Sometimes on the World Race you show up to a ministry host and think you know what you’re going to be doing. That was the case last month. Our whole squad would be staying together and working with a ministry that does outreach in the red light district of Chiang Mai.
I knew that we could be going out to the bars, talking to monks, and helping out in the café. My thoughts on my month were wrong.
In the weeks that we were in Chiang Mai doing ministry, I spent a lot of time channeling Harry Potter sitting under the stairs. Not in the café building relationships with the girls who work there. Not talking to the monks and playing with the kids in the slums down the street. Not in the bars as much as I would have liked. Under the stairs.
Hopefully you are now wondering why I was just hanging out under a stair case. Let me explain, near the end of our first week of ministry I found myself offering to use my financial knowledge to our ministry host, to use in any way she wanted.
Immediately she took me up on the offer. She cleared it with our squad leaders, and told me to talk to her the next day.
I have no idea what I thought she was going to need help with but it certainly wasn’t what I ended up doing. As I sat down with her the next day she started to list the things that she needed done for a proposal to send to a church in Ohio. As she rattled off the things this church needed to know, I realized I had jumped out into the middle of something and may be in over my head.
Over the next few days details came together, and I started to piece together some things for her. I worked for two weeks building spreadsheets, writing proposals, and making sense of numbers. The result was 20 pages worth of proposals and 3 new financial spreadsheets.
Every day as I sat under the stairs I got a little bit of a clearer picture of what Emmi’s ministry is all about. I learned more and more about this lady who is on fire for Jesus. I got to hear her talk again and again about how God has provided for her and the ministry.
Then I realized I was one of those provisions. As I sifted through financial data and brought a smidgen of order, I realized that what I was doing was going to further the Kingdom of God in Chiang Mai far more than if I had been out in the bars.
I hope that I left the ministry with a better way to track their finances. I hope I left them with a proposal that will help them to expand their ministry. I hope that I was able to be a blessing to Emmi, and relieve a bit of stress.
Being on the Race has shown me so much of who I am, but it hasn’t really changed me. I’m still the nerd who geeks out over Excel spreadsheets and gets excited about making Harry Potter references.
However the Race has showed me that it’s ok to be that nerd. That nerds like me are needed in ministry.
That without the people with some technical know-how ministries don’t make it. They need those who have knowledge in things like finance, IT, and marketing to make them succeed.
So this is for all you people out there who work behind the scenes to support your ministry. You are so important. You are so needed. What you do may not be acknowledged, but without you so many would still be lost and hurting.
You may not be on the front lines, but you enable those who are, and for that I thank you.
If you would like to find out more about Emmi’s ministry check out my squad mate Annie’s blog.
Love you all!
Audrey
