Overcoming what people say is Impossible

Growing up in a small city in Canada, racism was never an issue. I had friends that were different races and I never thought anything about it. I would hear stories of things that would happen in the south and would wonder how people could believe things like that, especially Christians.

However, I never thought I would have to battle racism when I came to Thailand but unfortunately lots of people struggle with it here too. The difference isn't skin color because the people looked down upon are Asian too. For many Thai people, especially rich ones, they think they are better than hill tribe people who have come from other countries. Hill tribe people look a little different than "normal" Thai people but usually the easiest way to tell a hill tribe person from a Thai is by their accent. Over the past few weeks we have been battling this issue with people that come to study English and it just makes me shake my head. I guess I shouldn't be so surprised that racism exists even on the other side of the world, because people in Thailand are in desperate need of Christ and racism is one of the enemies tactics to keep people from sharing the truth.

I am so thankful that the church we are trying to plant here is a mixture of different people groups. Many people, Thais and foreigners, have told us that building a multicultural church won't work, you have to focus either on Thai or a certain hill tribe because even hill tribes won't mix. However,we are seeing God bless the work here abundantly and on some Sundays we have Thai, Chinese, Karen (2 different Karen people groups), Lahu, Shan, American and even Canadian (if you want to call that a different nationality!!). We know that God is bigger than a person's skin color or accent and we pray that we will be able to continue overcoming this huge barrier in the minds of many people.