It’s so hard to believe February 15th marked the half way point of this journey!! Thank you all for the overwhelming amount of support and prayers 🙂 As of now I am only about $2,000 away from being fully funded by the final deadline of March 1st- praise Him!!! If you feel led, I would love for you all to share my blog with others you know who might be interested in joining in this journey. As you’ll see from the blog below, it’s not always easy – but it’s most definitely worth it!!! All for His glory!
My Valentine’s Day this year took “marketed holiday” to a whole other level….
When our friend Stephanie from YWAM (Youth with a Mission) here in Phuket invited us to join with their Valentine’s Day event “Buy Flowers Not Girls,” our team was excited at the opportunity to show some love in a ministry we haven’t gotten to do yet this month. This event would take us to the red light district of Patong to hand out flowers, gift bags, and the love of Jesus to the girls working in and around the bars. In the heart of Patong is Bangla Road- a strip of concrete about 400 yards long with hundreds of bars stacked from end to end, some of them multiple stories high. From 9pm-4am this street is flooded with promoters attempting to sell you everything from sex shows to actual women, men looking for love or more likely probably just a good time, and tourists who maybe are there just to walk through and gawk or even take pictures.
Together with YWAM, our night began on the beach where Bangla Road dead ends. We were blessed to be surrounded by people who had done this type of work before- they knew we needed to start with some prayer and worship before heading into this kind of night. The Holy Spirit was quick at work from the moment we set foot on the sand. As we began to sing, people around us would wander over. Some came to share in this sweet moment, and others just watched in curiosity. Some even pulled out their cameras to film what they saw. The cool thing was that a few people ended up joining in on the event with us, and even cooler was that others began to ask questions. “Who are you all?” “Why are you doing this?” “What’s with all the Jesus talk and hundreds of flowers….??” (500 roses to be exact!) I love how our Creator designed us to be curious- this opened the door for conversations around the gospel and just the love of Christ.
Since no one on my team had done this type of thing before, a couple of the others took us on an initial walk down the street to show us which places we should not enter (the bars with covered windows where there are live shows and sex trafficking likely happens), and just overall etiquette with our approach. We were there to convey love, value, and worth- to tell these woman that there is a man who truly honors them as a princesses and His name is Jesus.
Remembering why we set out would be crucial as emotions can quickly take over in a place like this. I was disgusted as brochures were shoved in my face. I wanted to cry as I saw women objectified on such an incredibly mass scale. I have to be honest… the first time I read this guy’s sign outside of a club that read “I support single moms, one dollar at a time.” I immediately thought, Lord, is this what you meant by holy anger- because I gotta tell you, I could truck stick this guy right now.
My heart was absolutely crushed. My spirit felt so defeated and an almost numbing pain radiated throughout my inner being. We hadn’t even started really talking to anyone yet. My heart was screaming, “I don’t know if you can take this.” For the first 15 minutes after that, I was sort of like a zombie. I was feeling so overwhelmed and smothered by the hurt I felt for these women, and I almost decided it really was too much. Then the Holy Spirit reminded me of Jesus’ words… He says, “Go and make disciples of all nations… and surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” He didn’t say, “Go take a class on how to do this thing.” Or, “Wait until you feel ready enough.” He said “GO.” And not only that, but “I am with you always..” as in, you’re not going out there alone. I will be with you.
And so I went. We split up into groups, and I set out with 3 of my teammates. Our arms were loaded with roses and little gift bags of make-up, candy, a contact card for a missionary who teaches english to bar girls as her ministry, and a bible verse written in Thai tied to the outside. The more girls we talked to, the more I realized they are actually very receptive to our conversations. Some even had a look in their eyes that told us they really wanted to continue talking, but as they constantly checked over our shoulders towards their bar, they knew they had better move along and try to collect more profitable customers. Even with other eyes watching them, eyes that clearly had a different agenda, they were each so sweet and friendly.
Each time we would hand them a gift, they would look at us with confused eyes as if they couldn’t understand that someone would want to just give them something. They would immediately ask, “How much?” Or they would look through the bag, thinking they would only get to pick one item. We would tell them it really was just all for them, no cost… their entire face would light up as if we had just given them some priceless heirloom. Still feeling like they had to repay us in some way, their next move would be to kiss us on the cheek and cover us in heart stickers they were handing out. I think we all walked off at the end of the night with at least 20 stickers covering our shirts and faces… we were still finding them the next morning!
We handed out hugs and flowers and collected stickers and lip stick marks on our cheeks for the next 2 hours as we wandered down the many side streets and into several different bars. As the night went on, we found it easier and easier to let the Holy Spirit lead us. We would all rally around each other as we each felt pulls towards different girls, particular streets, or bars. At one point, we passed a bar that had tree stumps lining all down that particular strip- my first thought was there is no way this is the game I used to play at college tail gates… I have to go there. My teammates were awesome and totally supported me and followed me over, waiting to see who was going to pull us in next. That’s when we made eye contact with Dong. She had big brown eyes, spoke pretty good english, and she sold us with her bright smile. She taught us the Thai version of the stump game I knew a little too well (read- absolutely clobbered us at) and shared some of her story and many laughs with us. By the end of our night with Dong, she let us pray for her and her 16 year old son, hugging us and telling us to come back to visit! When we handed her one of the gift bags, she looked so delighted and also surprised. She said, “For me? Why?” I didn’t know how to articulate all that I wanted to say to this woman, so I just said because you are so beautiful, Dong and Jesus thinks so too. I don’t know if she even really caught what I said, or really if she even knows who Jesus is. But after tonight, she heard His name, and she certainly experienced a taste of His love. These are the moments in the night that made my heart soar.
These times I got to zone in and spend time with the ladies. When I got to share my heart for them, and simply listen to anything they wanted to talk about. When I got to pray for them, and tell them that God loves them so much. Those are the precious moments I had to zoom in on in order to protect my heart from the collapsing weight of the bigger picture of what was happening all around us. The Lord used us that night to bring light and love into a place with so much darkness.
Driving home that night, we all tried to debrief a bit, though we quickly realized we didn’t really have all the words to describe all the things we felt. We were devastated for the girls putting on a show there to support their families and children, we were confused by the tourists just there to be a part of the experience, and we were even a bit heart broken for those looking to fill their loneliness for the evening.
It took me days to wade through how I felt/still feel. It took me a few days more than that to try and formulate words to share about the night. How do you describe a place where instead of promoting special deals on buy one get one chocolates or %50 off diamond jewelry, we saw the streets full of women for sale. Faces. Smiles. Daughters of the King. All on display, polished and ready for their customer to take notice. That night, we did our best to let those girls know there IS someone who notices them. Someone greater than any man they would meet that night, greater than this group of Christian faces who came to simply spend time with them and to tell them of this Greater Love. Earlier in the night, we sang a song on the beach that I return to when I think of that night. It ignites hope in my heart where hurt was planted that Valentine’s evening…
You’re the God of this City
You’re the King of these people
You’re The Lord of this nation
You are
You’re the Light in this darkness
You’re the Hope to the hopeless
You’re the Peace to the restless
You are
There is no one like our God
There is no one like our God
For greater things have yet to come
and greater things are still to be done in this City
Greater things have yet to come
and greater things are still to be done in this City
For greater things have yet to come
And greater things are still to be done in this City
Greater thing have yet to come
And greater things are still to be done in this City
There is no one like our God
There is no one like our God
For greater things have yet to come
And greater things are still to be done in this City
Greater things have yet to come
And greater things are still to be done here
There is no one like our god
There is no one like our God
Greater things have yet to come
And greater things are still to be done in this City
Greater things have yet to come
And greater things are still to be done here
His love is sweet, His love is wild, and it’s waking hearts to life!
