Marsha's Blog

 (Note to Reader: This is another in our series of “River Crossings” blogs, written while we were in Thailand (2009-2011). Enjoy! Today marks our seventh week of Thai language study, and as we keep getting exposed to all the language we don’t know yet, I figure in another month we should be totally illiterate! So, to celebrate the occasion and find some encouragement, Tony was blessed with the chance today to preach in Japanese. It’s a small group (about 30) of Japanese and Thai people who meet at a hotel not five minute’s walk from our house. I suppose a visit from royalty might have gotten a bigger response, but I don’t think so.  Having been  without  a  “real  live”  pastor  for  so long, they were determined to make the most of the situation, asking for not only a sermon, but also Lord’s Supper and a Benediction (reserved for the ordained in most Japanese churches). Tony gave it his best shot, pulled out the stops, and was like a kid in ...

Note to Reader: This is another in our series of “River Crossings” blogs, written while we were in Thailand (2009-2011). Enjoy! We’re coming into that dangerous stage of language study: the time when you know just enough to be understood, but not necessarily what you think you’re communicating. Like for instance the other day when Tony told the motorcycle taxi driver he wanted to leave dog doo on his bike (Ghii with an upward inflection rather than Ghii with no inflection). The guy must have understood, since he gave Tony a ride home, but now we know why he was grinning so much! Actually, my literary creations are quite proper, if not exactly useful, like telling the teacher yesterday that I wanted her to take my refrigerator outside, please. Hey, you never know when a phrase like that might come in handy. And come to think of it, I’m not the only one lacking all the information necessary for the situation. I remember a few years ago during the Sydney Olympics, we had some friends come...

  Dear Friends,  While you’ve been following the blog I wrote 13 years ago and re-loaded it during this time when we’re on the road, I also promised you a real-time update now and then.  Tony and I realised we’ve been here in Hawaii for more than half the time we’ve committed to, so I guess that a ‘catch up’ time is warranted. First of all, let me say how we miss you all in Australia.  Clearly you’ve moved on and the waters over the gap we left have filled in, making us both happy that you’re OK without us, but at the same time sad, because we miss you. So what have we been up to?  We’ll, of course Tony is LOVING his teaching job here and is often amazed at the depth and spiritual hunger of his students.  He was honoured to be able to speak at the 2021 graduation ceremony of the Oahu Bible Institute, even though HIS students will be graduating in the future after he’s gone.  Almost instantly we were bowled over with new opportunities for preaching and ...

 (Note to Reader: This is another in our series of “River Crossings” blogs, written while we were in Thailand (2009 – 2011). Enjoy!) Well, it’s been a week! We were “promoted” to Thai language level two and on Monday new classes began with the same “let’s kill em’!” breakneck speed the teachers seem to enjoy. We have new teachers, new rooms and a few new classmates who seem to be barely out of diapers. At least it’s clear that their brain cells are half the age of mine. I, on the other hand, vacillate between     being on top of the game and dragging along behind with      no idea what’s happening. Neither of us have actually cried yet (Tony DID decide to quit one hour but then had  tremendous success the next). It’s definitely a ‘day by day’ experience. Some of you expressed concerns last week about our blog, saying we should come home and just quit trying so hard. Part of us says, “Yeah; why are we killing ourselves, when we could probably take ...