Meet Leah. She is 20 years old and works at a bar in the red light district of Chiang Mai. She also has the sweetest disposition, a sensitive heart and loves to give hugs! She is gracious, funny, loves to share and has a smile that lights up the room.
I met Leah the very first night of bar ministry this month and she stole my heart. A few of the girls on my team and I have really connected with her and continue to visit her at the bar whenever we can.
The funny thing is, Leah basically speaks no English. She also doesn’t know how to read or write in Thai, so verbal and written communication are pretty much out of the question. The expression “actions speak louder than words” has to be true in this situation.
Every time we show up to the bar, Leah is so excited to see us! She immediately drops whatever she is doing, runs to us and embraces us like it’s been years since we’ve seen her. We spend our nights playing pool (Leah puts us to shame), sipping on Coke, and playing charades in order to communicate. But every night is seriously so much fun! We laugh, we dance and we shower each other with affection.
But the other night we had a different experience. As we were playing pool, two older men walked into the bar and the entire atmosphere shifted. Most of the girls were scrambling to serve the men, but Leah completely shut down. She was visibly upset and scared. We tried to comfort her and understand what was going on, but it was clear she didn’t want to be there anymore.
We’re still not sure if Leah was breaking the rules, or had permission to do this, but she picked up her purse, grabbed us by the arms and we left the bar. Once outside we all stood there confused and not knowing what to do next. It was already 10pm and we are supposed to return home by 10:30.
So we just started walking. We didn’t know where we were going, or what we were doing; we just wanted to get Leah away from the bar. All she knew how to say about the men was “bad” and she kept gesturing that her heart was very sad. She started to cry and it was next to impossible for me to hold back my own tears. It broke my heart to think about who those men were and how they had hurt Leah and the other girls at the bar.
We walked to a Rotee stand (Rotee is a Thai dessert and the most delicious thing I’ve ever tasted) and Leah insisted on buying some for us. She apologized and thanked us profusely as we tried to affirm her that we love her and didn’t care about leaving the bar. But in the back of my mind I had no idea how to explain to her that we had to go home because we had a curfew set in place by the ministry, not because we didn’t care.
It made me sick to think about the situation she was in and how broken she was feeling, and then literally all we could communicate to her was that we had to go to sleep, as if her pain meant nothing to us.
As we walked back to Zion Café I as begging God to intercede. To somehow show Leah that she is loved by us. Once we got to Zion, I tried to communicate with her to come back tomorrow, but it was hard to tell if the message got across. Saying goodnight to her was terrible because it was clear she didn’t want us to go.
We went upstairs to find the rest of our team and I couldn’t help but to feel defeated. I feared that all the love we had given to Leah was just ruined by the fact that we left her in the middle of a crisis. We prayed as a team for Leah and asked God to protect her, comfort her and keep the door open to having a friendship with us.
Not even 5 minutes later my phone started ringing from an unknown number. When I answered I heard broken English and a familiar voice in the background. It was Leah!!! A few nights earlier I had put my number in her phone, but had little hope she would ever be able to use it to communicate. But she had found a friend that spoke a little English and called us just to say thank you and she loved us!! We were also able to invite her to lunch the next day and confirm to her that we loved her back.
Not only did God answer our prayers that night, but He will forever be the foundation of our friendship with Leah. It is through Him that we are able to love her so deeply and unconditionally, no matter her circumstance, profession or background.
I trust that the Lord is working on her heart. I’m encouraged by the fact that when a bad situation presented itself, she didn’t want to be a part of it. I know that God has a plan for Leah and I will always be grateful that I got to be a small part of it.
