Today I drove the church’s tuk tuk out to a village with two of the girls from our team and the Pastor of the church we’re partnering with. After we dropped off the girls to hang out with some kids, the Pastor and I–and his friend we met up with–went for a walk down the street.
After walking maybe 1 minute, we looked inside a house and saw a man sitting watching tv.
“This man ask a lot of question about gospel. He was monk,” the pastor told me in broken English.
After we made our presence known–people here are so much more chill about just showing up on people’s doorsteps–the man gave us a big smile and came out. Immediately red plastic chairs were pulled out, dusted off, and set up for us.
The man was short in stature, balding, a lil’ rotund, and had some sort of makeshift cast on his right arm.
After we were all seated, the pastor and his friend begin to talk to him. The man asked me if I spoke Khmer, to which I replied no. He smiled and continued to talk to the other two.
While they spoke, I began to day dream. I thought about my past mistakes in life, and wondered if I really did have freedom from past habits. I pondered this for a while knowing full well that eventually the pastor would look a me and say something along the lines of, “ok, share now your testimony and how you know Jesus.”
I felt like I would be deceiving him a little if I shared about how I had been set me free from all sinful habits in my life, because I still fall back into old thinking sometimes.
After much thought, I decided that it would be truthful to share about how I had been set free from from sin. But, I would make sure that I talked about how there were still temptations that I had to face on the daily, and that it wasn’t all easy; I had to choose to walk in freedom everyday.
I noticed that the man started pointing at me, and I thought to myself, “alright, looks like it’s time to get real vulnerable with this Cambodian man I just met.”
The Pastor then looked at me and said, “ok, he would like to hear your testimony.”
I looked back at the man, gave him a smile, and said sure.
I started the short version of my testimony similar to every other time I started: “When I was younger, I thought that pursuing sexual desires would satisfy me, or fulfill me.” Haha, I never say the word porn here; I’m afraid that they won’t know what I’m talking about and ask me to clarify what it means. No thanks.
I continued for a little bit longer talking about how I knew that only Jesus could bring about fulfillment–that He had the power to forgive me and set me free.
Before I could talk much more, the man asked–through a translator–if I had a Christian family. I said yes, and that seemed to make him think a bit. He then asked me when I became a Christian, to which a replied “at a very young age, maybe 5. But I started to replace Jesus with sexual sin when I was about 13.”
All of a sudden my testimony was put on hold. The man started talking to the pastor, and then the pastor looked at me and said, “this man wants to try Jesus, and is asking what he needs to do to be a Christian.”
Oh snap. Somewhat dumbfounded I begin to laugh a little. So many things hit me at once.
One, that I realized that for the first time I was doing what I hoped to do on the Race. Two, that I had the opportunity to lead someone to Christ for the first time in my life. Three, that none of what was going on in that moment had anything to do with me–five minutes ago I was pondering if my testimony had any legitimacy due to the fact that I still undergo temptation everyday, and that I stumble in that temptation.
Haha, I didn’t even get halfway through my story, and this guys decided to open up a can of worms. Here I was getting caught up in trying to tell my story in a way that spoke truthfully to the daily challenges of following Christ, and how I still fall, and I never even got to that part.
I honestly can’t really remember the specifics too clearly after that, but I started by sharing how we’re all sinners and deserve hell.
I was reminded once again that making this man believe in Christ wasn’t dependent upon me when the pastor said that he had an idea of how to explain things since translating was tough. I said “yeah sure, go for it!” somewhat relieved that the process of believing in Jesus was being explained clearly in his language.
After they talked for a little while longer we got up and prayed for the man and his arm. We all prayed at once, and prayed that he would experience the presence of the Holy Spirit, that he wouldn’t be satisfied with not knowing Jesus, and that healing would happen in his arm.
When we finished praying the pastor talked to the man for a little while longer and then we said our goodbyes. As we left we introduced ourselves; his name was Rottinick.
As we walked away the pastor said that Rottinick felt tension release in his arm, and that it felt better. Later, one of the girls from the team I’m with–they walked in halfway through my testimony–also said that she observed that the swelling in his arm had gone down after we finished praying!
“What did he say about believing in Jesus?”I asked.
“He said that he would try to believe in Jesus now,” the pastor replied.
Please be praying for Rottinick, that his arm would be completely healed, and that he wouldn’t be satisfied until he knows and puts his hope in Christ. Also pray that I could visit him once more!
