Saying goodbye is hard and I’m really bad at it but it is something I am learning to do on this Race. We spend three to four weeks in each location pouring our hearts into the people around us, investing in deep relationships, praying on our knees for people, and yes, I even cry at times. And then when you get really close to people and go really deep with them- you leave, probably forever. But God doesn’t leave.
Something that He spoke to a lot of us about during this month is the idea that He was here before we were and He will be here long afterwards. He sees everything that we see and more. He feels everything that we feel and more. He is with the women behind the closed doors we can’t enter. He is with the girls that we built relationships with but weren’t allowed to say goodbye to because we were getting threats from their managers. He is with the women from Russia that became off limits to us. He is there with those women right now as I write this blog and as you read it.
There are women, right now, who are being forced to sleep with men in order to earn enough money to feed their kids that they haven’t seen in months. There are women, right now, who are being paid to have men rape them. There are women, right now, dancing on poles and exposing themselves and pretending to like it because they are trapped without a way out. There are women, right now, whose captors have injected them with drugs and put them behind glass cages until a man likes what he sees. And there is a God, right now, who is with them, adoring them, yearning to be with them, to comfort them and who has already died for them in order to have a relationship with them. I can’t be there anymore, God has something else in store for me right now, but He is always there, His heart is always breaking and His love is always flowing.
During our last night just hours before we left we went down and worshipped in one of the bars. We have some really talented musicians with us and our contact set it up so they could play a two hour set in a bar in the middle of Patong. We joined together with some people from our squad, the World Race Human Trafficking team and the Real Life Thailand team to sing God’s love over these streets, and it was powerful. Strangers came to listen as well. I noticed a Thai girl who looked like she worked at one of the bars came and listened to us for over half an hour. I talked to her afterwards and she said she was there for a friend’s birthday party at the bar next door. She heard us singing and it was so interesting and so different that she wanted to stay and listen to us, even though we were worshipping in a language she didn’t understand, rather than drink and party with her friends that she was with. It was a powerful night and a perfect note to leave on. I have a video of it but the current internet connection says it will take over 6 hours to load so that isn’t going up right now. Awesome amazing beautiful video to come! Yay!
Angie and I with "Hope" from a previous blog.
Lawren and I. She was one of those people that I just instantly bonded with. We usually went to visit women at the bar accross from hers and when we got there she was always playing pool with male customers or in the middle of being purchased. Because of this we never got to speak more than a few sentences to each other. Even so, we always smiled at each other and when I was leaving she was sad to say goodbye.
Ged, one of the first women I met here. On Our last night she saw us singing and left her bar and her customers to walk over and just spend time with us. She stood with us for about 15 minutes in silence, just smiling and hugging us as we worshipped. She eventually went back to work at her bar down the way but throughout the night we would look over and see her smiling and waving at us.
This is the incredible Real Life Thailand team that I got to live with this month. They are also a part of Adventures in Missions, the organization the World Race is under. They are beautiful, fun and unique women and they are bringing an incredible light to dark places. I have left Bangla for now, but they are there for a few more weeks and then they are off to Cambodia where we will hopefully work together again. If you want to keep following some stories about the crazy things happening in Thailand on Bangla road, check out their blogs, they are worth reading.
In the middle with the black hair is Gabby http://lookingupgirl.blogspot.com/
On the far right is Andrea, one of their leaders http://andreapasquan.theworldrace.org/
