‘My mother wants me to go back to the bars.’
This was a heartbreaking statement, uttered soberly one night by my closest Thai friend.
This friend of mine (we’ll call her Ann), left the bars the first week I was in Thailand. You can say that we kinda started this crazy adventure off together.
I joined her on her first day in the café, scraping paint off the floor of one of the bedrooms. Ever since that long day kneeling on the hard floor for hours, talking about life, Ann and I have been inseparable.
Now, three months later, while having a late night dinner, Ann offered me this part of her heart. She began telling me all about her family, and the weight she has been carrying ever since she was a little girl.
Ann began working in the bars after seeing the dire needs of her family. She loved them passionately and was willing to go to any lengths to provide for them. She went to the bars night after night because her family needed her, and she did what she had to for them.
‘Every time I was with a man, I just had to say to myself over and over again ‘this is for my family, it’s for my family.’
She told me that every man she went with, all of those nights spent in strange rooms with even stranger men, she had her heart focused on her family alone. That was how she made it through.
She confessed that talking to her mom back at home was the hardest part of having left the bars.
Her mother told her every time they talked, that she needed to go back her old job, find an old rich white man, and get married.
‘She just doesn’t understand!’ Ann said, fumbling with her fork, her food forgotten. Her mom doesn’t understand the pain and the heartbreak that comes with that line of work.
Those nights with the men it seemed, were tearing her apart. Often times, Ann confessed, after she was with a man she would have to run to the bathroom to be sick.
‘It made me sick, what I did’ she told me.
She used to feel her heart breaking into a million pieces, the pain was practically unbearable. Over and over again she had to remind herself that she was doing what she was doing because she loved her family.
And now that she was out of the bars, her family was pressuring her to go back.
“I can’t go back” she told me “they just don’t understand!”
As Ann told me about her pain, and hurt, I could see myself echoed in her dark eyes. I could see my own brokenness and helplessness. Scattered throughout her story I could see who I was before the Lord had chased me down.
And so I began to tell her a story I knew by heart. My own story.
I told her about how I grew up, often feeling unvalued and unloved. I told her how I often felt alone, and completely worthless.
And then I told her about the night where everything changed.
One night I cried out to God asking Him why. Why my life was the way it was, why I had to walk through so much pain and hurt, why I was so alone.
And then a voice broke through all my pain, and all my sorrow, and spoke directly to me. He said that I was more valued then the rarest of jewels and more loved then I could ever understand. He said that I was precious and valuable and worthy.
As I finished my story, I glanced at Ann.
Tears were streaming silently down her face; she knew she was not alone, we're the same. Not only could I see myself in her story, but more importantly she could see herself in mine. The only difference between the two of us was that I had Jesus to help me out of my darkness, and she was still lost.
But there was hope.
I know this is just the beginning of an earth shaking story of redemption and transformation because of one little sentence Ann said after I finished sharing my testimony.
She looked at me with a determined glint in her eyes and said “I want to hear God tell me those things, just like you.”
A huge smile burst across my face, and my heart jumped a foot. “He will” I told her, “all you have to do is ask Him.”
But he was already talking to her, she just didn’t know it.
I told her the reason I walk into the Café every day, and I tell her how much she is loved, is not because I love her – though I really do love her so much, but I tell her how loved she is every day, because as soon as I see her God says to me ‘Look! There is my most favorite person in the world. I love her so much.’
And when I tell her how beautiful she is, it’s not because I think she is beautiful. It is because when I walk in, and see her face, God says to me ‘Look! Look at how beautiful my daughter is!’
Every day I tell her how beautiful she, and how loved she is, not because it is what I think, but because it’s who God made her to be.
I’m telling her who she IS not who I perceive her to be.
Because she was made to be
Beautiful.
Loved.
Singled out.
God wants her to hear these truths so badly, Ann just doesn’t know how to listen to Him yet.
And so he uses me.
God is using me to be his mouth, to speak words of truth over this amazing woman who has been starved of the truth for so long.
I get to be the person who shows her how precious she is, how valued, how worthy.
I get to be her mirror of hope, showing her every day who she has always been, but has never been able to see herself.
And so now I wait, and pray. Because I know Ann is going to encounter God in such transformational ways.
I know that the Lord is going to minister to her heart, and show her who she was created to be.
I am so blessed I get to be part of this remarkable woman’s journey!
But it is not only me, I could never have shared my story with this fiery woman if it wasn’t for all the prayers and support you have given me!
You are helping change not only Thailand, and Chiang Mai, but also the life of this astonishing woman sitting across from me, named Ann.
I still need $1,500 for my trip here in Thailand. To donate to me to help continue the incredible work here in Thailand please click the ‘support me!’ tab in the upper left hand corner.
