Posted by Ric and Sharon on Wednesday, April 4th, 2012
Sharon and I just returned yesterday from a short trip to the Philippines to visit friends from our home church working there. We were sent as representatives of Trinity Church to encourage David and Vanessa and to get a first-hand perspective of what their lives are like. It was an incredible trip for a number of reasons. The trip gave us a new perspective on Thailand as we visited another place and it gave us a new perspective on our lives and ministry as we observed other missionaries.
We met several Thai people while traveling. It was fun to listen in on Thai conversations then interrupt with a question relevant to what was being discussed. I remember one older lady particularly well. Her jaw dropped and worked around in a circle until she got her wits around her again and sputtered, “You’re smart!” When people are outside their usual environment surrounded by people who don’t speak their language they really enjoy talking to someone who can understand them so this lady unloaded on us… I could have written a book on culture just from our 20 minute conversation. Many things combined to give us a fresh perspective on things that are distinct to Thais and characteristics Thai people share with other Asian people groups. In our line of work, perspective is priceless.
Interacting with other missionaries in the Philippines helped us better understand our own ministry and lives. It turns out missionaries there are slogging through the ups and downs of language learning just like we are here. It was refreshing to share with them the things we’ve been working on and to hear from them what they’re doing and how things have gone for them. Personally, it made me much more excited to get back here to Thailand and get back to work.
Many people on Facebook were able to follow our trip. We’ll continue to get more pictures up so you can experience the trip with us. We’re thankful for God’s protection while traveling and for a new way to look at life and ministry.
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Wednesday, March 14th, 2012
Pray for Pope, one of our good friends
Pope has been my friend since the day I met him a year ago. When we first met he flung an arm around my waist, patted my stomach and told me I was fat. That’s true love. He’s always bursting with energy and bubbling with joy so I was shocked when I heard his life story last week. Here’s a rough translation from Thai:
“I grew up in Na Fon village, the youngest of my family. My parents were farmers. Dad only graduated third grade so Mom and Dad can’t read or write. Now Dad can read the Bible because God gave him the wisdom to do it. Mom still doesn’t read well. My family is Lawa and ever since I was a kid my parents planted rice.
I only graduated sixth grade. After sixth grade I became a monk to learn in another village but didn’t make it too far because I was already addicted to drugs. Everyone chased me out of the village because of my habits. I went home and things got worse. I huffed glue, gasoline, anything that would make me high. I drank. I overdosed a few times and had to go to rehab. I would see strange visions and felt like I had a fever all the time in rehab. After I got out of rehab I would go back home and get right back to it. I was crazy. I didn’t know what I was saying. I had problems and fights all the time. Sometimes people beat me up because when I drank I didn’t know myself. (more…)
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Monday, December 19th, 2011
This weekend we visited our Thai church’s sister church in Turtle Mountain (Doi Tao) Thailand. Though there are not many members the church was very warm and welcoming. It was a joy to join them for their annual Christmas celebration. Here they are singing Joy to the World in Thai.
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Sunday, November 6th, 2011
After hours and hours interviewing dozens of people (sometimes multiple times) our friends are likely quite sick of us. On the plus side we now have several hours of raw language data from multiple speakers. Our goal is to now organize all that data, write it out in Thai and then speak it back to the people who gave us the interviews. Easy!
We’ve gotten some incredible stories. Today Tang was telling me about his childhood. His dad took him to boarding school when he was six years old. Dad told little Tang he was just going to go register him and be right back. Tang sat on the sidewalk for twelve hours before one of the teachers at the school found him and asked what grade he was in. Soon all the things Tang had brought to school were stolen except the clothes on his back and the spoon he had to eat with. Even his shoes were gone! But he held onto that spoon for dear life when other kids would beat him up because if he didn’t have it he would go hungry at dinner.
Puts our small troubles into perspective. Thanks for your continued prayers and support! – Ric and Sharon
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Wednesday, November 2nd, 2011
The water has gone down in our area and is now wreaking havok in suburbs of Bangkok, Thailand’s capital city. This year’s floods are the worst in 50 years and there are a lot of people that have lost everything as a result of this slow moving disaster. Some incredible photos at
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Tuesday, November 1st, 2011
This is the "deluxe" version of the same car we're buying. Imagine this minus the fancy grill and wheels.
We’re buying a 1995 Nissan Cefiro with low miles from a good friend. At first we didn’t want to buy a car because trucks are generally tougher, safer and a better value but this car fell into our laps and after driving it for a few days we fell in love with it. It’s probably different than the car you drive to work in a few ways: the steering wheel is on the right side of the car, the turn signal and wiper controls are switched and it has two fuel systems: one for gasoline and one for natural gas.
The above picture was definitely taken in Thailand, btw. Notice the parking job. People will often double or triple park this way then leave the car in neutral so it can be easily pushed out of the way if need be.
Vehicles are expensive and depreciate slowly. Despite its age the car sells for 8,000 US dollars on the open market! However, we’re thankful to be off two wheels and onto four. Thank-you for giving and praying to make this happen.
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Monday, October 10th, 2011
This year marks the worst flooding Thailand has experienced since 1942. Though our yard flooded for a few days we actually got off a lot easier than many people in Thailand who lost businesses, vehicles, homes, and even loved ones. Please pray for Thailand and for the ongoing flooding in Bangkok and the surrounding areas and check www.bangkokpost.com for more details. We are praying this will be an opportunity for God’s church in Thailand to rise to the occasion and make a real difference in people’s lives. Through this difficult time we hope to continue deepening our existing friendships and model lives of faith.
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Wednesday, October 5th, 2011
Today is the first anniversary of our adventure in Thailand. That doesn’t mean we did anything great… we’re pretty sure anyone could live in this beautiful country for a year. This first year is really YOUR victory and something you can be proud of. Without your continued prayers, interest and support this journey would be impossible. One year sounds like a long time but it’s barely scratching the surface of the time we’re committed to spend reaching people groups in Southeast Asia with the gospel.
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Wednesday, September 21st, 2011
Aunt Pat on her way to honor her mother's memory.
Last week Grandma Tong passed away. She was 96 years old. Having lived a long, full life it is believed she will go to heaven for as long as her accumulated merit will allow her to stay there. She will then enter the next life re-born in some other form, working hard there to earn enough merit to repeat the cycle as someone a bit better next time. Her two daughters (one of whom is our landlady) survive her and played a key role in the important task of honoring Grandma Tong and sending her to the afterlife. Ceremonies included ritual washings, house blessings, merit building for the deceased, funeral rites, giving new robes and other gifts to the monks, burning the body, collecting the ashes, listening to sermons on being a good Buddhist and ritual chants.
Sharon and I had the privilege to watch these rites and ceremonies for six days in a row. Our friends patiently explained the meaning of the various acts performed and even gave us seats of honor among the guests. It was an incredible opportunity to be a part of honoring Grandma Tong and to observe another aspect of the culture we know little about.
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Thursday, September 15th, 2011
Thai Grammar Workshop day 3
I knew it would be long week when Martin opened Monday with, “Thai uses ‘Topic-Comment’ sentence constructions rather than the ‘Subject-Verb’ formats we’re used to in English .” For the past five days we’ve been meeting with three other missionary families in all-day grammar workshop sessions. We’ve been learning about things like discourse analysis, the ten things people do when they speak, life perspectives and communication relationships. If you have no idea what those are don’t worry… we’re still learning too. The best part of the week was summed up by fellow attendee Ben, “I was just looking forward to sitting in the air conditioning all week.”
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Tuesday, August 30th, 2011
Sharon appears to have gotten over a short bout with mild food poisoning after two nights in the hospital. We went into a local clinic on Monday because Sharon had a low fever and a racing pulse. The doctor decided to keep her in the hospital for a few nights to monitor her after he felt that she looked as though she may feint. In the States, of course, this would never happen but here in Thailand staying in the hospital doesn’t necessarily mean you have a serious condition. After a raft of intravenous antibiotics and blood tests she’s feeling herself again and ready to go home this morning. Thanks for your prayers for continued recovery.
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Sunday, August 28th, 2011
Bungalow-Style Home in Chiang Mai
One thing weighing heavily on our minds is an upcoming move next month. Our current one year contract is expiring October 1st and we’ll be moving to a smaller bungalow-style or townhouse-style home near our church. Unfortunately we haven’t been able to find anything in our price range in this area. Please be praying as we look over the next two weeks that we’d find the house God’s prepared for us to spend the next year in. It should be located in a safe area, meet our basic needs, clean and relatively critter/bug free. Our reasons for moving are many and complicated but the primary one is financial. We’re trying to save money for a car and could better do that if we lived in a smaller place. Thanks for praying with us.
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Saturday, August 27th, 2011
Sharon and I are breathing a sigh of relief this week as our second set of intensive language evaluations drew to a close yesterday. Virtually all we’ve done for the past two weeks since Sharon’s family left was prepare for the evaluation by doubling our language sessions, spending hours reviewing and answering in-depth culture questions that our consultant reviewed before our language check.
It’s good news. We’re both on track to achieve our goal of reaching a “highly capable” language level by the end of our second year of study (a year from now). We feel grateful to our consultant for conducting a thorough check and spending days processing the raw data we’ve provided her into a set of recommendations to help streamline our study time. I can’t imagine doing this alone.
You can help by praying for us as we study this difficult language and learn more about this complex culture. (more…)
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Monday, July 25th, 2011
Got my conference face on. Has a camera in it.
We spent last week with some of our favorite people: our co-workers. Since many of them work in remote parts of Southeast Asia we don’t get to see them often. The six days flew by chock full of reports from the various teams, workshops and meetings with our leaders and fun times of fellowship and encouragement with fellow workers.
Below I’ve embedded several pictures of Sharon and I taken during the past week but believe it or not we weren’t the only ones there. You can see the rest of the people by visiting our Picasa web albums (also available on our new Google+ account).
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Saturday, July 16th, 2011
Holy City Chiang Mai 2011
We participated in this year’s annual gathering of 7,000 Christians for worship and prayer last night. Like last year our church led worship at this gathering which would appear to attract about 2% of all Christians in Thailand if you divide 7000 by the latest numbers given at Congress 7.5: 400,000 Christians in a nation of 69 million. Anyways, there are some sample images embedded below or you can see them all here. (more…)
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Wednesday, July 6th, 2011
We’ve been busy digging into Thai language and culture as usual with a little twist: we had old friends visit for five days this week. It was great to see life here in Thailand through their eyes and enjoy a short time of mutual encouragement with them. We’ll be posting pictures of some of our adventures soon.
In the meantime we wanted to let you know that important things have been happening here in Thailand during the past week. If you’re interested the best source of information is the Bangkok Post. As a side note we’d like to remind you to please avoid making any political statements or leaving political comments on our blog.
We celebrated our first fourth of July in Thailand by eating donuts and by watching an American movie with our friends. We hope and pray you each enjoyed the long weekend. Thank-you for your love and support. -Ric and Sharon
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Sunday, June 26th, 2011
This week I’ve been following a story in the Bangkok Post about a unique cultural phenomenon here in Thailand called “pubpeab.” It’s basically Thailand’s version of “planking“. Lying flat on your face in public just doesn’t fit well culturally so people take pictures of themselves in religious “pubpeab” poses in places all over the world and post them to Facebook.
So this week I’ve been thinking about the culture of sitting. (more…)
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Tuesday, June 14th, 2011
Can going to the gym count as work?
When we first arrived and I realized knee rehab would be a part of my everyday life for a while I immediately compartmentalized my life. In good western fashion I figured I could still get in enough hours of studying Thai even with spending a few hours every day at the gym. As it turned out, hours spent at the gym have been among my most productive.
First, we encountered a different definition of the word “gym”. They seem to have a different purpose altogether here. (more…)
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Wednesday, June 8th, 2011
During the past two weeks we’ve knocked some big jobs off our “to do” lists by using every available minute to study the Thai language and culture. During the month of June we promised each other we’d do no traveling and that we’d focus exclusively on improving our language skills. A few examples of what we’ve been up to include:
Finished reading the 600 page tome “Four Reigns” which covers a critical turning point in Thai history through the eyes of a royal servant growing up in the King’s court. This was the the last of several books on a list we were asked to read in our first year or so here. Next year I’ll have to re-read the entire list in Thai. (more…)
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Saturday, May 21st, 2011
This weekend we hopped on a $30 flight out of Chiang Mai to a small city lying in the other half of Northern Thailand. Thirty bucks! Sure beats almost dying on buses. The thirty minute plane ride is a six hour bus ride on winding mountain roads. Our purpose for the trip was simple: to learn about the ministry and enjoy the fellowship of fellow NTM co-workers here. They work among a people group here that has limited access to the gospel.
After a four hour delay at the airport in Chiang Mai because of an “electrical problem” on the aircraft we had a safe flight out and a wonderful visit filled with fun activities. Much of our time was spent discussing life in the village, local culture and their current ministry responsibilities. It really helped us get a clearer picture of what our lives in a similar village will look like in the future.
Ric and Sharon Bruce On a journey with you to Thailand 
Sharon and I just returned yesterday from a short trip to the Philippines to visit friends from our home church working there. We were sent as representatives of Trinity Church to encourage David and Vanessa and to get a first-hand perspective of what their lives are like. It was an incredible trip for a number of reasons. The trip gave us a new perspective on Thailand as we visited another place and it gave us a new perspective on our lives and ministry as we observed other missionaries.
After hours and hours interviewing dozens of people (sometimes multiple times) our friends are likely quite sick of us. On the plus side we now have several hours of raw language data from multiple speakers. Our goal is to now organize all that data, write it out in Thai and then speak it back to the people who gave us the interviews. Easy! 
Today is the first anniversary of our adventure in Thailand. That doesn’t mean we did anything great… we’re pretty sure anyone could live in this beautiful country for a year. This first year is really YOUR victory and something you can be proud of. Without your continued prayers, interest and support this journey would be impossible. One year sounds like a long time but it’s barely scratching the surface of the time we’re committed to spend reaching people groups in Southeast Asia with the gospel.
Sharon appears to have gotten over a short bout with mild food poisoning after two nights in the hospital. We went into a local clinic on Monday because Sharon had a low fever and a racing pulse. The doctor decided to keep her in the hospital for a few nights to monitor her after he felt that she looked as though she may feint. In the States, of course, this would never happen but here in Thailand staying in the hospital doesn’t necessarily mean you have a serious condition. After a raft of intravenous antibiotics and blood tests she’s feeling herself again and ready to go home this morning. Thanks for your prayers for continued recovery.
