Here’s the church, here’s the steeple…..

 

The first church building at the village of
Sue Mue Doh

Here’s the church, here’s the steeple, open the door and here’s the people. I bet you know the hand motions too! But how did the churches get there in the first place?

In the 1980s, while some of the Karen villages and churches had been Christian for a long time, there were ongoing evangelistic efforts leading new people to a relationship with Jesus Christ with new churches being formed and new church buildings being built. When new church buildings were first opened and dedicated it was a big event. Surrounding villages, missionaries and Karen church leaders would be invited and would make every effort to attend.

As new missionaries, we would be invited and often asked to speak at the dedication worship service. I was honored and put a lot of effort into preparing something appropriate and had to put a lot of effort into figuring out how I might say it in Thai and as time went on, in the Karen language.

Opening the first church building in
Phue Rue Khee Village

Our mission had a long-held philosophy and policy about church buildings which stated that any new church building had to be planned, organized and built by the village church. No outside help was allowed! It was part of the broader goal of trying to start new, self-sustaining and self-propagating churches and denominations that would survive and thrive without any mission or missionary involvement should the need arise. The Baptist churches of Burma (Myanmar) were often pointed to as an example of the wisdom of this philosophy as they continued to grow and prosper in spite of all missionaries being banned in the 1960s.

So, all the new church buildings came from the efforts of the believers in a particular village. Some
were quite small and humble and had a distinctly homemade quality to them but the builders were satisfied with their efforts and I bet God was as well! After all, it is the people that make the church, not the building.

The men's side of the first church building
in Oh Loh Tha Village

I never heard any complaints about this policy until maybe the late 1990s. By then, new missionaries and mission organizations were finding ways to get visas to work in Thailand and they found their way to the Karen and other Baptist groups. These new missionaries and organizations did not share the Baptist philosophy of letting villages build their own structures. These new organizations were happy to fund the building of much larger and better built structures. That sounded good to many villages and churches. In some cases, the new mission group would require the Karen village to join their particular group if they accepted the new building and alas, a number of churches did leave the Baptists.

But, during our first years in Thailand we were impressed with the efforts new believers put into their buildings and new faith. It often took a lot of courage to leave the Karen traditional belief system and become a Christian. But the Karen Baptists had dedicated evangelists and evangelistic programs that continue to this day. We were pleased to be able to support them.