit-sa-new-loke) at the
beginning of December. The Lord provided
a house for us to rent in a safe area.
It is a fairly small house for raising four children but we realized
that if we were going to make the move we would have to be willing to take any
available housing. We have a one year
contract for this house and Lord willing we will be able to find a larger house
for when that contract expires. After
four months of looking for a place to live, we are praising the Lord for His
provision and His timing.
We
have also been able to secure a building to, in the future, use as a church
building. Since rental buildings here
are just a hollow shell, some renovations need to be made before we are able to
meet there. The building is in an
excellent location on a busy street which goes through the heart of town. The back of the building borders railway
land. The railway allows you to build a
one storey building on that land, so in the future we would be able to build an
addition on that piece of land. Also,
the other side of the street at the back of the property borders the railway,
so there is a whole street for parking.
Praise the Lord! The building
itself is five storeys so we will have ample room for Sunday School rooms.
We
have begun distributing literature in the markets – especially during the New
Years since this is a huge holiday for Thais and so, there were lots of people
in the streets to talk to. As of yet, we
have not received any response cards from the tracts we have passed out. Please pray that those who have received
Gospel tracts will read them and be drawn to the Savior. We also plan to place evangelistic ads in the
local paper. Please pray for responses
from this as well.
Our
prayer is to be able to have Bible studies with individual people who want to
hear the Gospel of Jesus Christ. As we
have opportunity to work with people on a one-on-one basis, we desire to have
them come to know Christ as Savior, and then bring these people together to
start the church. Please pray that we
are attentive to the leading of the Holy Spirit and that we would find those
who want to hear.
We covet your prayers
as we seek to, by God’s grace, lay a foundation for an Independent
Baptist Church
in the city of Phitsanulok.
Thank
you also so much to those of you who sent Christmas greetings. We appreciate your thoughtfulness very
much. We were blessed to have Maureen’s
sister Amy and her husband Josh come for Christmas which was a great blessing
to us. Prior to coming to this city, we
did not know anyone here so it was a great to have family with us at
Christmas.
We
are praying for God’s riches blessings for you and yours in this year.
For
His Glory,
Michael
Sullivant Jr. &
Family
September/October, 2011
Dear
Praying and Supporting Friends,
In
our last Prayer Letter, Thailand was beginning to experience abnormal flooding
due to higher than normal rainfall. As I write this letter, parts of Bangkok
are still under as much as 2 meters of water.
Again, we are not in danger from the flooding at all, but many other
missionaries and Churches have been flooded and in some cases, the loss of
property and belongings will be tens of thousands of dollars. Many Bangkok
residents have been forced from their homes for over a month now, and many will
not be able to return until the floodwaters subside, which could still take
several more weeks. Please pray that out
of this physical disaster (which has already claimed +500 lives) many hearts
will be opened to the Gospel.
Since
our last letter, the New Testament Survey class I was teaching in the Bible
Institute in Chiang Mai has been completed and I have switched focus to looking
for housing in the city of Phitsanulok, about a 4 ½ hour drive from our present
location in Chiang Mai. This city is the
regional economic and educational hub for the Northern-Central region and in
the capitol city district has a population of approximately 270,000
people.
Regarding
our housing situation, on several occasions I have thought that we had secured
suitable housing at reasonable prices, only to have the owners change their
minds about renting out their houses and put them up for sale instead. As foreigners, we cannot own land in Thailand
unless we invest approximately $1.3 million US into Thai bonds. Long story short, we tentatively have a house
that we can rent, provided the owner can get out of his current “island
property” in flooded Bangkok. If you
could pray that we are able to move before December, we would appreciate it
very much.
During
this 2-month period, I spent several weeks in Phitsanulok looking for housing
and had the opportunity to talk to several people about why I was moving to
Phitsanulok. Few people understood what
a missionary is, and fewer still understand what a Christian is. There is a strong Catholic and Mormon
presence there and most people understand the term “Christian” from what they
know of these two cults. While I was
waiting to get a flat tire repaired, I was able to talk to the mechanic’s
family for about an hour and they invited me back to talk more once we have
moved.
In
October, the New Life Baptist
Church in Chiang Mai
celebrated their 7th Anniversary with a Family Camp. This is the highlight of the year for the
Church family and was a special highlight for us as well. A visitor who has been coming to church for
about one month, accepted Christ as Saviour and wanted to be baptized. When it was announced there would be a
baptism, our son Wyatt told us he wanted to be baptized as well. We went down to the river and I was
privileged to baptize him. Does our 5
year old understand what baptism means?
When I asked him why he wanted to be baptized, he answered, “So that
everyone knows that I am a Christian.” Amen!
T
Thank
you for your faithful prayers and support.
Thank you to those who thought of Charity and myself on our birthdays
and Maureen and my anniversary. Your
thoughtfulness is an encouragement to us all.
For His Glory and By His Grace,
The Sullivant Family
July/August, 2011
Greetings to our Brothers and Sisters in
Christ! I trust you have had a blessed
summer. We have experienced more rain
than normal for this time of year and flooding has become a problem in many
areas, though we have not been directly affected.
In our last Prayer Letter I mentioned that the New
Testament Survey class had started in June.
The class schedule was changed to accommodate more courses per year and
we have been meeting twice a week for a total of 6 hours of instruction per
week. The students have been faithful
and attentive as I teach. This has been
a learning experience for me as well, since there are many new Thai terms to
learn and use each class. I praise the
Lord for the progress that has been made in our language ability since we moved
here.
Speaking of language, I had to make a trip to Bangkok in July and was
able to collect the test results from my language exam last year. The grading is done on a scale of 1-6, with 6
supposedly “like a Thai.” The good news
is that I scored the highest level (Level 6) possible in the speaking
portion. My reading and comprehension
portions were at a Level 4, which is equivalent to about a Grade 8-9
Level. My writing ability needs some
work as I only scored a Level 2, which is equivalent to about a Grade 2-3. Thank you to all who have prayed for our
language studies, I praise the Lord for your help in prayers.
In July we had some evangelistic meetings that were
well attended by the members of the Church, but we did not have very many new
visitors. Missionary Aguinaldo Angeles
from the Philippines preached and did a good job adjusting the meetings to
those in attendance.
Maureen will be teaching the Grade 1-3 Sunday School
class for September, and I will be teaching the Adult Sunday School class that
month as well. There are about 6
children Maureen will be teaching who come with a lady in the Church. These children come from Buddhist families
but are very attentive to the lessons taught and will memorize the memory
verses given to them. Please be in
prayer for their salvation and for their parents’ salvation as well.
In September, the Bible Institute course will
conclude and I will begin looking for housing in Phitsanulok and begin laying
the groundwork for us to move there at the end of October or beginning of
November. Please pray for suitable
housing and a place to store half a shipping container’s worth of
John/Romans.
Thank you as well to each one who sent birthday
wishes to Jessica in August. In these days
of e-mail, it is still quite exciting for our kids to receive a card they can
open on their birthdays.
Thank you again for your prayers and support for
us. Your thoughtfulness and faithfulness
are encouraging to us, and we pray God’s grace will be evident in your lives
and ministries as well.
For His Glory,
Michael Sullivant, Jr. & Family
. May-June, 2011
Dear
Praying Friends,
Thanks
once again for your prayer and support over the last two months. We thank God for you all and are in prayer
continually for you all as well. God has
once again been faithful to us.
In
the month of May, we found out that our Missionary Visa, although approved,
will not be ready for us in time, so we will have to renew the current visa we
have here in Thailand. Being that we did
not have to take a trip to Laos
to have the Missionary Visa instated, I went for a survey trip of the city of Phitsanulok. Later on, we went again as a family. We believe that this is where God wants us to
start a work. There is no Independent
Baptist work there at all and very little in the way of evangelical church work
either for a city of nearly 300,000 people.
There are several smaller cities within an hour’s drive of this city
which also are without a Gospel preaching church. When compared to other regions, much of the
North-Central region of Thailand
has been ignored by missions in general.
We would like to see an outreach into those cities as well. Lord willing, we plan to move to Phitsanulok
at the end of the Bible Institute Term here at New Life Baptist Church in
October. We covet your prayers as we
step out by faith.
I
have also put advertisements in the newspaper in Phitsanulok for Correspondence
Bible Study courses. So far, we have had
three men respond to the advertisement and are working through the Bible
studies. Please pray that these three
men will accept Christ as Savior and that there will be many more respond. Please pray that God would prepare the hearts
of the people in Phitsanulok and the surrounding areas to hear and accept the
Word of God.
I
am currently teaching New Testament Survey to three young men in the church
here in Chiang Mai. It has been a bit of
a stretch for me to teach in Thai for three hours at a time. Thanks for your prayers for my brain.
I am also
teaching a class on marriage in the Sunday School hour here at New Life
Baptist Church. The Thai concept of marriage is quite
contrary to the Word of God, but it has been great to be able to teach these
young couples what God has to say about it.
Please
pray for the Revival coming up here in the month of July. The theme of the conference is “Who Is
Jesus?” Please pray that as we pass out
flyers inviting people to come that there would be receptive hearts to the
message of Jesus Christ.
Our
family is doing well. Thanks to all of
you who sent Wyatt birthday cards. He
enjoyed opening each one of them.
For His Glory,
Michael Sullivant, Jr. and Family
March/April 2011
Dear Supporters and Friends,
Thank you for your prayers and support for us over the last couple of months, we truly are grateful to our Heavenly Father Who has seen fit to give us such faithful supporters and prayer partners. As I was praying this morning, I was reminded of the term that is used when raising support, “Deputation.” Thank you for deputizing us to be an extension of your efforts to fulfill the Great Commission for these three years that we have been in Thailand. April 23 marks the three-year mark for us since we sold our house in Canada and moved to Thailand. God is good, all the time!
Thank you to each one who sent cards, e-cards, and e-mails wishing Wayne a happy birthday in March. Each card and email that our kids receive is an event for them they absolutely love them. For his birthday we took a couple of friends and our family to a Royal Flower Garden. You took him where? Well, you have to know that this Flower Garden has one of the biggest playgrounds we have found in our area, and the kids love to go and spend the cool part of the mornings playing there. Afterwards, we went for some ice-cream.
In our last letter, I mentioned that we had received approval of our application for a missionary visa. By way of an update, I have paid the necessary dues and we are waiting for the various government departments to finalize our paperwork. Once that process is completed, we will need to travel to a Royal Thai Embassy to receive our new visas. Please pray that this whole process is completed by the beginning of August as that is when our current visa expires and we do not want the added expense of having to renew this one when we are so close to receiving our missionary visa. The person I talked to about the waiting period was optimistic about meeting the August deadline.
We had hoped to drive to Laos to receive our new visas and at the same time, use the trip to survey several cities along the way. Since the timing for our visa is somewhat uncertain, I am planning to go and survey these places the first week of May. I have received some counsel from veteran missionaries advising us to place ads in the local papers offering free correspondence courses, and try to gauge the response and see if the Lord would open doors for us that way. Please continue to pray for us to have wisdom, direction, and safety in travels as well.
Thank you again, and may God richly bless your service for Him.
By His Grace, For His Glory,
Michael & Maureen, Jessica, Wayne, Wyatt, and Charity Sullivant
January/February 2011
Dear Friends,
Praise the Lord for safe travels. We arrived back in Thailand on March 10, at about 3:30 in the afternoon. By the time we got all of our baggage claimed, through customs, loaded on the songtaew-pickup and home, it was 5:00PM. We were all pretty worn out from the flying, but the timing was about right as we were in bed by 9:00pm and everyone slept through to 6:30AM. That was a huge blessing as we were able to avoid any real jetlag affect from the time difference.
In January, we were able to spend time with our families in Canada and fellowship with many friends and meet many more people who were not part of our Home Church before we left for the field in 2008. It was great to come back and see almost 200 new people that are now in Church and in various stages of spiritual growth.
A highlight of January for me, Michael, was being able to be a part of a group of people from our home Church who went to the Holy Land. It was a wonderful experience that has given me a greater appreciation for the descriptive portions of the Bible. I also want to thank those who made the trip possible for me.
Upon returning to Canada in February, we hit the roads, and a snowstorm in Illinois, and made it to Tennessee for 4 days to visit some of my Mom’s side of the family. As we prepared to leave for Ontario on that Wednesday, another snowstorm struck but by Thursday morning we were able to weave our van through the ice and snow. As we got to the USA/Canada Border to cross into Ontario, it started to snow/rain but fortunately traffic was fairly light and everyone behaved themselves on the roads! It was good to visit with Maureen’s sister and her husband, and the Driedger, Rempel, and Wall families who are now serving the Lord in Churches in Ontario. These families are all from our home Church and are very dear friends to us.
As we travelled back to Manitoba for our Home Church’s Missions Conference, I was able to get in touch with my great-grandfather & great-grandmother whom I had not seen in almost 15 years. Please pray for their salvation. They are 92 and 85 years old respectively and most would consider them to be good, moral people.
What a blessing it was to be in our Home Church’s Missions Conference again and see several people surrender to the Lord’s will for their lives, specifically to the area of foreign missions.
Before we left Canada, we were trying to arrange the last hurrahs with our various families and Maureen had the opportunity to lead her 80 year old grandmother to the Lord! Maureen knew the Lord had been working in her heart, as it was grandma who brought the subject up in the conversation on the phone. Praise the Lord!
I want to say thank you to those who have so faithfully supported us in the areas of prayer and finances. We really could not do what we do without your faithful prayers and support. One answer to prayer that I want to share is that our application for a missionary visa was approved while we were in Canada. This is a real answer to prayer and I know many of you have been praying for this. Later this week, I am to start all the paperwork that this will entail.
Now, that we are back on the field, please pray that God would give wisdom and guidance as we seek to follow His will about where to minister. We have been praying over some areas particularly and will, Lord willing, be going to do some more thorough surveying in the next few months. Please pray for us in this decision and thank you again for your faithful prayers.
