Good News Ministries was started in 1978 by two World Outreach missionaries from New Zealand, Lorraine Dierck and Valerie Bateup. There are now 12 Thai Christians working in the Good News Ministries Team. We meet with Lorraine while we were in Bangkok.
Their Vision
20 million Thai children and youth have not yet heard a meaningful presentation of the gospel. 94% are Buddhist and 4% are from other religious backgrounds. Less than 1% of these young people know Christ as their Savior.
Thai youth are the key to the future of the church in Thailand. Yet, at the same time, thousands of them are being exploited and abused. For centuries, children have been regarded as merely commodities to be used for the best advantage of the extended family or village. They desperately need to hear that God loves them and can give them a new life in Jesus Christ.
Their Mission
To make disciples by winning young people to Christ and helping them to grow in their Christian faith within Thai churches.
To do this they run the following programmes:
Correspondence Courses
Most Thai children aren’t able to go to church. But they do want to learn more about Jesus. So Good News Team has developed a series of lessons that they can study by mail. These lessons introduce salvation, and then explain what it means to follow Christ. More than 100,000 children are presently enrolled in this program.
The correspondence program has three levels, with six lessons in the first course, ten in the second, and eight in the last. When the children complete the first level they receive a certificate. Then if they want to continue learning, they can enroll in the second course. At this stage they are also sent a Thai New Testament, and taught how to use this during the lessons in the second course. Many of the children will write to the Good News Team with questions about what they are learning, and also with letters of thanks for sharing the Gospel with them.
The team also produces a monthly newsletter called ‘Susu’, which means ‘Faithful Message’. This newsletter is written for the youth enrolled in the correspondence program, who have finished all lessons in the three courses. Its focus is on those young people who have no other form of Christain teaching. Susu is made up of a variety of columns and interest stories, including simple bible lessons for life application, testimonies, and teaching on how to grow in God, and live a healthy lifestyle. There is also a ‘Youth Life’ column that focuses on answering questions, and giving guidance on the concerns and life issues that the young people are writting about.
School Outreach
Twenty years ago the Lord gave us a vision to reach the children of Thailand, and a strategy for doing this – by going to their schools. These state schools, many located on the temple grounds, remain open to the gospel. Our team can freely visit them – taking an evangelistic program of puppets and songs, and always telling the story of who Jesus is, of His love for us all and of what He has done for us. Always there’s a hush as children and teachers listen so intently, and for many that’s when they start their journey towards the Lord.
Since 1981, the team has produced up to 300,000 cartoon-style magazines each year, explaining the good news of Jesus. These magazines are distributed in every Thai school the team visits, as each child is given a magazine following the programme. “What a treasure” their eyes say, as they immediately begin reading. Each copy is proudly taken back to the classroom and then to their home.
Many thousands of children have heard about Jesus for the first time during one of these school evangelism programmes. They enrolled for the correspondence course and made a decision to trust in Jesus Christ as their own personal Saviour. Many of those young people who were first reached in the schools have since come to the Lord, been to Bible College and are now serving the Lord in their own part of Thailand.
School Library Project
Although a team is not able to visit every school in Thailand, God has opened a way to reach them - by sending copies of our evangelistic magazines to school libraries. Each year Good News Team send them to over 5,000 school libraries, representing over 2 million children. From some schools, every child has written to us asking to join our correspondence course programme.
Correspondence in the Prisons
This ministry outreach started 3 years ago when a Christian group took the booklets to a prison. Prisoners started taking our lessons and learning about Jesus through the correspondence course. Some of the prisoners taking the lessons were transferred to different jails, and started witnessing to others in the new prison. The Good News of Jesus and our correspondence lessons started to spread among the Thai Prisons. Now more than 500 prisoners in six different jails study with Good News Teams.
They write … “before I couldn’t love, couldn’t smile – now I know Jesus, and I can love, and smile” … “I’m free on the inside now” … “before my future was empty, now I have hope”.
