Rev Dr Quek Suan Yew

Blessed Trip to Bethel Development

Centre (BDC), Chiangrai

It has been a few years since my last visit to BDC after the home-going of BDC’s founder, Elder Chalo, in 2013. BDC’s ministry comprises a children’s boarding school, Bible College and a Church that conducts worship service, Sunday School for adults and children, and Youth Fellowship every Lord’s Day.
A Music Seminar was conducted before their yearly gospel rally on Saturday 12 December. The team that conducted the music seminar, led by Dn Lee Kong Sing, left for BDC on Wednesday 9 December. The following is Dn Lee’s report:-

"Report on BDC Music Seminar
"In early 2015, Billy Harichaikul of BDC approached me to conduct a music seminar at BDC. Actually, we conducted a music seminar in 2012 at Billy’s request. The feedback received then was that there was too much content covered and it was not sufficiently targeted towards the audience’s needs.
"According to Billy, the CCM influence is very strong in Chiangrai. This has posed a constant struggle because a large part of their ministry is to the youths who are very easily taken by the pop-styled tunes and CCM in Chiangrai. I was told that in a population of less than a mere 100,000, Lahu people already have local recording artists producing Lahu CCM. Chiangrai is engulfed by a very strong Charismatic presence and with it also comes CCM.

"With the lessons learnt from the previous seminar, we rearranged the content and worked with BDC to divide the audience into two age groups. This recent music seminar was conducted in two parts. The first part was tailored for youths of ages ranging from primary school to teens, while the second part was for the adults. The first part for the younger audience was more participatory in nature with lesser coverage of doctrine, while the reverse was planned for the adults. However, after it was observed how the youths responded to the musical exercises that we conducted, the BDC staff told us to include the exercises for the adults as well. Therefore we had the adults doing some rather kiddish musical exercises which brought laughter to everyone. I believe this subsequently broke the ice and made our topic more accessible as well. It was a wise adjustment.

"The general approach of both parts of the seminar was to first build a personal understanding of how music affects our emotions. We wanted the audience to identify for themselves specific and rather precise emotions that were felt when certain music was played. They were provided with simple musical instruments to try out various aspects of music to deepen this understanding. After this important fact was established, we tried to impress upon them that they are consequently subjected to the designs of the composer who is in the position to manipulate their emotions with the music they compose. After these two facts were established, we then laid down the doctrines. I taught out of God’s Word what God’s will is regarding our choice of music for personal consumption as well as for worship. Given the short attention span of the audience, we aimed only to leave them with a strong impression and some truths which we hope will cause them to meditate and explore further. The two parts of the music seminar were conducted over the entire day.

"In the audience were two pastors from neighbouring churches. There was also a church leader who, interestingly, is currently serving at Billy’s former church. Billy gave a testimony during the seminar that he was guilty of introducing CCM to this same former church. This was before Billy started his studies in FEBC. Sadly, they are now unable to remove CCM out of this church. Also present was a group of about 25 to 30 female teenagers who spoke only Thai. (The seminar was translated from English into Lahu and Thai simultaneously). I discovered after the seminar was over that these ladies were "at risk youths" who had suffered from sexual abuse. I was stunned.

"One of my deepest impressions of this recent visit was how the very little things that we take for granted in CPBPC can have such deep and great impact on our Chiangrai brethen. The Lord’s Supper can only be conducted when an ordained pastor visits. This happens once in a few years. The same goes for baptism. I also realized that there is no one to play the synthesizer in BDC. Worship services are sung acapella. Sister Su Ling’s mere presence and availability transformed worship service for the BDCers that Sunday. For the Christmas gospel rally, the Lahu children were planning to present a song acapella. However, sisters Siew Meng and Su Ling were able to create music for this song impromptu and the children were able to sing with musical support. When the choir presented the carols sung in parts, I noticed that the children were completely still with looks of great seriousness on their faces. I suspect that it is not often that they hear, or perhaps they have never heard, music presented in this manner. I hope it has left a deep impression in them of how God’s music can and should sound.

"I spoke to some choristers regarding their recent experience in BDC. Many said that they wanted to come see for themselves what this ministry is about. Many have prayed and supported but had no idea what it is like there. I thank God that after this recent visit, many testified that they wanted to do more.

"BDC is only one of the many missions that CPBPC supports. It is not particularly exceptional in terms of needs. There are many commonalities among other missions. I would like to encourage Pandanites to involve themselves more in the mission field. As of now, I am unsure if I have been blessed much more than I have been of help to them. Many share this experience.
"..Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature. Matt 16:15" [End of Report]

These are the statistics provided by Billy regarding the ministry:

1) Music Seminar (10 Dec, 2015)
- Theme: Music & Worship
- Attendance: 30-40 for Children’s programme, 40-50 for Adults’ programme

2) Gospel Rally (12 Dec, 2015)
- Morning Games Session: 270-300 people (children, teens and adults from nearby hostels and churches)
- Night Gospel Rally:
Message title "His Name is Jesus" (Matt 1:18-25) by Rev Quek Suan Yew
170-200 people attended (children, teens and adults from nearby hostels and churches)

3) Lord’s Day Activities
- Morning Sunday School: 30-40 children (BDC and non-BDC children)
- Adults Bible Study: 10-20 adults (regular worshipers and parents of BDC children)
- Morning Service: The attendance on 13 Dec was around 100-120. The regular
attendance is around 60-70
- Young children programme during message: 15-20 children
- Youth Fellowship, 4 to 5pm: 30-35 children

4) The Bethel Bible College
- 1 full-time student and 5 to 7 part-time students for this semester


For the first time, the sacrament of Water Baptism was done by sprinkling instead of immersion. There were six for believer’s baptism and one for infant baptism. We thank God for the salvation of lost souls in this very important part of Thailand. Please continue to pray for Billy, Warunee, Paul, Irene and Charissa (Billy’s wife and daughter) and soon to be new born Nathaniel, as they serve the LORD by bringing the truth to their own Lahu people.