If you recall from a couple blogs back (Sweat and Sweetness), I described a brief encounter with a young bar girl named Wan who is 17 yrs old and her Aunt who spoke a little English. Well, I have a fantastic update from that story…
I went back into the city during Xmas to spend it with our girls team – just a week and half after meeting Wan. My friend, Carin, who was with me that night I met the bar girls had informed me that the Aunt had taken the initiative to call and set up English lessons just a couple days after Carin and I met them! I was so stoked to hear this news! Carin and another friend went to visit them twice that week to start the English lessons.
Now that our World Race team has left Thailand, a YWAM (youth with a mission) team consisting of young adults from the UK, Brazil, Phillipines and Germany will be meeting with them to continue the English lessons which is a super valuable skill in Thailand that can give Wan the ability to leave the bar scene and seek other employment. The Aunt actually really wants Wan to learn English as soon as possible so she can get out of that line of work.
More importantly this team will be able to continue to show them the love of God and eventually introduce them to Christ as they build a relationship.
Who would of thought that a night of playing Connect Four and Tic Tac Toe would have led to possibly getting a confused and lost young girl and her aunt out of Thailand’s infamous bar scene and hopefully lead them to Christ. I guess this is just an example of how Christ calls us to plant seeds, then allow the Holy Spirit to water them and do what only He can do!
The day after Christmas, I bought an awesome little sterling silver cross necklace in one of the city’s many jewelry markets. I wrapped it up and brought it to Wan that night as she was working in the bar. Unfortunately her Aunt wasn’t there who usually did basic translating, but Wan was none the less ecstatic to have received a gift. I’m not entirely sure she knew it was a Christmas gift since I couldn’t verbally communicate anything to her and since shes probably never celebrated X-mas a day in her life, but she immediately had me put it on her and she wore it for the rest of the night! (I found out later that crosses are in fact trendy to wear – ironic in a 97% Buddhist country).
My hope is that one day she will come to know the real meaning of that cross. My hope is that one day she will understand why I played Connect Four with her for hours only to close the bar down and say Goodnight at the very end.
Below is a picture of Wan and her Aunt on Christmas eve…
Sorry if this is scattered or has type-o’s. my first draft got deleted right before publishing it… blogging frustrations! 😛
