I am sure if I had time I could sit down a make a huge, long list about the crazy things I have seen and learned here in Thailand, but right now I am just going to stick to some things I have leanred about buddhist belief.
First of all, I am beginning to see how widely accepted it is to be homosexual here. Every single day we see transexuals or men dressing and acting like women. I can't even give you an estimate of how many we have seen because they are everywhere. But we learned that it is accepted here because buddhists believe in reincarnation, so the homosexuals may be men or women in this life, but they were probably the opposite in another life. They say that you may be a man, but you are truly a woman in your heart. I need prayer that I can get through my judgements of these people and just see them the way God created them, in His likeness.
The second thing I learned is that we may see running an orphanage as a GREAT thing, but many Thai people believe that it is wrong. This ministry that we are a part of here has had much criticism for taking in these orphaned children. Again, since buddhists believe in reincarnation and karma, they think that the children were left orphans because they were bad people in a past life or something. They would tell the ministry that they were messing up the children's lives because they wouldn't let "karma" unfold the way it needed to. I am so thankful that the true God of this universe is a merciful and loving God who will not abandon us or forsake us. Thank You Jesus for dying for our sins, all of us all over the world!
This is a fruit that we have been eating here. It looks so strange on the outside, but the inside fruit taste great. It reminds me on a big grape without the skin on it, but it's a little bit sweeter than a grape. To open it you just stick your thumb into the skin of if and break it open. Interesting!
