Christmas is a time of Hope and Joy. We often speak of hope and Joy we have in the birth of Jesus. But what does that look like in living from day to day? What hope and Joy does Christ

	Above and Below:  Christmas dinner, Nam Rii Church

mas bring to those who are living in desperate circumstances? Christmas week was spent celebrating in the Lua Churches in Nan, Province. Five nights, five churches in villages scattered through out the mountains that border Thailand and Laos. Some of these villages are located in an area that was under control of the communists during the Asian conflict that did not end in Thailand until 1992. Just down the road from one of the churches is a memorial built by the Communist to memorialize "the struggle"

One evening we were at the church in Nam Mao village. We spent some time visiting Mr. Denai, a former student at Lanna Theological Center. Three years ago he was in a motorbike accident and was paralyzed form the chest down. For two years he was severely disabled. He could not move his limbs and was unable to talk.  In the last year or so he has made remarkable recovery. He has just recently regained some movement in his arms and when we visited him he was able to talk. Although confined to a hospital bed, in a remote village on the side of a mountain, he spoke with joy and hope and a smile on his face.

Mr. Denai shows David L. Filbeck how movement had returned to his arms.

At one point one of our Thai leaders, Mr. Prawanwit, made the observation that Mr. Denai's ability to speak with joy and hope in Christ has not been diminished. He encouraged Mr. Denai to continue to gain strength, then consider finishing up his Bible Studies and become a preacher. Mr. Prawanwit said "You can still preach and serve God, even if confined to a wheel chair" I can not describe the look of hope and joy that flashed across Mr.Denai"s  face when he heard this. This is the joy and Hope of Christmas.  In Christ and through Christ we have joy and hope even when paralyzed.  Please pray for Mr. Denai's continued recovery. Pray that God reveals to him how he can serve the Kingdom regardless of his physical condition.

David & Deloris Filbeck, and Translation team dedicate the Mal New Testament.

The highlight of December was the dedication of the New Testament in the Mal Language. David Lee Filbeck has worked on this translation for close to 50 years. Satan placed many road blocks  to halt our delay the translation. In the early years the Indo-china war interrupted the translation work as the area in which the Mal people lived fell under the control of communist insurgents. This conflict did not end here in Thailand until the early 1990s. During the early 1980s a drug war erupted between two factions here in Chiang Mai. In an attempt by one side to eliminate the leader of the other side, a truck bomb was driven into the compound where our parents' house was and detonated. The goal was to destroy the next compound over, but all it did was destroy the houses in our parent's compound. All was lost

Baptism following the Bible Dedication.

-except for the translation work.   One last road block: we sent the final copy to the printers. Something went wrong during the transmission from one computer to the printer's computer and in the final printing there was one misspelling all the way through. After a year or so of trying to figure out what went wrong, and looking at different options, the decision was made to finance a second printing. This printing was successful. December 24th we held the official dedication of the New Testament at the Ban Ta Luang Christian Church. David A preached the dedication sermon. David Lee and Deloris along with the translation team officially presented the Mal church with the New Testament in their own language. The day ended with a baptism of a family that traveled down  from the mountains to attend the dedication service.