It's a cold, clear Saturday morning in Chiang Mai. The clock goes off at 5 a.m. Am I crazy! No it's the day for our Christian Tribal Youth Fellowship (CTYF) retreat. I drag myself out of bed and begin packing the car to meet the more than 70 youth who will be traveling together with us to Chiang Rai for an overnight visit to a local Karen church. We've arranged for 6 local taxi trucks to take the kids on our two-day expedition. As the kids begin to arrive and we all gather round for prayer before we set off I notice many new faces as well as our regulars. All of the kids seem really excited to begin our trek. We traveled for three hours into Chiang Rai and then rode all around the mountainside visiting places that these kids had never seen. Even though most of them were born in Northern Thailand they had not had the opportunity to visit these national sites.

In the evening we all gathered at the church for dinner and a wonderful service of praise and worship. The youth from the Taweerat Church welcomed us and everyone enjoyed spending time together. Then it was off to sleep (?) in various homes of the church members. Bright and early Sunday morning we gathered again for breakfast and worship with the local congregation. The CTYF youth shared a song with the congregation. We returned safely back to Chiang Mai on Sunday evening. Sounds like kind of a typical church outing doesn't it! In many ways it was but in so many ways it wasn't. CTYF is one of the few organizations, which is set up to offer fellowship across tribal lines. These 70 plus youth represented 3 major tribal groups. As we worshiped, fellowshipped, ate and slept together we all came to a better understanding of who we are in Christ.

Every month I help to organize a special service for CTYF young people. We do many things together but one of the most important is that each young person is able to see Christ at work in the lives of people outside his/her tribal group. These young people are the future leaders of the Church in Thailand. They must learn to cooperate and love one another. This is one of the goals of CTYF, to teach them to be leaders who are following the example of Christ. As a missionary serving in Thailand part of my mission is to help teach these youth by example in word and deed.