Yay for another blog about Thailand!
I’m so thankful that God blessed me with my month there, and for the lessons He has taught me. I won’t lie though, it has been one of my toughest and most exhausting months so far on the race, BUT it’s also been my favorite too…funny how that works huh? Haha 🙂
I think this month was so difficult for me is because of them amount of spiritual battles that were going on…it was a daily fight against darkness going into the bars.
Now most of you know how I struggle with prayer and am just learning about spiritual warfare, but this past month has grown me in that area. Everyday our teams would meet together and worship/pray for three hours. At first I was like “three hours of praying?! I can barely get through ten minutes of praying before I run out of things to say or get distracted” haha. It really wasn’t all that bad. Yeah, I did get distracted a time or two or was really tired and accidentally fall asleep during intercession, but it was good to learn how to pray and worship God for that long about specific things. I learned about crafted prayers and how it’s good to pray for specific things consistently by writing them down and praying for them daily, and then when God answers your prayers it’s cool to see it 🙂 The intercession times taught me how to seek peace from the Lord about things while waiting for Him to answer my prayers, AND most importantly to thank Him for answering the prayer and be confident He will take care of it. It takes such a weight off to give burdens to God and have confidence that He will take care of business. I learned also about how vitally important it is that we get into the word, pray, and soak up God's truths as we fight. If you didnt stop rest and be filled back up you will run out of steam because you can't win that battle without God's help. All of these lessons are good to know and use in daily life because we are always in a spiritual battle it just may not always be as evident as it was this month. I also learned a thing or two from the girls on “A” squad who was in month eight of their race, they stayed at the same guest house as us. One thing that has stuck with me from them is what Brittany shared at one of the intercessions “giving thanks to God always precedes a miracle”. God truly blessed us with the companionship of these girls to learn from their wisdom of life obedient to God and life on the race. I feel like we were able to bless them a little too because we brought fresh light and joy to them as they moved into their ninth month on the race. I know they were tired, but I hope that we helped encourage them and spur them on to finish this race well. Love you A squad ladies! 😉
The times out in the red light area were also hard in a few ways. It was hard to go into the bars and have your senses overloaded with dark things. Girls and lady boys dressed in provocative outfits, foul language, John’s (what we called the men) filled with lustful thoughts hanging around, and just the darkness of generational sins like alcoholism, infidelity, and just coming to these bars. It broke my heart to see the young kids out so late at night selling flowers and being exposed to such darkness at such a young age…most of the little girls I talked to were between six and nine years old. It was also hard to see the girls and lady boys sitting outside their bars (if they didn’t have clients) looking so sad. They normally sit outside and welcome wandering John’s into the bars but they only do that for so long and then they just sit there, in death. I know that sounds harsh but it’s really true…they have no hope, no light to fill their lives and bring them true life, they don’t have Jesus so they are living in death. But that’s where the good part, and my team, comes in to play. We helped show them life and hope. So don’t get me wrong that it was all doom and gloom out at the bars. I had a lot of fun going around and shining God’s light and Joy to these people in whatever way we could. Which meant would end up a lot of the times playing games with the girls like connect four, dominos, jenga, pool…never really thought I’d be playing those games to help show the hope and love of Jesus but it was fun. I of course got plenty of opportunities to be my goobeerish self and joke with the girls or do silly dances haha 😉 Again, it is so important to rest and be filled with God's truths after going out and conquering daily. I learned that it is impossible for me to pour out love, grace, and truth on these girls daily without being filled up again myself.
Another thing that I am still learning with the past month and going into debrief is about freedom and what that really looks like. I praise the Lord for placing me in America and letting me live in a free country. Freedom of choice has been huge on my team and I’s hearts this month. Choice is a freedom and a luxury often over looked…freedom to choose a career, you can get an education for free and choose to go to college, etc. My teammates Beka Hull is writing a series on this right now and I highly recommend you go and check it out. Hopefully I never will take it for granted again.
So yeah this month was hard. It would be silly to sugar coat things to make them look all peaches and cream. Growing in Christ is hard, and chasing after God living a radical life isn’t easy…but boy is it totally worth it!! 🙂 haha. It's super awesome to be a debrief now and be able to rest in God and refill with God's truths, love, and grace. The A/C, soft beds, free wifi, and free breakfast here don't hurt none either 😉 haha
Chiang Mai Thailand will always have a special place in my heart. We had some fun adventures and lots of awesome growth together. I may return one day and I pray that the visions and dreams that were had about that place would come true. Thailand will be free in Christ’s name one day!
P.S. I plan to write in more detail later about the relationships with the girls that my team and I made so be on the lookout for that 😉
