Posted by Ric and Sharon on Friday, November 25th, 2011
A good friend sent us this prayer request list. Here’s how he’s lifting us up these days:
That God would find favor on Ric and Sharon granting them good health and full healing for Sharon’s leg from her motorcycle accident.
For them to create a good study routine for the next few weeks before Christmas.
That God will show them ways to use their car effectively for ministry.
That God would lead Ric as he makes disciple-makers of the two guys at his church. Also, that the Holy Spirit would convict their girlfriends of their need for Christ’s redemption.
That God would direct Sharon to those girls that He would desire for her to develop intentional disciple-making relationships.
That God would help Ric and Sharon “see” the needs the students have and how to best reach out to them.
For continued strength and patience in their language learning.
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Monday, July 18th, 2011
This week is one of refreshment, encouragement and strategic planning with other members of our organization serving in this region. We’re thankful for this time, these friends and the clarity the first few days have given us so far. This marks the first week since our arrival that we’ve taken done virtually no language and culture study. Instead our days consist of hearing ministry reports from our various tribal teams, business meetings, praying for Thailand and encouraging our fellow workers. Pray this week will be profitable, encouraging, fun and safe. Thanks!
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Sunday, June 19th, 2011
A vehicle we're borrowing.
During this first year in Thailand we’ve been using public transportation and a scooter to get around. That’s been working out well with one big catch: it’s not very safe. We didn’t really realize just how unsafe the motorcycle was until we borrowed the truck in the picture above for a few months. The owners are fellow missionaries currently on “home assignment” in the US. To buy a good, used vehicle like the one above will cost around $10,000 US dollars.
Please be praying with us about this need. When we first arrived in Thailand we had 3,100 dollars in our “vehicle fund.” We spent the majority of this on the scooter and we currently have $1,200 to put toward a car. Our leadership team in the US has agreed with us that this is a need and is praying with us that we will be able to raise the rest of the funds before the end of September. Please visit our Give Page to see more information on how you can help with this special project. Thanks!
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Monday, May 16th, 2011
Every day my knee feels stronger and the joint gets tighter as my quad muscles learn how to do their job again. Unfortunately we’re not out of the woods yet on this one though. I’ve got a mix of good and bad news for you and I could still use your prayers for a full recovery so I can use my knees to build closer relationships with guys who play soccer every day near our house.
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Tuesday, January 25th, 2011
Just thought I’d mention that just because we post pictures and video of us having fun all the time that doesn’t mean we just have fun all the time. That’s obvious I know but we’ve had a few people asking us on Facebook and many of our friends here don’t understand how we spend our time.
I can assure you that we work hard but you’d be bored out of your minds if that’s what we talked about on our blog all the time. The truth is learning a language is extremely tedious and not at all glamorous. Actually it’s quite embarrassing as we struggle through basic conversations about topics most children can converse about easily (like what we ate for dinner yesterday).
Thai is an extremely difficult language for an English speaker to learn and some days we feel like we’ve made almost no progress. Other days we have encouraging conversations with patient people who give us a lot of grace when we make mistakes. Good relationships are crucial to our method of learning language but relationships here don’t follow the same rules we’re used to back home because the culture is different. Some days we make great connections with people and feel we’re really progressing but other days those same people act like they don’t know us in certain situations. We’re still getting used to that.
Pray with us as we seek wisdom in balancing our schedules, building relationships and having fun as we do it. This is hard, ching ching (really really).
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Friday, November 12th, 2010
You know that feeling you get the first day you’re out exercising? You’re like, “Oh man I’ve totally got this.”
Then the second day you’re like, “Man that was hard but now I feel good.”
Then the third day you want to die. Today I went to my third day of physical therapy. I’m starting to feel the burn but it’s awesome to see big gains in just the first few days. I’ve pretty much regained full mobility in my knee through squats, leg press exercises and biking. The therapist is really excited about my progress and has told me to start doing the therapy at home or in a gym closer to where we live. It will be nice to have that extra hour or two every day. We’ll update again on Monday after my next appointment with the Doctor. Thanks for praying!
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Saturday, October 16th, 2010
Well, the surgery is tomorrow. At YouTube (and below if you’re visiting our website) you will find a quick video I made tonight. We appreciate your prayers as we experience a new part of the culture here: surgery.
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Tuesday, October 12th, 2010
We’re pretty sure Ric has a torn ACL… it’s been an ongoing thing but tonight he re-injured it during soccer practice. Tonight was pretty scary because his knee wouldn’t go back into place and he had to be helped off the field. It’s a major bummer for several reasons:
Soccer is an awesome way to build relationships and something our church loves to do.
Surgery is the last thing we want to think about right now… we’re already in the midst of so many adjustments.
Probably the biggest thing is the team needs him to win the inter-church world cup.
Our next step is to get an MRI to asses the damage. Pray the meniscus is still intact and that no further damage will be done until we can find a permanent solution.
The up-side of this whole thing is our church. After practice tonight they all prayed for me and asked God to heal me so I could play soccer with them again. Our soccer coach is actually a Muay Thai coach and knows about torn ligaments so he brought some anti-inflammatory medicine and the Thai equivalent of Ben-Gay to our house tonight. Below you’ll find a quick video Sharon took of the soccer practice. Thanks for your prayers and love! -R+S
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Monday, October 4th, 2010
Hello everybody-
Just a note to let you know we are over half way there! Our first two flights went well and we are waiting to board the leg to Bangkok. Please pray we will be able to sleep on this leg, as it is now night-time in Thailand. We are encouraged and feeling great as we lOok forward to our new adventure tomorrow. Thanks a lot for the comments, prayers and emails! Keep them coming! -Ric and Sharon
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Monday, September 20th, 2010
Our number arrived! Tomorrow morning at five AM we’ll crawl out to the car dragging an overnight bag. Four hours later we’ll slap a two inch thick pile of paperwork on the desk at the Thai embassy and the waiting game will begin again. At least this step has a pretty predictable outcome: we’ll definitely get the visas. Just pray it will be a short, painless process and that we’ll come back to Lansing safely. If you’ve forgotten what our faces look like already here’s a picture to enjoy:
Chautauqua Lake in New York.
UPDATE – September 21 4:00 PM
Everything went according to plan this morning. We arrived at the consulate just as the guard opened the doors chased a homeless guy off the steps. We walked out fifteen minutes later with a receipt to pick up our visas in two days. So immediately after arriving we turned around and drove right back out of the city. Pretty boring trip. We’ll have to repeat the entire ordeal later this week. We’ll post about it here.
UPDATE – September 25 2:00 PM
Went to Chicago yesterday and picked up our visas with Sharon’s parents and sister. It was a great trip! Check out our photos in our latest post: Our Visas are Here!
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Tuesday, September 7th, 2010
Something occurred to me today as I was tracking a UPS shipment scheduled to arrive tomorrow: there are no tracking numbers for Thailand’s visa approval process. In fact, there’s no way to track the process at all. In today’s internet-saturated world it’s hard to imagine real, physical paperwork (turns out it’s called that for a reason).
Maybe it’s a good thing there’s no tracking number… I would probably check it every five seconds. Keep praying!
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Wednesday, August 18th, 2010
Our co-workers and friends about whom we have written several times, Kevin and Emily, have just arrived in Thailand! We received this note from our field leadership:
“Only 3 nights ago we were able to welcome our newest missionaries to the field, Kevin & Emily Bertram and their son Logan. In spite of jet-lag the Bertram’s have been very busy getting set up at their house as well as getting a bank account set up, shopping for needed items, getting official photos done, spending time here at the office for a field overview, etc. Pray for good rest at night for them all and that they’ll soon be over jet-lag. Also, pray for the other enroute families that their letters of guarantee will come through in a timely way – God’s timing!”
Wow! That will be us soon. Be praying with us for them and for our paperwork to come soon.
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Saturday, July 10th, 2010
Please pray with us. It appears there could be a delay in the processing of important paperwork that we filed in March of this year in Bangkok. We aren’t certain it will be delayed but two of our co-workers who filed for their visas and work permits before us have experienced delays.
What does this change? Well, not much. We still have two months before we’d like to see ourselves in Thailand. As soon as we receive a letter of authorization from Bangkok we will travel to the Thai consulate in Chicago to get our passports stamped and book tickets. We won’t have a departure date set in stone until we literally have every piece of necessary paperwork in hand because we could experience delays at any juncture.
Please pray this crucial paperwork will be processed in a timely manner. Thank-you.
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Wednesday, June 30th, 2010
From the department of ouch comes bad news from our dentist: my wisdom teeth need pulled. Here in the states the full package of mouth repairs would run well over two thousand dollars but we’re currently exploring all our options, including waiting until we arrive in Thailand.
Next week I have consultations with two local orthodontic surgeons. We’re told having the tooth extractions done in Thailand would be cheap and safe as well so we may just wait and see what options open up to us there. Please pray with us that we’ll make the right treatment decision and spend our start-up money wisely.
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Wednesday, June 23rd, 2010
Tonight we finished the setup for NTM’s display at the festival. It looks awesome but if people aren’t praying it won’t be effective. Please pray! We want to really grab people’s attention and make them think about what it would be like to be IN another world. A world without hope and without Christ. Please pray God will use that experience to raise up workers to go into the ripe harvest fields (John 4:35). We’ll update tomorrow.
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Tuesday, February 9th, 2010
“He who tends the fig tree will eat its fruit.” Proverbs 27:18
Northeast Thailand
February 2009
Matthew, Sharon, Ric, Carl, Barb in Thailand
If you had asked Trinity Church’s Global Outreach team last spring about Trinity’s Southeast Asia missions focus, they would have told you that Southeast Asia was to be considered in the near-distant future. As it turns out, the Lord had a different plan and a different timetable!
On January 20th Matthew Philip, Ric and Sharon Bruce (New Tribes Mission), and Barb and I boarded a plane for Thailand and emerged in Bangkok some 20 hours later. The next morning we flew north to Chiang Mai where we were met by Trinity missionaries Kenneth and Maxene. They had arranged meetings with leadership from NTM, Pioneers, and others engaged in missions-related work, and graciously transported us and kept us on schedule. As part of our visit, we also flew to northeast Thailand to visit Trinity missionaries Mike and Sandy who immersed us in rural village culture.
It is evident to us that our Trinity missionaries are having a significant impact on the lives of the people with which the Lord has connected them. They have been intentional in their relationship-building and we were warmly received by their Thai friends and acquaintances. Our missionaries provide an excellent testimony of faith and service in their communities.
A temple in Northeast Thailand
Traveling the streets of Chiang Mai with Kenneth and Maxine as our guides we caught a glimpse of the Thai lifestyle and culture: busy city streets with many small motorcycles and street vendors, archways and paintings honoring the King of Thailand, breathtaking flowers and gardens reflecting the country’s love of beauty and color, and numerous spirit houses, temples and statues that attest to a unwavering faith in unseen gods. Kenneth and Maxene work at Grace International School (GIS), a school designed for missionary children so that their parents can continue their work. We also met several other GIS staff and faculty, including Mark and Joanne from Trinity.
In northeast Thailand Mike and Sandy led us on an extraordinary walk. We strolled along the narrow streets and in keeping with local customs Mike and Sandy spoke with everyone we encountered and engaged in leisurely conversation.
Sunrise over a rice storage shed in the village.
We learned first-hand that “time” has a very different meaning here, and is not as linear as we see it in the U.S. As Mike translated, we learned about basket making and weaving from the local women and visited a store owner selling homemade food. What a privilege to see the warm and trusting relationships shared by Mike and Sandy and the villagers.
The respectful, kind, and generous nature of the Thai people made our interactions easy and comfortable. Smiling, laughing and gesturing with our hands allowed us to effectively communicate even though we couldn’t speak the Thai language. Most Thais in larger cities such as Chiang Mai and Bangkok speak some English.
What is the state of the Thai Christian church? Is it vibrant? Can we partner with them? How can we best come along-side our own missionaries in Thailand? These were some of our questions and though we don’t have complete answers, we are very excited about what we have learned and the potential for Trinity’s growing involvement in this part of the world.
We ask for your prayers as we seek to discern God’s plan for Thailand and SE Asia and the role that Trinity Church will play. The Lord is already moving ahead: shortly after our return, Ric and Sharon were formally invited to join NTM Thailand. We’re excitedly looking forward!
On behalf of the Southeast Asia Leadership Team at Trinity Church,
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Thursday, November 12th, 2009
We’re in Norfolk, Virginia watching the rain slam against the windows and listening to the wind howl though the trees outside. This is the yearly “Noreaster” that residents here have come to respect for its ability to flood the city annually. Here’s a link. We are safe, but appreciate your prayers as we are hoping to drive to central Virginia tomorrow and then head on to Tennessee Saturday.
Yesterday, however, we did squeeze in a little fun before the heavy rains and wind. We went to the Virginia Beach Aquarium and had a great time looking at the animals. Here’s a sample of what we saw:
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Thursday, October 22nd, 2009
Sharon sitting down to sort through mounds of Cherokee data.
As Sharon sits behind me she alternately scratches her head, bounces her knees, and bangs some phonetic writing out on the keyboard. Today is her first full day of work after four full days of packing, cleaning, traveling, visiting, and unpacking. Outside the orange leaves on the trees are almost gone and rain is in the forecast for the next three days. In the kitchen is a pot of hot coffee and under Sharon’s feet a small space heater breathes warmly on her feet. Ideal conditions.
Now if only the computer would work right, the data would fit together perfectly, someone would spoon food into her mouth, and the kitchen would clean itself. Then it would be perfect, but that’s probably asking too much isn’t it?
Please pray that Sharon will be able to focus on her studies and finish her analysis of the Cherokee language before we hit the road in a few days!
Posted by Ric and Sharon on Wednesday, October 21st, 2009
Standing at the border of Michigan and Indiana
Have you seen the new sign at Michigan’s borders? We took this picture in front of it while we stopped for a much-needed break on our way back from Oklahoma. Maybe it’s a play on words with two meanings, one indicating that the state is very environmentally friendly and the other making it clear to all crossing the border that Michigan is not two states, but in fact is just one state (despite the fact that a lake separates its two main halves).
We are back in Michigan for a few days while Sharon works on her write-up of Cherokee. It will take a lot of concentration and effort on her part! While she is doing that I will be working on the house we’re living in with my dad and preparing for our next round of travels to Maryland, Virginia, Tennessee, Missouri, Arkansas, and Arizona.
Ric and Sharon Bruce On a journey with you to Thailand 
