100% GRACE the whole life

I needed 100% grace to become Christians. And I could not by good deeds or Merit making qualify myself to start my walk with JESUS. 

So from the beginning we are helpless and need 100% Grace, but over time we can start feeling we are becoming good people. We also become so educated so we start to believe that we can fix all problems around by ourselves. Without the grace of God and without other people.

No no no … we need 100% Grace throughout our whole life. Even as Missionaries, Pastors and other church and mission leaders we must begin in grace, walk in grace, and end in grace. Even in our family life ... we can not lose the grace along the way.

                            

We were lost, about to perish, but thanks to grace, we became King's sons and daughters. And throughout life, despite our education and despite of our titles, we need 100% Grace ..... so we can end well.

Ingvar (Fred)

Don`t give up MISSION....

.... it is God`s idea. Today I want to encourage you. Don`t give up MISSION. 

                                                

To be involved in MISSION is a blessing:

A. For The Receivers. Those who walk in the darkness…. will see the light breaking in. A grandmother came to us with her granddaughter who was abused. (Now the perpetrator is in prison). She and her granddaughter came very scared. I wished her God's ความสงบสุข = Peace and she is a Thai but responded: What is ความสงบสุข = Peace? One Thai explained for her what God`s Peace is. She left us after 3 weeks.... full of God`s Peace.

Often I think: 

B. For The Senders A blessing for those believers who cannot go, but can pray, send others and can send money. Anna and I felt God`s leading 1972 just when we got married to sponsor a child in India. It blessed us. Be a blessed Sender. Without Senders we are lost.

C. For The Goers. Yes Mission is a blessing for us who are going…. to new Pioneer areas. We see many Missionaries coming and going. To coming as a family with school children to a pioneer area is hard. How can my children go to school? Many are struggling with: How to start a church? Which method is fruitful in this place? And for some, Mission is hard because we want to be close to our grandchildren. We understand all these hardships.

Ubon-Pakse is a pioneer area with very few Christians. And most Churches are very small.

D. For the once we train. Most ecouraging with MISSION is that it is is contagious. The local nationals also get the calling and are blessed. So they bless others, who bless others.... This we see happening right from the beginning in a new place. Also here.

 

Today ….. the cry from UBON-PAKSE is: don’t give up MISSIONS. Ingvar (Fred)

Multiply grandmother Inez

                                               
The date: October 13th stirred my thoughts this morning about my mother, our children's grandmother Inez. She would be 95 years old today if she was alive. 

A brave woman I could write a whole book about. I still meet people in Sweden who are happy to testify what she meant to them, especially when they were young. After all, it wasn't just her own grandchildren who captured her heart. It was especially the vulnerable. She even got paid from the municipality to be a supporting grandmother for a period, to single mothers with toddlers.

I would like to multiply her here in Isaan. It is the grandmothers who take care of the growing generation. Often without the support of those who brought them into this world.
If we are to build the ruins after many generations of fragmentation and destruction, then we must bring them on the train too.

Here in Ubon-Pakse are we teaching and challenging the children, teachers, village leaders but must also bring the grandmothers along. We have understood that if we can bring them as a united front then we have more chance to see change, a reformation of how we value the children and break the vicious cycle of abuse and human trafficking.

Very grateful for my mother. She was a great example for me. 
Anna.

The Power of Gods`s Word + my testimony

                                       

As a new Christian, a new pastor and a new missionary…. everything is first so exciting, and we are attracted by the fantastic new ministry with God. Even if the new circumstances are tough, we still see everything wonderful, so beautiful and we see the mighty hand of God.

Over time, we can fall into becoming “Home Blind”. The Christian life, the church, the mission field and also our families can become  - not so blessed any more. We can be 100% Christian and preach 100% the Word`s God, but …. we have lost our good news, our own testimony. We are still 100% biblical but the World does not become our personal Living testimony any more.

As the new Christian, Acts 4:20 spoke to me very strong:  ^“For we cannot but speak the things which we have seen and heard.”

The last months I have been greatly touch by seeing the unity of the power of God`s Word and the power of our personal Testimony. If I believe all in the Bible but have no living testimony … well the question is if I am only doing religion? The world is indeed fed up with dead religion.

We now feel in Ubon-Pakse that ……  ^“For we cannot but speak the things which we have seen and heard.”

We find that life as a missionary is more exciting now than when we first started in India and Bangladesh. We ourselves see and hear amazing things, but the most amazing thing is to see how our dear friends and coworkers are blooming. With God everything is new and exciting .... my whole life. Ingvar