February 2021 Mcclain Family Prayer Letter

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During the past couple of months we had another round of covid cases here in Chiang Mai and in several other places here in Thailand and because of this, we were not able to have our community wide Christmas outreach at the local recreation facility and the national Children’s day celebrations in January were also canceled. But we were still able to reach out to several neighborhoods around the church and invite them to our Christmas celebration at the church and one person that just recently moved into the neighborhood of the church came and made a profession of faith. Then this past Sunday, a 65 year old lady that received a Christmas invitation tract about our Christmas celebration at the church in December came to the church with the Christmas invitation tract in her hand and she said this was the first time she has ever been to a church. She has a friend in the US that is a Christian that has been witnessing and praying for her and telling her she should go to a church and seek the Lord and because she received the Christmas invitation tract she came to the church and made a profession of faith. Another blessing from this is that her son dropped her off and came to pick her up at the church because many of times when an older person starts seeking the Lord, their children forbid them to do this and many of times their parents for some reason listen to them. Therefore please help us pray that this lady will grow in her relationship with the Lord and that her son will continue to be a blessing to his mom and not try to forbid her from coming to church or studying the Bible and that he will be open to hearing the gospel also. With this, on Sunday night I reminded the brethren that passing out tracks, witnessing and praying for people is like planting seeds, and just as it takes time and care for a seed to sprout and produce fruit, sometimes it takes time to see fruit from sowing the Gospel and the truths of the Word of God. But if we are faithful, we shall reap a harvest in due season. So please do not stop passing out tracks, praying and being a witness!

We also praise the Lord that we have seen a couple of new people start coming more often to our weekly home Bible study outreach and also to the church services. Last Sunday night we had a blessing because one of our member’s husbands came for the first time to the church services. Please pray for him to be saved and allow the Lord to use his life in reaching out to people in their community because a lot of times people in their community hang out at their house so he could join with his wife in being a witness and inviting people to come to our weekly Bible study outreach and to the church services.

Please pray with us that more of the Christians here will sell out to the Lord and that more young Christian men will surrender their lives to serve the Lord fulltime because there is a great need here for more laborers, just a couple of days ago I got word that a missionary has decided not to return to Thailand so the church he has started about 9 hours from us needs a Thai pastor. And for now there are a several Thai pastors that are helping take care of this church and another church that also needs a Thai pastor. Also just two weeks ago one of the Thai pastors here went to be with the Lord, so please pray for Ban Wai Baptist Church and this pastor’s wife and family. We do thank the Lord that there is a Thai preacher that is praying about becoming the pastor of this church but I noticed at this funeral that if the Lord does not come back soon or give long life to the current Thai pastors that several churches could be without pastors in the coming years and there is a great need for more young Christian men to surrender their lives in the next 1-3 years so that they will be ready in time if the Lord does not come back soon or if the Lord does not give long life to these current Thai pastors. And this does not even take into count the many many places here in Thailand that does not have one Bible believing church. Also pray that covid will not break out again here because we are planning on relaunching some more outreaches and we are also planning on having a part in the annual youth conference this year in April which is greatly needed to challenge the youth to not only get saved but to surrender their lives to serve the Lord.

Also please pray for Wing Ping Baptist Church anniversary revival meeting this coming March 13-14, for our Resurrection Sunday celebration on April 4, and for the youth camp from April 12-15.

For the Millions of Untold Souls in Thailand,

Brian, Evelyn, Ruth, and Rachel McClain

Musical Instruments…

Just wondering if anyone has any musical instruments that you would like to donate. If so, please email us and thank you so much!

August to October 2020 Mcclain Family Prayer Letter

Click to download the Mcclain Family August to October Prayer Letter

Thank you for your faithfulness in these uncertain times in continually praying and supporting us here in Thailand without which we could not make it here. The last couple of months have been exciting times.

We thank the Lord that we were able to host the annual national Independent Baptist Family Camp here in Chiang Mai and the theme of the camp was be ye also ready from Matthew 24:44. There were almost 200 people in attendance from around 17 different churches and 2 people made professions of faith and many were encouraged to strengthen their faith.

Lanna Baptist Church in Lampang celebrated their 20^th year anniversary in October and this is the 3^rd year that Pastor Apisit has been the pastor there and the church is growing! It has been a blessing seeing Pastor Apisit and his wife grow in the Lord and be used by the Lord there at Lanna Baptist Church and we are asking for the Lord for another family to train for Wiang Ping Baptist Church here in Chiang Mai and for others to start churches throughout Thailand and the world. And we are also reminded of the reality of the spiritual warfare here in Thailand because Lanna Baptist Church was started 20 years ago by Pastor Srithone but it took 17 years for the church to have it’s own pastor even though there have been a couple of families that Pastor Srithone tried to train in the past but sadly they did not stay the course. But praise the Lord that Pastor Apisit, his wife, and family have allowed to Lord to develop them for His glory and ministry.

We mentioned in our last prayer letter that a former student of Ban Samuel leadership and Bible training center and their family moved near the church and that he started coming back to the church and has been bringing his brother. We thank the Lord that he is still regularly coming to the church and has helped us get some more teenagers from the Pa Mai Deng Community to start regularly coming to the church. Last week we had 8 teenagers from this community and two of their parents came for the second time along with our regular adults that come from this community. We thank the Lord that several of these adults that regularly come from this community are growing in their relationship with the Lord and are trying to get others to come to the church or at least join us for our weekly Bible study there. We have also had one teenage guy from this community become a student of Ban Samuel leadership and Bible training center, please pray for this new student because many things have happened in his family over the past year and pray that he will allow to work in his soul and develop his life.

We thank the Lord that two weeks ago that a new couple joined Wiang Ping Baptist Church and we thank the Lord also that our visa and work permit have been renewed for another year.

Also please pray with us that the local government will allow us to have our Christmas outreach again this year at the local sports field and as we are preparing for this outreach and also an outreach for the national Children’s day in January.

For the Millions of Untold Souls in Thailand,

Brian, Evelyn, Ruth, and Rachel McClain

May to July 2020 Mcclain Family Prayer Letter

Click to download the Mcclain Family May to July 2020 Prayer Letter

We praise the Lord for continually helping us and watching over us here in Thailand. We praise the Lord that we have been able to start the church services back up at Wiang Ping Baptist Church and we have also been able to start having the weekly Bible studies in the houses of people that regularly attend Wiang Ping Baptist Church once again. We have also slowly started opening back up the evangelistic English classes.

According to the news Thailand has not had a new domestic case of covid-19 for 76 days but there have been some Thai people and others returning from other countries that have tested positive in state quarantine and they are held there until they test negative. Also according to the news there have not been any deaths from covid-19 for several months now. We also do not know of anyone or know of anyone that knows anyone here in Thailand that has had covid-19. Also the majority of places where we are have opened back up but we are still required to wear a mask to enter the big stores that are similar to the grocery stores, home improvement stores, etc in the US. Around our house and the church area, it seems like the majority of people are starting not to wear masks anymore. The schools here in Thailand have opened back up but most schools around here have the students on a rotating schedule. Before the schools opened back up they were trying to have the students learn online or through a government educational tv channel, where they would broadcast the classes.

As we mentioned in our last prayer letter the students of Samuel’s house Bible and leadership training center have stayed here at the church and we have been having our regular classes as always. About three weeks ago we have had a new student come to the training center so we currently have 5 guys and 1 girl student. Within the last two weeks it seems like one of our guys is starting to mature some and this is a blessing to see because we want each of these students to come to know Jesus Christ as their personal Saviour and become a leader in society and in the church and if God calls them, for them to serve the Lord full time. Please continue praying along with us that we will see these things happen in the lives of each of our students for the Glory of the Lord.

Also back around September of last year, we told you that one of the students seemed to be influenced by a relative and left the training center and we lost contact with him. Last month their family actually moved to the area where the church is and this student has been coming back to the church services and has gotten his dad, mom and younger brother to come to the services twice already. And yesterday he brought his younger brother to church with him. Please join with us in prayer for this young man to fully surrender his life to the Lord and allow the Lord to use him to proclaim the Gospel to his family members and be a tool to help reach the Lahu people with the Gospel.

In July we had one young lady that got saved toward the end of last year, receive baptism. And yesterday we had two people come back to the church that have not been in several months and a new lady that has visited the church three times over the past two months, came back after not coming for two weeks. One of these is what I call the church barber because his shop is across from the subdivision that the church is in and several of us get our haircut at his shop. And through all of us witnessing to him, he got saved the first part of December and started coming and even got some of his friends to come to the church but around February, he stopped coming and was saying he cannot come because he will lose customers if he keeps closing on Sunday morning or afternoon to come to either one of the services. But again all of us did not give up on him but kept praying and trying to encourage him and it was great to see him come back yesterday. Also two weeks ago I went to get my haircut at his shop and one of his friends and their friend was hanging out at his shop. Both of his friends are from England and once I got my haircut, one of them said he just learned that I am a missionary and even though he is an atheist, he wants to ask me some questions and one question was do I try to force the people that come to the church or to the English classes or to any of the other things we do, to become Christian, so this opened up a great opportunity for me to explain to him that if someone becomes a Christian because someone forced them to or because they think that is what the person wants them to do, that it would be meaningless because becoming a true Christian is decision that a person has to willing and freely make for themselves. He also wanted to tell me that he was a Christian before because he went to church and went to a Christian school, when he was a child in England and some of the reasons why he doesn’t believe in God etc but when I started explaining why mankind sins etc, he hurriedly had to go but the other guy from England that I have meet before started talking to me and said he appreciated that I listened to his friend and actually talked to him because before they ran into another missionary and they were arguing back and forth. Please pray for these two men from England that live here, that I can meet up with either one of them again soon and try to explain the Gospel and Bible truths to them.

Please pray with us that the Lord will allow Wiang Ping Baptist Church to host the annual national Independent Baptist Family Camp here in Chiang Mai as planned. We are planning on hosting it from October 5-7. Also thank you for praying for my toe that I broke in April, for the most part it has healed back up and I am getting around fine but I still have some pain from it off and on. Also please continue to pray for our visa renewal process for this year, we have sent all the documents in and are praying that all the various steps will be finished before our current visa extension expires in September.

For the Millions of Untold Souls in Thailand,

Brian, Evelyn, Ruth, and Rachel McClain

February to April 2020 Mcclain Family Prayer Letter

Click to download the Mcclain Family February to April 2020 Prayer Letter

We are praying for all of you and for all our brethren around the world that the Lord will help each of us during this time to grow in our relationship with Him and to give us wisdom to reach and minister to those around us during these times. We also thank you so much for your continually prayers and support for our family and ministry here in Thailand.

By the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, our family and the people in the church are well but we have had to stop many of our ministries. About a month ago we started having weekly Bible studies at the house of a family that has been coming to Wiang Ping Baptist Church for several months and then another family that has been coming to Wiang Ping Baptist Church opened up their house. And then another lady in the church opened her house for Bible studies. But then the number of people with the covid-19 virus started multiplying here in Thailand and the government requested for people throughout the country to not have any gatherings, so for now we have temporarily stopped these Bible studies and we have also had to cancel our April summer school outreach in which we would have had students from the local area study Math, Thai, Science, English and the Bible from Monday to Friday from 9 AM – 3 PM and we have had to stop our usual Friday and Saturday English outreaches, and we have had to start online services, like many churches have had to do around the world. But praise the Lord for the technologies that we have today to be able to continue preach and teach the Word of God to our people and try to reach others online. 

The students of Samuel’s house Bible and leadership training center have stayed here at the church and we are still having our regular classes and since the government schools are closed, two of the church families that live almost an hour from the church have had their teenage sons come stay and learn at the church for atleast the month of April. Please pray for these teenage guys that are temporarily at the center and for our regular students that each of them will stay physically healthy and will grow in their relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ and will use these times to be a witness to their family and friends.

As we mentioned in our last prayer letter that after seeing our Christmas event, the local city administration asked Wiang Ping Baptist Church to have a part in the local children’s day celebration. We got the teens and young adults together and we came up with a plan to have a game in our booth using one of the boards we used in our Christmas event that explains creation. We also made up treat bags with tracts in each one for all the children and teens that came to our booth along with prizes for being a winner of the game we played. We praise the Lord that we were able to give out over 700 treat bags with each having a gospel tract in them and more people have been able to put faces with the name of the church and have come more familiar with the church now. Please pray with us that these children and teens will respond to the Bible truths that they learned from our creation game and from the tracts they received and will receive the Lord as their personal Saviour and will unite with Wiang Ping Baptist Church to serve the Lord together. We praise the Lord that we can rest in His promise that His Word will not return void and at least several times a year, we are reminded of this through the testimonies of adult Thai Christians saying that the gospel seed was planted in their soul when they were youths and how they remembered those truths that they learned in different situations that happened throughout their life and eventually they quit rejecting the Lord’s working in their soul.

We also praise the Lord that our two daughters took the challenge to get together with our only girl student in Ban Samuel that is learning to play the flute and the three of them start playing during the church services with our Ban Samuel student playing the flute and Ruth playing the violin and our youngest daughter Rachel playing the piano for special singing. Now my wife is helping Ruth teach four of the young people in the church how to play the violin, so that they will start playing together during the services and possibly during the national Independent Baptist Family Camp in October. Its been a blessing when these young people have been accompanying the congregational singing with playing the flute, violins, and piano. 

Please pray with us for our church family, students, our family, and all our brethren around the world that each of us will grow in our relationship with the Lord and that the Lord will help all of us to have good health which will help us with the help of the Lord to focus and think of new ways to try to reach out to others around us that are perishing without true faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Also this week I slipped and my little toe on my left foot got snagged on the corner of a door in our house and my toe was broken. On Thursday, I had a foot doctor try to set the toe bone back in place and taped it up. Please pray that during this week the bone will start to heal properly because next week I will have an x-ray done to check to see if the bone is healing correctly and if not the doctor may try to reset the bone again or my only option may be to have surgery, which if possible I do not want to have because it would slow us down even more with getting some outreach and ministry projects done. 

For the Millions of Untold Souls in Thailand,

Brian, Evelyn, Ruth, and Rachel McClain

October to December 2019 Mcclain Family Prayer Letter

Click to download the Mcclain Family October to December 2019 Prayer Letter

Thank you for praying for the Annual Independent Baptist Family Camp from October 21-23. Wiang Ping Baptist Church joined together with Pastor Apisit and Lanna Baptist Church in Lampang in hosting this camp at the church property in Lampang. It was a blessing to see our teens and adults join in with the people of Lanna Baptist Church and helping them with cleaning the property, preparing food, to washing dishes. There were 237 people who attended from 15 churches from north, northeastern and central parts of Thailand and a couple of other churches from a neighboring country. We rejoice from the help that we all received from the preaching of the Word of God and for the 60 year old man that came with one of the churches that was saved. There were others that heard the gospel but were not ready to be saved. Some of these said they were not ready because their families have forbidden them to become a Christian. Please pray for this man’s spiritual growth and for these that were not ready to accept Jesus Christ as their Saviour, that they would see their real need to be saved before they pass into eternity. 

Please continue to pray for the several groups of people that we mentioned in our last prayer letter because the cousins that made professions of faith during our summer camp have not been able to come back yet and a couple of the Lahu teens have not came back but we have been able to communicate with some of them and have tried to get them to realize that living their lives according to the desires and lusts of their flesh has not given them any true happiness and peace in their lives but Jesus Christ has promised that if we sincerely repent of our sins and come to Him that He will forgive us and will make us His child and if we will choose to walk with Him in our daily lives that He will help us have the victory over the desires and lusts of our flesh and will give us true peace and happiness in our lives that no one else can give us.

During the first part of December the husband of a lady that has came several times to the church, made a profession of faith at the end of our Wednesday night prayer meeting and he has came almost every week since then! Please pray for this couple because there are some strong holds in their lives and we are praying that they will fully surrender their lives to Christ so they can get the help they need to have the victory over these strong holds.

We also held our largest Christmas outreach ever, we rented the large community shelter at our local community sports field, where many people play soccer and exercise in the evenings and we did many different things to try to get the gospel and Bible truths to those in our area like passing out invitations with gospel tracts explaining the true meaning of Christmas, making large display boards about creation, the fall of man and how we can receive salvation from Christ that we had at the registration area the night of our Christmas outreach for people to see and read while they were registering, we had Nong Lom Baptist Church in Lamphun bring a choir to play and sing Christmas songs, our teens made a play about the meaning of Christmas, and we had a time of preaching the Word to everyone there. We were bless to see the people of Wiang Ping Baptist Church work together in making this happen and about 100 people from our local community came to this outreach, heard the Gospel of Jesus Christ and everyone left with a gift from the church which included more Gospel material.

This coming Saturday, January 11 will be Thailand’s national children’s day and after seeing our Christmas event, the local city administration has asked the church to have a part in the local children’s day event and we are currently preparing for this by preparing gospel games, tracts and gift bags, and we are expecting about 800 children to come to the event with their parents. Please pray with us for this event as many of these children and their parents will be hearing Bible truths and the gospel for the first time and also pray that these children and their parents will fill out the information cards that we are preparing to help us with following up on them.

Also thank you so much for Ruth’s and Evelyn’s birthday cards and gifts, for our Christmas cards and special Christmas offerings, for your faithful support and prayers for our family and the ministry here in Thailand.

For the Millions of Untold Souls in Thailand,

Brian, Evelyn, Ruth, and Rachel McClain

Prayer Request

Please pray for our community wide Christmas outreach this Friday starting at 6:00 PM Thailand time which will be 6:00 AM Friday morning Eastern Standard Time. This year we have rented a large community shelter which is at the community sports field, where many people exercise in the evenings and we have been going house to house inviting people to come, hanging banners, and advertising online, so we are not sure how many people to expect but we are preparing for around 200 people.

Many of the members of Wiang Ping Baptist Church came to the Wednesday night prayer meeting to pray, practice, and work together packing gifts for the visitors that come on Friday.

Pray with us for the all the people that will come because this will be the first time that many of them have ever heard the true meaning of Christmas because many Thai people think that Christmas is the westerners new year or the birthday of santa claus, therefore we want to introduce them to the Creator of the world and the Saviour of mankind, the Lord Jesus Christ!

We are also having another Christmas Celebration at Wiang Ping Baptist Church this Sunday evening and are praying to get many of the new people that come on Friday to gather with us at the church location on Sunday evening.

Also pray because several of our people are getting over being sick and others are fighting with getting sick, we need each of them this Friday and Sunday.

Thank you so much for your support, time, and prayers for our Christmas Celebrations and continually ministry here in Thailand!

Brian, Evelyn, Ruth, and Rachel McClain

Prayer Request

Please pray for the Independent Baptist Annual Family Camp that Pastor Apisit and Lanna Baptist Church will be hosting from October 21-23. As you know, myself and Pastor Srithone have worked together in training Apisit and his family for the work of the ministry and ordained him as the Pastor of Lanna Baptist Church in Lampang.
Many of the Thai pastored Independent Baptist Churches will come to the camp and we are expecting around 200 people.

Please pray with us for the ones in all the churches that have not yet decided to come to the family camp or not, that they will decide to come and be apart.
Also pray because there will be people that need to be saved, others that need to surrender to walk daily with the Lord in prayer, in reading and studying and obeying the Bible, others that need to surrender to serve the Lord fulltime, and there will be pastors and church workers and their wives and families that need the Lord to encourage and give them strength and wisdom in their ministries.

For the Millions of Untold Souls in Thailand,

Brian, Evelyn, Ruth, and Rachel McClain

July to September 2019 Mcclain Family Prayer Letter

Click to download the Mcclain Family July to September 2019 Prayer Letter

We want to thank all of you once again for praying for our yearly visa extension renewals and work permit renewal. Everything has been renewed and is back in our hands. Unfortunately, Thailand is not like the US in regards to being able to get a multi-year visa, therefore we have to do yearly renewals, along with reporting to immigration every 90 days etc.

It seems like atleast several times a year, we are reminded how much of a strong hold the devil and his angels have here and how they do not want anyone coming to know the Lord Jesus Christ as their personal Saviour and walking with Him in their daily lives. In our last prayer letter, we told you about the 6 people that professions of faith in the Lord Jesus Christ at our full month summer day camp here at Wiang Ping Baptist Church and how two of these are cousins and how they have started bringing some of their friends to the church services. But toward the end of July, one of their parents forbid the both of them to come to any of the activities of the church and to the church services and this is sad because from what we have heard from some of the teens in the church and from these teens is that they want to come back. Pray along with us that the parents of these teens will see that we are trying to help them in developing their teens and that they will let them come back soon.

We also like to ask you to pray for one of the students that from what it seems like was influenced by a relative to leave Samuel’s house Bible & leadership training school. Unfortunately, we have not been able to contact him but we have heard that he is working with his relative that seems to have influenced him to leave the school.

If you remember that once our Thai language ability got up to speed and through the Lord’s leading, our family started for the first time the Sunday morning services here at Wiang Ping Baptist Church in Chiang Mai, because the Thai missionary pastor that we are working with Pastor Srithone was still holding the Sunday morning services at Lanna Baptist Church in Lampang. And we are rejoicing that over the past couple of months that the number of people coming to the Sunday morning services has started to equal the number of people coming to the Sunday evening services. Another thing that is different here than from what I have seen in the US is that for most people it is not traditional or cultural to regularly go to a religious place of worship. Most people here only do any kind of religious activity, when they have a need for something or at the several yearly major religious holidays. Therefore its a blessing to see these first generation Christians growing in their relationship with Jesus Christ and becoming faithful to the church services. Because of the major importance the church has in growing together to join together in serving our Lord Jesus Christ.

We also praise the Lord that several teens from the Lahu neighborhood came back to church a week ago, after not coming for awhile and it seems like they are more open to communicating with us. Plus another family came back last Sunday, after not coming for almost a month. Pray for this neighborhood because the Jehovah witnesses have came into this neighborhood and is giving loans, animals to raise, and other things to people in this neighborhood that will allow them to teach their false doctrine to them. Pray for the people from this neighborhood that come to Wiang Ping Baptist Church because we have personally taught them about the major false doctrines of the Jehovah witnesses and have also took time to teach these to the whole church.

Lastly, we want to ask you to pray for the Annual Independent Baptist Family Camp which Wiang Ping Baptist Church has joined in with helping Lanna Baptist Church to host it there at the church property in Lampang from October 21-23. Most of the Thai Independent Baptist pastored churches will be coming to this camp. We are praying for the preachers that will be preaching and for everyone that will come that the lost will be saved and that the saved will rise up and serve the Lord in their local churches and that there will be ones that fully surrender their lives to the Lord for fulltime service because most Thai churches are lacking in people voluntary faithfully serving the Lord in their local churches and there still are so many places in Thailand that do not have a solid Bible Believing Baptist Church.

Please continue to stay faithful in your local church because you are glorifying our Lord and are making a difference around the world!

For the Millions of Untold Souls in Thailand,

Brian, Evelyn, Ruth, and Rachel McClain

Renewed Visa! Thanks for praying

We want to thank all of you for praying for our visa renewal. We were able to renew our visas for another year. Thanks so much!