Burgess Road Baptist Church

May 2020

Dear Friends,

Operation Dorcas

I am just going to start this off by letting you know that I am overwhelmed by your response to Operation Dorcas. Your trust in me and the grace of God in our life never ceases to amaze me! What started out as a project to help 100 families turned into 300 families and now I am working on the second set of 300 more families. On May 14, 2020 I was able to give out 300 sacks of rice; 300 trays of eggs; 300 packages of hotdogs, noodles, sardines and powder milk for those who have babies. Odek and I and our two children were still under home quarantine and so I had the food items delivered to the house. I designated several people from our church, who had government passes, to give out stubs to the people. Odek called our local Barangay (Vicinity) Captain and got permission to give out food to 10 people every 30 min. On those stubs, there was an indication what time they were to come. It was a blessing that we did not receive any interference from the local government. The word of God was freely preached to a group of 10 people at a time.

 
2nd Wave Operation Dorcas

This second wave that we are working on is being done differently. We have learned that when you have a private vehicle you are allowed more privileges. The checkpoints are very lenient towards us and we are able to travel around more freely. My husband, Odek and I have visited over 40 families, delivering food and sharing the word of God. The Lord has already opened the door for new bible studies. We visited one compound on the edge of the dumpsite and within this compound, the matriarch has 16 children, 10 of them are married with children of their own. They, the married children and families, put together shacks all around this compound and there are over 80 people living there. They were overwhelmed by the food we came bearing and intently listened as Odek told them about the greatest gift of God which was his only begotten son Jesus Christ, so that we can be saved. The mother was moved to tears as well as her children. I have attached pictures of several houses that we visited today.

Barangay Tipo Bataan

Zone 4 Landfill New Cabalan Olongapo City

 
Once again, I want you to know that I am so very grateful to the money you sent that has enabled us to be a blessing to so many people both physically and spiritually. May God bless you fourfold.

Love,
Annalisa Valbuena

 May 2020

Dear praying partners,
 

Current Situation
Like you, we are being affected by the COVID virus. Thailand has been under curfew and many travel restrictions. Our church has been meeting online for over a month. Fortunately, no one has been affected by the virus, and attendance via online meetings has been well attended, and everyone’s in good spirits.

Visas
Praise the Lord Mike’s visa was secured with no problems. The Covid-19 situation actually helped expedite the process from 3-4 hours to 15 minutes.

Ministry in Thailand
The Lord has blessed by allowing our foundation to finally get approval for the branch offices in three other provinces: Chaiyaphum, Phitsunalok, and Bangkok. The establishment of these branches will help the missionaries at those locations in their church planting ministries. They won’t have to spend large sums to establish another foundation, and they’ll be able to acquire visas and work permits for the missionaries as well as those coming to assist the ministry. The brother I mentioned in our last letter got saved three weeks ago!  Even while having to do services online, he faithfully attended and finally came to the point of readiness to accept the Lord. Seeing a Thai get saved is a rare occurrence and always an exciting time. Dtom, the senior Bible student, has started to teach him a creation to Christ class as the first step in his discipleship. Additionally, the teen sister of one of our members has also been recently saved. It is a blessing to see our members faithfully communicating the glorious gospel to friends and relatives.

Bible Institute
The online Bible school has six people registered for New Testament Survey. It is an exciting time in the expansion of the Bible School. It is especially encouraging to have the advanced Bible students proctor the online students. In addition to the online students, the classes continue via Google Meet. Christian Leadership and the Christian Family are the two current classes being taught. Additionally, Mike is teaching Biblical Greek to four students from a sister church.

Prayer Requests
Salvation: The husband of a member who has been attending for five years. Two members who have not been faithful to church for several months that they would return or find another good church. Continue to pray for Mike’s students and fellow teachers at University.

Faithfulness: Pray for the Bible students to continue steadfast in their studies. Pray for a new couple in our church for spiritual growth in being newly married as well as her visa application to the USA. Pray for the new Christians to grow in the Lord and to follow the Lord in baptism after the COVID restrictions are lifted. Please also pray for wisdom and faithfulness while we continue to serve the Lord in Thailand. The longer we serve the Lord, the more we understand how weak we are.

May the Lord bless you richly as you continue to serve Him.

For Christ in Thailand,
Mike & Francis Frederick

www.thaimissions.org      Facebook: thaimissions.org

mike@thaimissions.org

(Skype Phone) 864-640-4654

May 2020

Praises

• Additional customs expenses given
• Most of tool room funds given
• Monthly support steady
• Residency paperwork came in!!!

Prayer Request

• Jon’s salvation
• Raise last $1,000 for tool room in school building
• Leave for Costa Rica soon
• Need a few more supporters

 
Ecclesiastes 3:1
To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven.

 
Through the last few weeks this has been a time that the majority of the world has never seen. The global pandemic as its been called has affected every person in some way. Our God is not caught off guard and is still on His throne and still in complete control. Hopefully we have been good stewards of this time and used it to reach out, to minister, and to share the gospel of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

Our hearts desire is to be in Costa Rica getting settled in and beginning our ministry there. We are in Florida in lockdown like everyone else. We have a temporary house to stay in and a rental car for now and best we can tell our monthly support remains steady. Our household goods and the tools for the missionary training center were all delivered to our rental house in Costa Rica on April 14th. Our church family there cleaned the house and met the movers and now it’s all in a pile waiting for us. Our jeep is stuck in customs and hopefully gets released, inspected, and registered soon. The airlines gave us a credit on our tickets so we can apply that to the new ones hopefully in the next 2-3 weeks. Right now the borders are scheduled to open again May 15th and airlines will start flying again right away.

God has met our needs in miracle fashion time and time again. The homeowners of our temporary house offered us some work while we wait. We’ve been able to enclose their carport and some other misc. items on their wish list. We’ve been able to help a couple of churches build walls, finish drywall, and make roof repairs. Keeping busy and having these ministry opportunities have really been a blessing and have helped us not get cabin fever too much.

Thank you each and everyone for your prayers, and notes, and texts, and e-mails of encouragement and your faithful giving. We truly appreciate your partnerships and support.

In Christ,
Kevin and Sonya McCoy