Start of a new month in Cambodia! With this being the 1st of our last 3 months of ministry,Team Fuego is working with Teen Challenge of Cambodia this month. The center is about 2 hours outside of Phnom Penh in the bush of the Samrong District in the Takeo province.
Teen Challenge of Cambodia helps street children and young adult males whose lives have been shattered by drugs and many other addictions. They provide a one year discipleship training residential program where the boys are provided with care, protection, and rehabilitation. It helps the children and adults develop holistically through education-Khmer and English language learning, health, bible, art, grammar, and sports classes and we have the privilege of helping the guys out this month.
The center has around 30 students right now and they are all so awesome. Many lives have already been transformed by the students coming to know the Lord. But many still need the power of the Holy Spirit to change their lives. Many still need to be set free from the bondage the enemy has over them and they need to experience the awesome freedom the Lord has for all of them!
This week we’ve been helping the guys in the rice fields-gathering the rice from the rice paddies. I can’t help but think about the cambodians in the 1970’s who were forced to plant and gather rice everyday during the genocide led by Pol Pot of the Khmer Rouge. So many were forced into slave labor in Pol Pot’s “killing fields” where they died from overwork, malnutrition and disease, on a diet of one tin of rice (180 grams) per person every two days.
Seeing older faces knowing they experienced that insane time in cambodian history breaks my heart. Over 2 million people died during the genocide-20,000 died just in the evacuation out of Phnom Penh. They saw so much, they had family members die, they were tortured and treated terribly. What it would be like to walk in their shoes for even a day during that time.
There is a huge difference though I’ve noticed in the cambodians. They are some of the most kind people I’ve ever met-even on the race. And there is definitely an investment in Cambodia from Christians. There is of course a huge stronghold of Buddhist believers but there are many that have at least heard of Jesus’ name and many that are Christians.
Next week we begin our teaching with the students at Teen Challenge. Please pray for the students, for our team, and for all of Cambodia.
Much love 🙂
