Blessed Christmas and New Year

                                  We wish You All

                                     a Meaningful

                                    Christmas 2016

                                                                             & 

                                                      a Blessed Year 2017

Dear friends,

We wish you a very Happy Christmas and New Year.  We are now after 5 years celebrating Christmas in Sweden. Feels so good to be closer to family.

We look back on a very good Pioneer year 2016 in Ubon-Pakse. The three projects:

are growing and developing. We are grateful for all dedicated coworkers. We were in Ubon-Pakse from October to November 2016, planning to be there Feb and March 2017 and move back to Ubon July 2017.

Thanks for participating, visits and praying for us and the projects.

God Bless you all from heaven…with Christ in the Centre.

                                                             

 Ingvar & Anna Fredriksson

Many are praying for you!

Sometimes we can wake up in the morning with many questions: What will happen today? And sometimes we walk up with great happiness; What an exciting day ahead.

This morning I woke up hearing: Many are praying for you. I took it as a message from God himself, who hears all of our prayers.

Thank you all who are praying for us today. Your prayers are lifting and en encouraging us.

Ingvar (now 4 days travelling in Sweden)

Welcomed immigrant

Yesterday Anna and I went to the Immigration and received our 1 year visa. Even if we had

all the papers …. we had a taste of how it is to be an immigrant. You never know how you will be treated. We have over the years met hard government officials in different countries always asking for more papers but also those who have been very very friendly and helpful.

Not until the stamp is in passport and in the Work Permit book do you know if you will be able to stay and continue the work or not.

Yesterday, the government officials treated us with the greatest possible kindness. Not a question. We got the feeling that they think they are doing a merit by helping us. In Thailand missionaries have a great Good Will and honor. Pray that we in all can live up to that.

Our job description is: Missionary. To preach the gospel and teach the Christian religion. Thank you Jesus for the mission you and the Thai Authorities have given us. And thank you dear Thais that you are welcoming us so warmly.

We walked out of the Thai Immigration today, grateful for the call of God and the kindness of the Thai people.

I hope and pray that immigrants to Sweden feel the same warm welcome coming to Sweden. Ingvar

Frogs, boardmeeting and failed homevisit.

Had an interesting day.
Frogs
 Wanting to cool down the room before the board members come, we just heard a rumble in the AC compressor. And it came to a stop. Ingvar found a dead frog and another alive escaped from there. But the compressor doesn't want to start now.

Boardmeeting
Grateful for a Boardmeeting today in the tune of joy and gratefulness. I said to our staff yesterday that, yes writing reports might be boring and timeconsuming, but usually we are encouraged when we look at what has happened the last six months.

CSC
Grateful for all the hard work of the Child Safe Community team. And for the open doors and cooperation with schools, local community leaders, churches and government. All for the sake of the children of Isaan.   We've seen the team recently add new members who bring with them talents and skills we have been lacking. Isaan has a special music and song culture. It is important to reach the heart of  the people. Combining songs and rythm to the awareness program is so good.

N&GC (New and Growing Churches)
Grateful for the heart of unity in the group of pioneer workers and to see their humility and willingness to reach across the denominational boundaries. We had purposed to ''strengthen feeble knees and weak hands'' and the feedback we get is that these gatherings means a lot to many who otherwise would have given up and left Isaan.

TOL
Today we visited a home. We had been asked to help a young mother who has prostituted herself and is in a bad shape. Family fears for her sanity and she hasn't been able to leave the house for quite some time. Is battling a demonic darkness.  But today we missed her by a few minutes.
Jesus came to set free, those who are bound by the power of darkness. Love is our most powerful tool. We will be back.

 


 

...... give thanks...

 ......in everything give thanks..... 

1 Thessalonians 5:18

Our obstacles, Gods plan in disguise.

My precious friend was struggling with her driving license. It took longer time to complete than she expected even though in Thailand. The weather, the queues … there were always something in the way.

She shared this with me, and said- I complained to the Lord when she heard Him say.-Because I have a job for you to do.

Next time when she stood in line for her driving test, the lady in front of  her showed so much fear, she was trembling all over. Lampuang asked her if she could pray for her that she would have peace and asked if she had heard about Jesus.  No she had never heard, and Lampuang shared simply about Jesus and  spoke to fear to go in the name of Jesus and asked for peace to come.

Suddenly all the fear was gone and Lampuang  asked her – would you like to invite Jesus as Lord and Savior and they stood there in line to take the driving test and this lady says YES to Jesus and then goes to take her test and did brilliantly.

It is so much fun to see disciples follow Jesus.  

A thought: Sometimes our obstacles are there because God has something good in mind.

Not me first but His Kingdom comes first. Not my will but Yours be done!

With Love

 Anna

Pray for Thailand

We are doing well in Ubon-Pakse. There are many things to do and we are very happy for the progress of the work.

People, yes we all, are very much effected of the death of the King. He was much beloved and a father of the nation. We are now wearing black and white  cloths for one year.