Immjai House

While in Chiang Mai, we spent our evenings at Immjai House orphanage, which was established there by a member form Immanuel church. They currently have 39 orphans, ranging from six or seven years old to eighteen. They have very nice facilities, thanks to supporters in the US, who have since stopped donating. The orphanage now has great buildings and a lot of financial pressure in maintaining them.


Each evening, we met with the kids. They really enjoyed our times of songs and games because most days are pretty routine unless they have visitors.

Game time.

The director told us about a young man whose nickname is Joshua. Josh is maybe seventeen years old. He has been a challenge over the past couple of years. All of the kids attend public schools and make friends there who are not always the best influences. Josh gravitated toward the wrong crowd. Over time, he began to sneak away in the evening and to be deceitful toward the directors. One night in August, he left on one of the ministry's motorcycles and went to town to meet friends at a club. He got drunk and later that evening ran the motorcycle into a car badly inuring himself. He had an injured lung and a badly damaged liver. Doctors removed a portion of his liver and he faces another operation soon. Right now, he has a catheter to drain fluid from the area and is painfully thin. Because he is a 'charity case' none of the hospitals in the area want to be responsible for the cost of this next surgery, so he has been shuttled from one to another.

I was very pleased when the director offered to take us to the hospital to visit Josh. I am sure he has no visitors, other than the directors, who are not sure what to do about him once he does recover enough to be released permanently.

Ah Jan Winit and I both spoke to Josh. Winit translated for me as I had him look me in the eyes. I talked to him about his namesake, Joshua, in the Bible and how he was a leader, not a follower, and how he chose that, regardless of what others might do, he and his house would serve the Lord. I told him his life had been spared for a reason and that God had a real plan for his life, IF he would choose to allow God to lead him day by day.

Joshua.

Vee and I spoke and we agreed, I will have the guys in the Young Leaders' Bible Study each send Josh a short note to encourage him, assure him he is not alone, and to show him that you CAN be a pretty cool person and serve Christ. Please pray for Joshua!