This post, originally posted in 2013, has been updated in 2022.
Thai festival Loi Krathong, like many other holidays around the world, is the perfect mix of joy and sadness.
Above me float a thousand rice paper lanterns. Flickering orange flames dot the darkness, puncturing the Asian sky with prayerful afterthoughts. The beauty of the moment is alluring, but the ascending prayers go unanswered year after year.
This post has been updated from its original upload date in 2013—my first year in Thailand. It’s now 2022, nearly ten years into my Thailand experience. Loi Krathong is still just as beautiful as ever, tinged by the same hopelessness I remember from a decade ago.
As I watch people lighting lanterns and sending them into the night sky, I am reminded of E. E. Cummings’ poem, Sonnet IX from Tulips (1922):
the hours rise up putting off stars and it is
dawn
into the street of the sky light walks scattering poems
Lantern Festival carries a certain unmistakable charm. And yet, dawn comes quickly. The evening of the event passes, and on the morning after, a country awakes to the same old uncertainty. The Buddhist merit system does not promise answers. People are left wondering, “Will the gods or ghosts be happy with me this year? Will luck find me at last?”
Cummings continues:
on earth a candle is
extinguished the city
wakes
with a song upon her
mouth having death in her eyes
and it is dawn
the world
goes forth to murder dreams…
And here is the point of this post: Salvation is found in Jesus alone, but a country of 70 million people has yet to know who Jesus is. After nearly 200 years of Protestant missionary presence, a mere 0.77 percent of Thailand’s residents are Christian. 95% adhere to Buddhism. Because, as they say, “To be Thai is to be Buddhist.”
The poem goes on:
i see in the street where strong
men are digging bread
and i see brutal faces of
people contented hideous hopeless cruel happy
and it is day
in the mirror
i see a frail
man
dreaming
dreams
dreams in a mirror
and it
is dusk on earth
a candle is lighted
and it is dark.
the people are in their houses
the frail man is in his bed
the city
sleeps with death upon her mouth having a song in her eyes
the hours descend,
putting on stars…
in the street of the sky night walks scattering poems
In 2013, our family lit three lanterns with our Thai friends, one for me, one for my wife, and one for my daughter. My 11-month-old child watched in awe as our lanterns rose slowly, joining the symphony of thousands of Thai celebrators.
Only a few hours earlier today, we joined our Thai friends in Wat Faham—one of the 557 Buddhist temples in Chiang Mai—as they burned incense and bestowed gifts upon the orange-clad monks.
My daughter crawled on the carpet as monotonous chanting echoed within the 500-year-old wooden frame of the temple.
I whispered to my infant missionary kid, “It’s good to be here. Many Christians would tell you, ‘you shouldn’t go to a Buddhist temple.’ But it’s good to bring light to the darkness. Enjoy being the light!”
Like our Within Reach Global partner pastor, Richard West, says, “Don’t run from the darkness. Simply turn on the light!”
I was happy to be part of the Loi Krathong festival by joining our unbelieving Thai friends at the Buddhist temple. It’s in my nature. As the Founder of Within Reach Global, we’ve always gone to places most Christians dare not venture.
I remember that night in 2013 well. I sat on a sidewalk in Chiang Mai, Thailand, to pen this blog. The once brightly lit lanterns of Loi Krathong waned as the dark night sky consumed their flames. Hollow gray carcasses of a thousand prayerful lanterns ebbed toward death in slow motion. One landed in front of me, crumpled and lifeless, as I wrote.
An unanswered prayer.
A hope deferred.
Once again, in 2022, the eyes of the nation are lifted toward the sky tonight. Some are hopeful. Others are breathing their last hope in 10/40 Window wind.
Loi Krathong, like many other holidays around the world, is the perfect mix of joy and sadness.
But the Light of the World is still flickering in the night sky, scattering hopeful poems of salvation and redemption and life. And I am determined to be light in the darkness with him.
The popular mantra states, “to be Thai is to be Buddhist,” but I rather think that “to be Thai is to be loved by God.”
Join us as we give gospel access to unreached people in Thailand and the surrounding nations. Learn more about Within Reach Global at withinreachglobal.org
