In this episode of the Evangelism Podcast, Daniel King interviews Manop Moonsri from Thailand about the International Gospel Music Festival. Manop explains that the festival started in 2014 and aims to reach young people in Thailand and other countries through music. The festival takes place in shopping malls, attracting a broad audience, including those who may not attend traditional evangelistic crusades. Manop believes that music is a powerful tool for reaching young people because almost everyone listens to music. We talk about the opportunities and restrictions in different countries, such as Thailand, Myanmar, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, China, Malaysia, Singapore, and the Philippines.
Connect with Manop: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=501520132
Transcript:
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (00:00):
Welcome to the Evangelism Podcast. I’m Daniel King and I’m excited about telling people about Jesus. Today I have a very special guest with me, Manop from Thailand. Thank you for joining the Evangelism Podcast.
Manop (00:12):
Yeah, and it’s good to be on your TV program.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (00:20):
We are in the nation of Cambodia right now. Yesterday we were in Laos, and then a few days ago we were in Thailand. And in each place we are doing a international gospel music festival, which is a vision that God has given you to help reach people for Jesus. So tell me a little bit, what is the International Gospel Music Festival?
Manop (00:47):
Yeah. International Gospel Music Festival started in Ette in 2014, but before that I already do a lot of music festival with different name. But then in puke I invite more bands from international, from different countries like Singapore, Malaysia, Korea, America, and NAMI Beer and a few other countries. So from Pke, I felt that this is a good method to reach out to the people in Thailand and other countries and the location that we choose with the Pke or in Bangkok or in Chiang Mai or in other places we use shopping mall because in the shopping mall there are many groups of people come to shopping. And the target, I mean of course the main target are the young generation. And I feel that with different bands and different messages can reach out to a broad group of people that some of them doesn’t go to the traditional kind of crusade or evangelistic crusade, but for the music festival, they are okay to listen and then to participate.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (02:08):
And so I really like this strategy. You’re taking the music festival into the mall, which is an attraction point for the entire city. Everyone knows where it is. Everyone comes there for shopping, and you are deliberately attracting young people who like music. And have you had some pushback from maybe older church members, more traditional members? What does the church think about this unique method of reaching?
Manop (02:41):
In some city, the leaders are very open and they understand the young generation, but in some city, they’re still not quite understand why we do what we do. And a lot of them feel that it’s wasting of time. But after we did one festival in that city, then they start to see that in the evangelist thing, we lost the generation between 15 years old and 25. But all these people, they come for our festival first, leaders start to see the important of having a music festival reaching out to this group of people.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (03:24):
Why do you think music is such an important tool for reaching young people?
Manop (03:30):
Almost every one of them will listen to music, whether pop or rock or reggae or hip hop or whatever style. International gospel music festival is not a gospel in a type of music, but it’s wider, a broader and all kinds of musics that in this world I can say.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (03:54):
Now you have been the go-to person in this part of Asia for production. You’ve helped Franklin Graham with some of his production. You’ve been with Dr. Billy Wilson from Empowered 21, and you have technical expertise. How did you get started in this area of production?
Manop (04:19):
Actually, I was study in technical college before I went to Bible school in Singapore. And after that I went to join YWAM and then come back to Thailand to start church planting. But while we are doing a lot of outreaches, I felt that we need a better system to do a better job for outdoor. So in 2000, in about 2001, I started to get into a more production because at that time I felt God is calling me out to the marketplace. So starting from a full-time pastor, get into a 10 making, we call business for the kingdom. And I started the production company to help with a group organization or churches that need support for production and keep upgrading our system until we become a distributor for speakers brand am mate from Spain. And we also doing some secular job just to get enough fun to continue our ministry. That’s how I started.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (05:38):
But really the core of what your heart is is evangelism.
Manop (05:44):
Yes.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (05:45):
How do you merge the music with evangelism
Manop (05:53):
In a traditional way of evangelistic meeting? We just have worship preaching and then other call. And a lot of people, I mean for some people I say 15 to 25, they don’t want to participate much in that kind of a traditional crusade. So in the secular music festival, in Tale or in Asia, they like to have lots of bands line up maybe 10 to 12 bands, and it’s for the long period. So I get the same idea and I add the messages or the testimony or the preaching in between the band so that the people don’t feel like, oh, I’m come here just to listen to the speaker speak about what they want to speak about their God or something like that. But the difference is when the band, when they’re singers, the singers that they shouting their testimony or even telling the gospel, they don’t feel like, oh, I got to listen to this speaker. Or even you have another speaker come in between the band. They still don’t have the kind of, what do you call it? They still feel easy to listen to it because they expect to listen to the band after these speakers. So in between 10 to 15 minutes we slot in speakers.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (07:31):
So instead of having a one hour preacher, you do music and then 10 minutes testimony, then music, then a little message, and then music, and then give people a chance to respond.
Manop (07:45):
So we break the message messages into small, smaller one in between the band. In a shopping mall, there are, if we do like six, for example, 6:00 PM or 4:00 PM until 10:00 PM there’s a lot of people that walk in and out. They might sit for the band that they like for one hour and they might walk away. So every hour there’s a new audience come in to the mall. So having a speaker speak 10 to 15 minutes, it is a slot. Releasing out to the new people is not the same audience for the whole day.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (08:22):
And throughout the day you’ll have maybe hundreds, even thousands of people come through and hear the music, even if they’re not all there at one time, they’re passing through. And sometimes the music fills the entire mall. Even the people who are shopping on the other side of the mall, they hear what is happening
Manop (08:43):
In some of the mall, if the light is banned, they’ll stop for maybe one hour and inspect the whole area. So it depend on the band as well.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (08:59):
Yeah. Let’s talk about Asia. There are millions of people in this part of Asia and it’s a huge harvest field. There’s lots of people that need Jesus. What do you think God wants to do here in Asia over the next 10 years?
Manop (09:21):
I mean, from my own opinion, I believe that the young generation, we come to know Christ more because their heart is open. And I can see, and even in my local church, the majority of people in my church are 80% of young generation. So I believe that God is bringing in the young generation to the churches and we have to go out and take them in, not waiting in a church for them to come in. So what I do is, apart from the music festival that I do, I also have a youth festival, one day festival where we bring in leaders and youth to come for the training, stir them up, and then send them out the coming February, we have one in Bangkok. And after the one day, one full day, the training or the festival, we will send them out to do prison ministries to do a smaller festival in other cities.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (10:31):
And I heard you’re actually bringing in Planet Shakers with Russell Evans?
Manop (10:36):
Yes. Planet Shakers have been coming to Thailand almost every year before Covid.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (10:42):
And so people here love them,
Manop (10:45):
People like the band. So that one day on the 20th of February, we’ll have something from 10:00 AM until 10:00 PM and then the last session will be Planet Shake concert.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (10:59):
Wow. I believe that will have a big impact.
Manop (11:03):
Amen.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (11:04):
How did you first come to know Christ? What’s your testimony? And then how did you develop a heart for ministry? Okay,
Manop (11:13):
I was grown up in the Buddhist family and when I was 12 years old, I got sponsors from World Vision because my family cannot help me to study. So World Vision adopt me and I go to church. So I accepted a lot during my time in with World Vision.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (11:43):
And then you went to ywam
Manop (11:45):
And after World Vision I graduated from high school and then I went to YWAM in Penang. Yeah.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (11:55):
Are there opportunities for evangelists to come to Asia and to work here? Would you invite people to come?
Manop (12:05):
Yes. So there’s evangelists, it’s depend on their ki. So if they do a smaller group or big festival or music, they’re most welcome to join us in our festival in each month.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (12:25):
Wonderful. Your vision ultimately is to be doing festivals every month throughout different parts of Asia or
Manop (12:36):
Yes, hopefully. But to prepare for that is take a little bit of time. So I do it in different country and each country we network with a local church and with the people that have the same heart and then they do all the grow population and we will go in for three days festival and then move to another country.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (12:56):
Let’s talk about the unique challenges in different countries. Done a lot in a bunch, and every country has opportunities and every country also has restrictions. So we’ll start with Thailand, the country that you’re from, what is the opportunity and what type of restrictions are there
Manop (13:16):
In Thailand? There’s a lot of opportunity. For example, the mall now, they understand what we do and they open anytime for us to go in. So the problem is we don’t have enough people or enough resources to do all the shopping mall in other cities.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (13:36):
And you’d like to do many different cities.
Manop (13:40):
I like to partner with the local church. So if the local church ready to accept us, we will go in and help them to prepare and continue. Because if I go to the city where there’s no use as well, so I go to the church, to the city where the church are ready to do the follow-up after our event.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (14:03):
Now, a few years ago you were doing stuff in Myanmar? Yes. Now there’s been a change in government there. Is it possible to do something in Myanmar even
Manop (14:11):
Now? We can go back anytime, yeah. Okay. Because we are not having problem with the soldiers or any politics in Myanmar.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (14:20):
And we were just in Laos and they gave us some guidelines on what could be done there. But yet they still allowed the music festival.
Manop (14:31):
The music festival there. They’re still allowed. Yeah.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (14:34):
Now we are here in Cambodia. We’re going to see tomorrow night. What
Manop (14:41):
In Cambodia? If you get a permit from the local provincial or the mayor, you are fine to do it. Yeah.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (14:49):
And what about Vietnam?
Manop (14:52):
Vietnam, we working with local church and they apply for their own permit. So Vietnam is another country that is starting to open more for the gospel
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (15:05):
And Franklin Graham was just there and had a tremendous event. Just thousands of people came and it would be really wonderful to see God open up the door. Now China, have you ever gone to China is probably
Manop (15:20):
China. There’s a lot of underground churches that we network with, but we haven’t done any music festival there yet.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (15:29):
What about Malaysia?
Manop (15:31):
Malaysia? We can go anytime.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (15:33):
And have you done work in Singapore or Indonesia?
Manop (15:37):
We did Philippines, Malaysia,
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (15:41):
Philippines. It is totally open. Yeah. You can do anything? Yes. Wow. Well, I really believe that God’s eye is on Asia and that we are going to see a great harvest of souls come into the kingdom of God throughout all of Asia. And I think God is also going to raise up powerful Asian evangelists like you. Amen. Who have a heart to reach this part of the world for Jesus.
Manop (16:07):
Praise God.
Evangelism Coach Daniel King (16:08):
So thank you so much for being on the Evangelism Podcast.
