Picture: me, Bab and Awe (it’s Awe’s first night working in a bar)
Bab: “You’re tired. You’re just so tired but you have to come to work anyway.”
me:“Because you can’t afford not to, right?”
Bab: “Yes. And then you have to smile. Even though you are tired and miserable. You have to smile.”
me: “You have to pretend to be happy for the customers, huh?”
Bab: “Oh yes. But no one’s really happy. We’re all broken. All us girls, we all have broken hearts.”
As we began our initial decent, before our plane even touched ground, I fell in love with Thailand. I was head-over-heels for this country. Everything I saw reminded me of home in Florida and was completely different at the same time.
Thailand and I had our honeymoon period on the beautiful island of Koh Samet. Life was grand. It couldn’t get any better.
Then we came to Pattaya and Thailand broke my heart. My heart, still fresh with love and passion, lay in pieces on the dirty floor of a bar. And like a person who is madly in love, my love endures despite the pain. Every time I walk into a bar, my heart falls in love all over again. And I walk away with it in pieces.
But God is good. All the time. ALL the time. He knows our hearts are broken. My heart was broken long before I came to Thailand and not in a good way. But listen to how good God is:
“He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds.” Psalm 147:3
God is healing my broken heart. As the Lord continues to heal my broken heart, this is what he has called me to do:
“The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is upon me because the Lord has anointed me to… bind up the broken hearted…” Isaiah 61:1
I get to help heal hearts too! I may not be able to pick up all the pieces of Bab’s broken heart and restore it to its original glory by the end of our 20 minute conversation, but I know God has used me. If only to reach down, gingerly pick up one piece, dust it off, and place it back inside her. After that, I trust that the Lord will send someone behind me to pick up another piece, dust it off, and place it next to the first. Her heart will never be fully restored until she receives Jesus, but I trust that He’ll send someone to do that too. Because as much as I am madly in love with Thailand and her people, He loves them so much more.
