Once again, I’m flabergasted by grace. In continuation to my last blog, I was honest with my teammates I was being a jerk to, and asked for more Grace… and they willingly gave it. I keep thinking it will run out one of these days, but the Lord has been challenging me to ‘Trust in His unfailing love’.
And if I’ve ever needed to trust in His unfailing love, it’s this month.
I was rocked when we visited the Killing Fields when we first arrived here in Cambodia. Walking through the cells and torture chambers I was overcome by the knowledge that these people had no rescue. They were people just like me who were captured, trapped, tortured and killed and they never once were given a choice.
Choice is something I’ve taken for granted living in America. Even when it comes to God, I’ll often flaunt my ‘rights’ at Him when He asks me to give up something I’d rather not. (Of course, that’s under the assumption that I have any rights at all). In America, we do have rights. We have the right to freedom of speech, the right to choose further education, the right to kick people off our property and the right to return our Latte if it is only 175 degrees and not the steaming 190 degrees that we asked for. We have a lot of ‘rights’ and entitlements that we aren’t so willing to give up. That’s what hit me the most about the torture grounds here in Phnom Penh. These people had no right to anything. All their ‘rights’ and choices were stripped from them. Instead of a plush mattress and a hot meal these adults and children (yes, I said children) were chained to an iron bed-skeleton with only a small metal box to contain their feces. Their lives were stolen by someone bent on stealing, killing and destroying!
As we walked around, another feeling came over me: empathy.
I’ve never been captured and tortured in a physical sense, but when I struggle with depression and anxiety, it feels a lot like that. I feel like I have no choice to get out of it and when the One I’m calling on to come rescue me doesn’t come, I lose hope. I feel as if I am doomed and condemned to a cruel fate. But one thing I do have to hold onto, even when He doesn’t come rescue me the moment I call, is that
Jesus is
still there.
He doesn’t leave me to condemnation. Instead, I can have hope that He is only perfecting His heart in me and that this season shall someday pass.
When we were walking around the mass graves at the Killing Fields, I kept getting distracted by the butterflies. Even when we stood by the tree where children were killed against, butterflies roamed around oblvious to the cruel nature of the place. It was a small glimmer of hope in a place where the enemy once prevailed.
Working with New Life church, I’ve seen more of that same hope…
only this hope is an intense, fiery longing and hunger for the Rescuer to bring Kingdom to this place!
The church has tons of different departments and opportunities for the local people to be involved in. From English classes, to leadership trainings and HUGE youth outreaches, there is plenty to choose from. In a bigger sense, this church is helping the Cambodian people to
dream again. Suddenly, there is hope for their future. They are learning, which births a hope of traveling and getting better jobs and furthering their education! Satan’s hold of depression is lessening as the Hope of a Saviour rushes in.
The kids here are the ones who have my heart. They are the ones I want to see swim in oceans of opportunity, passion and hope. There are so many street kids, orphans, extreme poor and slaves to the labor or sex-trade who will never have a chance unless someone gives it to them. I haven’t talked much in previous blogs about the visions God has been giving me for kids such as these, but back in Africa, He gave me vision for Restoration Houses, which are safehouses for girls rescued from the sex trade. Here in Cambodia, He’s giving me vision for a large school complete with room and board for these specific children. Imagine a huge school, K-8th grade, with living quarters and classrooms and play rooms etc. In the dorms, the older children learn to take care and supervise the younger children teaching them leadership and parenting skills. We teach the children to cook and clean for themselves, helping them become self-sufficient. We provide the required educational classes for that country and also provide art classes, photography, music lessons, sports, woodshop, PE, home ec. and anything else we can dream up. We give these kids every opportunity to find something they are passionate about and run with it. We teach them that with God, all things are possible! We teach them their identity in Him! If one kids wants to be a pastor, we pass on the keys of intimacy with the Lord. We teach him how to worship and hear the Lord’s voice. If another wants to be a missionary, we teach him the same as before, pl
us take him on local outreaches and teach them about different cultures.
Why not dream big? This is my dream… providing the children around the world the keys to unlock the Kingdom of God in their own hearts. Stepping in and saying “No” to injustice for them when they cannot speak for themselves. And giving them all the overflow of an intensely deep love that the Father gives me.
It truly is about time we start acting when we see injustice happening… especially when the victims are children who cannot speak for themselves.
“Evil prevails when good men do nothing.”
Now, what are your dreams?
Prayer Requests
***Along the lines of what I said earlier about this place being blanketed in depression, please pray for us who struggle with that. There are a few of us on the race who have really struggled in depression and anxiety and being in a heavy spiritual climate like we are, it brings this all to the surface. Pray that God pulls up the roots of these strongholds. Pray specifically against fear and for double portions of TRUST AND HOPE.
Thank you and I love you!
