Hello from Cambodia!
This month is womanstry/manistry month. So all of the men are together and all of the women are together. Ashley, Jacquie, and I are with 2 other teams here in Phnom Penh. We are working with New Life Church doing a variety of ministries. Between the 10 of us, we are painting the church and helping them get ready to move into a new building, teaching home school, babysitting, teaching English to kids in a village, teaching English at the church, and “ministering” to the 25+ girls we live with. I am with the crew that paints 6 hours a day and then I help my friend Cheata teach English on Monday and Tuesday evenings and I babysit Thursday nights. By far my favorite ministry is getting to know the girls that we live with. The church has a program that allows university students to live in a dorm, so they get to go to school and they have to come to church on Sunday and Wednesday. They were pretty shy at first, but Cheata and I have been buddies ever since I sang “My heart will go” on with her the second night we were here. It was a very awful rendition.
Cambodian culture typically isn’t very affectionate, but we’ve gradually seen these seemingly shy girls start coming up with excitement and hugging us in greeting. They are very funny and silly and talk about boys all the time just like most groups of girls, but they also are incredibly smart, deep, and have a lot going on in their hearts. A lot of them are stressed with family situations and duties. From what I’ve gathered, family culture in the villages expects the older girls to stay at home and help care for the younger kids or get a job and help support the family. Many of them feel guilty for leaving their families behind. Many of their parents are not Christians, so there are disagreements there too because the older generation of Buddhists need their children to perform rituals when they die and if their children are Christians, then there is no one to do that. There aren’t any churches outside of the cities, so to be around a Christian community here, you have to move into the city and leave the life you know. Coming from the United States, it’s hard to imagine these repercussions for choosing Jesus. But it’s so awesome that these girls knew the cost beforehand and still chose Jesus over everything. It makes me wonder, at that point in my life, would I have made the same decision?
