August Update

  Dear Friends,   Hello everyone.  I hope you are all doing well.  We are doing well also here in Thailand.  It is rainy season now and it is certainly living up to it's name in the jungle where I live.  Sometimes I think I need a helicoptor instead of my 4 wheel drive to get from place to place unless of course I want to take up white water rafting as my primary mode of transportation.   This last month has been so good.  I have been mainly spending time at my children's home getting to know the lovely little people God has given me.  I prayed for God to send them a mother to come work with us as staff but he sent me instead.  Heartstealers each and everyone.  We adore each other and the boys new funnest game in the world is to tickle Tharamu (me) and watch her scream.  We play and play until I get so hot that they have to fan me usually hitting me in the face in the process with whatever paper they have in their hand or worse yet blowing their bacteria infested spitfilled breath in my face.  But it is amazing how much you can love being tickled and hit in the face and spit on.  They were out of school recently and we took those that could not go home to see the waterfalls about an hour away.  They loved it as none of them had ever seen anything like that.    We are in Chaing Mai buying supplies again and God has blessed us so we can buy a set of drums for our home.  We have a little boy who is 9 years old who is so small he looks like he is maybe 6 or 7 but he is an amazing drummer - we have truely talented children and they are becoming well known in the area.  Our little band and worship team could travel to minister in the churches every weekend if we had time.  Last month we went twice. I am happy we can buy drums so the band can practise more and get better and better as it the call of God on our home that our children should teach their people how to worship. In most churches they don't even use a guitar or piano or anything for worship so what we are doing is so different and exciting. We hope next month to buy a bass guitar - we have another 13 year old who is extremely talented on the guitar.    Next week we are hosting a team from America at our children's home and our children's home as well as the team will be doing a free concert for our town.  We are expecting over200 people and at this concert we will preach the gosple as well as sing.  We want to reach the Thai people that live near us who are 100 percent Buddist.  The young people often come to our home because they hear our children worshipping every night and they come to hear the music but they don't understand the Karen language that we worship and preach in.  So this concert will be in Thai to reach these young people.   I have been preaching and teaching alot and last week we had the bible school so I had the opportunity to teach on worship.  When our children go to the churches to sing I usually am invited to preach.  I teach about worship and oru children show them how.  I am teaching our children not to be afraid of people because in the churches they only sit and sing an old song and there is no life at all.  And sometimes our children our scared to worship like they do in our home.  But last time I saw my little girl that I am teaching special as I know God has called her to preach and to work with me in the future - I saw her stand in the front of 200 people who have never worshipped God in their life and while all of her friends who stood with her were scared - she raised her hands to God and sang from her heart and she is only 14 years old.   More brave than you can imagine in a culture where no one ever does anything different and the people are so shy.  I don't recall ever being so proud of anyone in my life as I was of her at that moment.  She will lead her people.   It becomes increasingly difficult to go between my children's home and the village where I live as the children need me so much and have completely captured my heart.  I am looking at next year making a change.  Sometimes if you try to do too much you end up doing nothing well.  At the end of August I will be returning to America.  My mom is buying me a ticket home for my birthday and I will be only 3 weeks at home.  I have been in the jungle for 6 months and it feels like a lifetime.  And even when times are difficult I know that everything I want in the world is in a little children's home in the jungle and I wouldn't change places with anyone.  God is so good and so faithful and I am so very very blessed.   Thank you for your love and support and prayers.  God is doing great things here in Thailand usually inspite of me and not because of me.  But that is the beauty of it all - none of it has anything to do with me.  Only God who never lets me go.  When I get back to America I will send pictures so you can see the beautiful children that you help feed and love everyday.  I wish you could hear them laugh and sing and see the light on their faces as they worship God.  I don't have words to describe.  I tell God often - I hope you are videoing this - when we get to heaven I want everyone to see this moment.  I hope to hear from some of you when I am back in the States.  God Bless you all!!   Love, Candace   PS  To make a tax deductible contribution send checks to RHEMA Missions PO Box 50126 Tulsa OK 74150 write Rev Candace Smith on the memo line.  100 percent goes to the work in Thailand