January Update 2018

Dear Praying Friends and Family,

Greetings and Happy New Year! We pray the Lord’s abundant blessings for you and for your family.

Life continues to be a fast pace in relation to church ministries. After a month full of Christmas activities at various places, we can now return to our “normal” schedules.

Christmas event at Toul Prich

Christmas event at Toul Prich under a newly built children's center

Christmas service at Srae Nouy village

Christmas play in Poipet wth a real baby acting as Jesus

But a lot has happened since our last update and we want to share it with you…

In our last update, we shared with you and asked you to pray for a new believer, Naat (aged 36 married and a father of four small children), and for his new found faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.

Here is a continuation of Naat’s story...  Before his conversion, Naat was (still is) a gifted carpenter making beautiful furniture to sell and earned a good income to support his entire family. His family owned a few pieces of properties where they raised cashew plantations. About 8 years ago, however, Naat got involved with the wrong crowds and he became an alcoholic since then. As his drinking continued, Naat lost his job and sold off his tools and properties in order to support his alcoholic lifestyle, a habit which nearly destroyed his marriage and life. When sobered, Naat attempted many times to quit drinking on his own, but had failed miserably. Depressed and feeling completely hopeless, Naat grudgingly accepted his lot in life saying, “This is who I am. I can never change." But his sixty-five year old widowed mother had refused to give up on Naat. She had prayed for him continuously until that glorious day in December when God demonstrated His power upon Naat’s life. On this past Christmas’s Eve Sunday, Naat attended church at Toul Prich with his mother and younger sister.

Naat excited and ready to attend church for the first time

During that church service a leader asked if anyone had anything to share with the group. Naat excitedly took the opportunity to share how Jesus had delivered him from the bondages of alcohol and of evil spirits. It just so happened that on that particular day, two other men from Toul Prich also attended church for the first time. When they heard Naat’s story, they were amazed. Now six weeks after his conversion, Naat has not touched one drink since and seemed so in love with Jesus. He is noted by his friends and family as, “Always singing praises to Preah yea-sue all the time!” People around Naat’s life were surprised by the transformation they saw in Naat’s life. As a result, Naat’s wife and their four children also accepted Jesus as their Lord and Savior. Other carpenters and Naat’s former “drinking buddies” also expressed their astonishments at the changes in Naat’s life. Some asked, “What happened to you? You look different.” Naat only responded, “I met Preah yea-sue, that’s what happened. Jesus changed my life.”

Naat (back row on the right) joined the men's choir at Srae Nouy's Christmas event

During the Christmas season, we attended a total of 11 Christmas events, and of these places we saw 32 people come forward to receive Christ as their Lord and Savior!

20 people came forward to receive Christ at Sra Em vilage at the Christmas event

On January 13, we welcomed Cori from central California to live with us for two months. Cori is here to help out with children and youth ministry in Toul Prich.

Cori teaching English to Toul Prich kids

God is truly at work! We are so blessed to be part of His kingdom movement in this part of the world. Please pray for the new churches in the northwest region and around the Anlong Veng areas. Since we moved into Anlong Veng in July, we visited a total of five newly planted Alliance churches; each place located about a 1.5-2 hour drive from us. The new believers seem very excited and are requesting for solid teachings of God’s word. Please continue to pray that God would send us some experienced Khmer-speaking discipleship teachers to help teach new believer classes.

Upcoming events needing prayers:

1. January 19th, meeting with Thai C&MA pastor and his team to discuss issues concerning Toul Prich ministry.
2. January 27th, bimonthly leadership classes in Poipet.
3. February 10th, National youth committee meeting in Phnom Penh.
4. February 16th, Leadership classes/workshop in Tek Cho village in Bantey Meanchey province
5. February 24th to March 2nd: Field Leadership Team (FLT) meetings and prayer retreat in Phnom Penh.

As always, we are very grateful for your prayers and financial support toward the Great Commission Fund, which allows us to continue serving in this part of Cambodia. Thank you for partnering with us in the Cambodian ministries.

Blessings,

Soeuth & Synna