This week was the first week of ministry. We had spent the previous week working around Zion and finishing our training in preparation for the next 10.5 months. Emmi is the owner of Zion Café, also called Zion Hostel, and is in charge of what we will be doing for the remainder of our time in Thailand. Emmis is an amazing woman who has been through so much in her life and through it all she has come to know God and wishes to bring others to know him. She works with Lighthouse In Action (lighthouseinaction.org) which has different ministries: Zion Café, Love Acts, and X-life.
Emmis is an interesting ministry to start with because it’s apparently very different from what we will be doing the remainder of the year. She believes in us being led by the Holy Spirit, so aside from some guidelines and objectives, we are able to serve the Thai people how we feel lead to. Mainly we are NOT here to rescue people or preach at them. One of the big things I loved about Emmis intro speech was her focus on making sure no one treats anyone else like a project. It is not your goal to bring this person to Christ, and once you do you can add another name to your list of good deeds. NO!
My job is to befriend people. My purpose is to love and befriend someone. To build up trust and care about them and know I’m going to miss them in a few weeks when I leave. Then I can see if they would like to learn about Jesus. Then I can share my story about what Gods done for me. Then I can share my relationship with Christ. Thailand is a culture built on relationships. A place where you’ll pay more to buy something from your friend. A gift giving culture where you know someone cares about you when they’ve bought you a small gift to show their love. Then you get deep. Getting deep on the first day of knowing someone just tells them you’re here to share and not to listen, but relationships need to be a two way street. How can I talk about my relationship with my Father, unless I build a relationship with them? This is why I love Emmi’s ministry, and her heart for people.
Now that you have the intro I’m going to share more about what we did for our ministry.
ZION CAFÉ
This is where we stayed, the building’s about 8 stories tall and most of its bedrooms. The first floor is a café and kitchen area. YWAM (Youth With A Mission) teams from around the world were staying here as well and many of them served in the Café, Taking orders, cleaning and doing dishes. The Fusion Squad didn’t participate in this ministry outright. We did our own dishes but weren’t on a schedule to help in the café.
Instead we helped with the staff. Many of them are from difficult backgrounds and simply need people to love on them and show them the love of Jesus. Basically just be nice and make friends, this is a culture based on relationships. Trust me it’s not hard at all to befriend people, and most of them want to practice their English, which is WAY better than my Thai. Its’ been fun. Some are Christians and some are not, and that’s ok. Hopefully they will know Gods love one day, but right now they’re just in their own journey and anything I can do to help I will.
LOVE ACTS
There’s three different ‘sections’ of Love Acts: Monk Chat, Slum Ministry, and Bar ministry.
MONK CHAT
Monk Chat is a program some temples have where they set aside a time for tourist to come and chat with the monks. It’s mostly dual purpose, monks get to improve their English and tourists get to learn more about Buddhism.
Emmi sends people here to talk to the monks, befriend them, and engage in religious discussions. Emmi says they are fairly open to this and love learning and practicing their English. From what we experienced she’s right. Not one team said they had a bad experience there. But I can only speak from my own experience.
My team (Love Rangers) went to Monk Chat 2 different times, and each time we met with the same Monk, an Indian man named Sadiat. He is from a Buddhist family and moved to Thailand because his master studied at this temple. I learned a bit more about Buddhism, but mostly about his daily life. While you can’t play sports we did learn that one of his pastimes is video games. There are 200 some rules that monks must follow, and only 10 a novice must.
- Do Not kill
- Do not have sex
- Do not wear makeup
- No Gold or jewels
- So singing or dancing
- No luxurious beds
- No eating after noon
- No lies
- No drugs
- No makeup
The first day we mostly learned about him and talked about ourselves, where we’re from and simple things like that. It took us a while to find the temple (it’s about a 30 minute walk if you know where you’re going) and because of that we only had about a half hour left to talk. I am very proud of my team for not trying to force the conversation and talk about Christianity in the last few minutes. We simple made a friend.
God blessed us with getting to talk to him a second time two days later. We spent the first hour learning more about him and Buddhism, for example her was reading a book about arguing and loves to learn. His friends and teachers dislike that he asks the difficult questions because it’s the best way to learn. The last half hour we opened the topic of Christianity and why we were in Thailand. Sadait likes Jesus and thinks he was a wonderful man. But he’s not sure if he’s actually a God. He really liked the story where Jesus stand up for the adulteress woman and says ‘He who has not sinned must throw the first stone.’ He had Christian friends in India and actually has three Bibles, one in Hindi, one in Thai, and one in English.
Tori then posed a difficult question, one she decided to say because he had been so open to hard questions and knew many stories from the Bible. She said that Jesus convinced so many people and did such good things that there are only three possible reasons he claimed he was God. 1) He was crazy, 2) He lied, or 3) he was telling the truth. Sadiat thought about it a lot and then said, ‘I don’t think he was crazy, I’ don’t think he was a liar, but I’m not sure he was telling the truth.’ I loved that Tori asked this. It’s a question I had never heard before. And while Sadiat was not really confidant that any of these three options were correct, he really thought about each one. It was wonderful having this discussion with him. We told him we would be back tomorrow morning and would love to speak with him again.
Low and behold, he was there the next morning. We mostly just talked about Buddhism and learned a lot of practices are because of the Hindu mix, and therefore do not have Buddhist roots. The other thing mentioned was what he thought about the conversation the previous day (you know the one). And Sadat said he thought it went well (yay for not offending our new monk friend!)
SLUM MINISTRY
This is basically just playing with kids. Though in Sarah’s case she ended up playing badminton with a dad who wouldn’t let his kid play. They were really good. The kids we played with were really cute, and did many things kids in the US wouldn’t. It’s just their reality that they are playing on a dirt field scattered with glass and other trash, as well as broken bikes. We spent the hour playing soccer, badminton, and spinning the kids around. Ones shoe fell off and as soon as he was put down he ran over to get it. All I could think was that the kids probably have it drilled into their heads to always have their feet covered. Partially because of the trash and likely also in part because feet are considered dirty in Thai culture and pointing an uncovered foot at someone is a sign of great disrespect.
We only got to go once, but it was fun playing with the kids. Most were 3-8 years old and there were about 6 kids at any given time. Mostly guys but some girly came out later in the day and decided we’d make good climbing post. They were really sweet and just wanted someone to play with them. We mostly communicated in broken English and pointing, something I’m going to be doing a lot on this race.
BAR MINISTRY
Bar ministry looked different for us then it usually does around Thailand and around the world. Usually you go around the bars and pray during the daytime. Then you go back at night and go in, order a coke, and play games with the girls (Mostly pool and 4 of a kind), basically just befriend them. Most girls initially say they love working at the bars, but as you get to know them better they tell you how unhappy they are but that their family needs the money. Most of these girls are working here to get through school and to send money back to their parents. It’s expected of them to send money home if you live in the city, especially if you had a child that your parents are taking care of so you can make more money.
This is not what we were doing. That is because the police (Good cops) were going to be out on the streets in the week we did city ministry. Because of this Emmi didn’t want us in the bars at night. So our mission was to go out and pray in the day, and then go back at night and pray again. Praying for what God put on our hearts, for Jesus to come into this place and make it his territory and not the enemies, for these girls to know there are other options and that they are worth so much more, for the men to realize that what they are searching for in these girls can never be found and that God is the only answer.
There is a lot of spiritual warfare in Chiang Mai, most of which we felt on Bar Street (the main strip in Chiang Mai with…questionable bars). For me it was stomachaches, for most others it was headaches. What helped most of my team was singing and praying out loud. Heather and I spent the last part of our last night on Bar Street laughing and praying aloud. We were done with the general prayers and started getting specific, and God’s got a sense of humor. We prayed for ATMs to break, we prayed for shops to close, and last but not least we both admitted that earlier in the day we were praying for…..well let’s just say the men won’t be able to have fun that night.
X-LIFE
X-life is the village ministry. It’s about stopping Human Trafficking before it starts. Human Trafficking is the exploitation of vulnerability through force, coercion, or deception. While many people view human trafficking as those girls and boys sold or kidnaped into slavery, it is more than that. That is Force. The last two are coercion and deception. [Define]. Both of which keep these children in the bars.
Village ministry is about stopping trafficking before it starts. It’s about stopping trafficking at the root of the problem. When the girl who sells herself is the only one with a car, it looks like a great option. You do it for your family and in part yourself. So parents encourage their children to go work in bars. That way they can send more money home. And they will end more money home, but it’s detrimental to the kids, and the parents have a hard time understanding that. Some also see selling their kids as a good option. They need the money and it’s not that bad for the kid, you’re helping your family out, and that’s something you should want to do.
This misconception is part of what we’ll be working with. When you never hear from a child you sold you just assume the best. I’m not sure which village my team will be going to. It will likely be one that’s use to Christians visiting, because they’re a contact of Emmis. They also probably know more about the realities of the bar industry, and are hopefully more understanding if their son or daughter chooses to leave that life.
All of the specifics on my village is speculation. I won’t be able to tell you about the village until I live there. There’s no internet so you’ll have to wait until I make it to Cambodia in February and then I’ll tell you all about it.
