Adventures WorldRace SethBarnes Sponsorship Giving

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This is the blog of my teammate, the wonderful Bekah Byxbe
I’m including it because what she describes is exactly what we saw every night on Bangla Road.
 
 
 
Let me paint a picture for you: One large street full of people showing you all sorts of things like advertisements for their bars and colored lights that fly up in the air. Tourists fill the area, from elderly couples all the way down to small children. Little girls run up to you, begging you to purchase a fresh flower necklace. Loud music is coming from every angle, including live karaoke or special street performances. Shops line the left side, full of anything a tourist could want. The right side is lined with smaller streets, containing bar after bar full of women dressed very scandalously. Games are being played on every countertop; games like Connect 4 and Jenga. Everywhere you turn there are women dancing on bars, flirting with men, or begging you to come into their bar hoping to show you a good time. Women also line the roadsides, waiting to be purchased for the night. The smell of alcohol and cigarettes lingers heavily in the air. Here on Bangla Road in Patong, this is what you experience.


But this is only surface level. During our first few nights of ministry, this is what I saw; people having fun and girls just trying to make a buck or two. But after being submersed in the culture of this particular area, things started coming into focus: a bar girl laughing and seemingly carefree sneaks behind the bar to take some pain pills and down a shot of vodka; a woman pushing advertising takes a brief moment to sniff some more glue before continuing her lively and upbeat persuasion; a small child being pushed away from her parents to bring home money for the family by selling flowers. This is real life for the people who work the streets here in Patong. Every night, trapped in a place that brings little to no promise for a future.

But among all these horrible things, I see hope, because I serve a God that promises hope and a future. I see women who want a change, and are just waiting for someone who cares enough about them to show them a way out. I see children with strong hearts that will radically transform the world with the love of God. I see mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, friends…  I see light; little glimpses of light shining through the midst of such a dark place. I see the power that MY GOD possesses, and the love He wants to pour out in a place like this. And at the end of the day, what I feel the most is humility. The Almighty God, Creator of the universe, Alpha and Omega chose little old me to bring the light into one of the darkest places on Earth. Prepared? Not a chance. Willing? Bring it on. Changed? Forever.