God has been showing me a lot of faces this month. Let me clarify – God has been allowing me to see faces this month. Many times I walk past people – sidewalks, stores, church, etc.. – and I see them, but I don’t really see them… I glance their way, but I don’t really look…
This month God has really opened my eyes to the individual person – that they are not just a crowd but all individually wonderfully and fearfully made… all made and loved by the Creator of the Universe… God has really just broken my heart for the people of Thailand – as a nation and as people. I see people everywhere and I want to cry… My heart is sad because they don’t know that Jesus loves them.
Let me explain that Thailand is 95% Buddhist, 4% Islam, 1% Christian, and 1% other. So, there are pretty good odds that when you see a person on the street they are probably not going to heaven. This thought crossed my mind the first week we were here and I haven’t gotten passed it. Thailand is a nation that bows to stone and prays to gold… they have beautiful temples and idols at every turn… but, if they could just see Jesus – get a glimpse of His heart – I know His beauty would be too captivating to ever turn away from. But how do you get people to see – how do you get them to look…
Being in Thailand has definitely opened up my eyes to how
big the world really is… how it really is impossible for me to do
anything – only is it possible with God… and that there are way too many people that are not going to heaven – and it is not OK!
We went to a big festival / carnival the other night. This celebration was to ask forgiveness for using and polluting the water. It was amazing the amount of work and effort and planning and participation this whole thing caused. The Buddhist made little flower “things” that had incense and candles in the center and they set them in the sea as their prayer ritual. This festival is so important that the government actually mandates that parents give their children at least 100 Baht to spend at the carnival. We went and we walked around… and I saw so many faces. So many people that prayed over their flowers and bowed down in front of their idols… (I kept wishing God would just set the whole thing on fire… kind of joking, but then again kind of serious.)
In these faces I could see so much bondage and brokenness, so much confusion and hopelessness, but I also saw so much potential. I wondered if they knew Jesus, and found out what a relationship with Him was like, if they would love Him back with such enthusiasm – would they throw a big party in his honor to celebrate salvation?
I saw all these people and realized that, probably, every person around me was not going to heaven… and I panicked. I mean why am I here? What good am I if Hell is still on option? I just do not think I can put into words how sad and heavy and hopeless it feels to walk past the prostitute or the monk and know that you have Jesus and they don’t.
I haven’t come to any conclusions or revelations or answers to the problem, and my heart isn’t feeling any better, but… the only thing I can come up with is Love… it always seems to just come back to Love – but, then again God IS Love…
Below is some information on the ceremony taken from http://www.loikrathong.net and the video I made of the festival :
1. Loi Krathong is to ask for forgiveness Pra Mae Khongkha.
2. According to Brahma belief, Loi Krathong is to worship God.
3. Loi Krathong is to welcome Buddha when he came back to the
world- he had stayed in the Buddhist temple during the rainy season
at the second heaven ruler to teach his mother.
4. Loi Krathong is to worship foot-print of Buddha on the Nammathanati River beach.
5. Loi Krathong is to worship Chulamanee in the heaven where the Buddhas hair is buried.
6. Loi Krathong is to worship Bhakabhrama in heaven.
7. Loi Krathong is to worship Uppakutta-dhera who observed religious precept at the middle portion of the sea.
