The idea of “redemption” is one that has been on my mind
and my heart a lot lately.
Up until now in my Christian walk, I have known that when
you accept Christ into your heart, and you make Him the Lord of your life, you
are forgiven. All of your sins are
nailed to the cross, and God sees them no more. This is pretty sweet, and I have accepted this as a part of
my basic theology. I had no idea
that there could be more.
On the Race, I am learning that God not only has already
forgiven me for every single thing that I have done wrong and will ever do
wrong, but He also wants to redeam it all. What satan meant for evil, God wants to use for good. Every single struggle that I have had-
God wants to turn it from a source of shame to a source of glory for His
kingdom.
CRAZY THOUGHT, hey?
Is God actually aware of what He is dealing with? I was Wiccan, for crying out loud! I was an adulteress! I was divorced when I was barely 21
years old- aren’t I supposed to be some kind of second class Christian- never
allowed in a leadership position and relegated to the furthest pew in the
back-lest I set a bad example for the good young Christian girls?
For the past week and a half my team has been doing bar
ministry here in Chiang Mai. We
ride our brightly colored bicycles downtown, go into the bars, order a coke,
and try to make friends with the girls.
Last Friday when we were out, all of the bars were closed
because it was a Buddhist holiday.
We were pretty bummed out- it was one of our first nights out and we
were really excited to be there.
Kristin Bruce, Katie and I decided to stay out anyway, and see what
ministry opportunities the Lord had in store for us!
We went to one of the only open establishments on the
street- the tattoo place. Kristin said
that the last WR team had made friends with the artists there, and they had
said the guys were really nice. We
went in and struck up a conversation, talking about tattoos that we might get
while we are here. I had planned
to get my nose pierced when we go to India next month- but then I heard that we
are probably going to Calcutta… and I don’t know much about Calcutta… but what
little I do know makes me think that there are better places on this earth to
get a metal rod shoved through your nose flesh. Even if it does cost only 50 cents there! So I asked “Ugly” (the piercer) how
much it would cost. He said it
would be 300 baht (about $10). I
thanked him for the info and tucked it away to think about it later. I guess that he thought my asking that
question meant that I wanted to do it right that second, because he started to
get things ready and said, “I do now”.
I said, “WOAH! Not NOW! I have to think about it!” This went back and forth for a few
minutes… but (spoiler alert) I wound up with a bedazzled face!
It turns out that the Lord was faithful, and did provide
people for us to speak with. Most
meaningful for me was a john named John (I call him john John.) As you probably know, I do NOT have a
heart for johns. I basically hate
them and want to punch them in the balls.
(Am I allowed to say that on the World Race blog? I guess I’ll find out!) Laura Meyers said that she will be
praying for my heart to be broken for them, and I asked her not to pray that. I want to keep hating them and loving
the girls.
So when we were walking back to our bicycles to head back to
the guesthouse, I noticed a man hunched over on his moto, sobbing his guts
out. Men don’t really come to this
street unless they are trying to pick up a prostitute, so I knew exactly what
he was when I saw him. Unfortunately,
I am physically unable not to comfort someone when they are crying… even a
john, it turns out.
I went to him and asked what was wrong- but he was foreign
(from Norway), drunk, and sobbing, so I could understand maybe every 5th
word. The jist is that his “Thai
girlfriend” (who he had been “dating” for the past 4 days) has a brother who
had just been in a terrible moto accident, and she was very worried about
him. John John was very worried
also, and that is why he was crying.
When we are doing bar ministry, we are not supposed to talk about Jesus
too much because they want us to make sure that we are nto seeing these men and women as our little
“ministry projects” and just trying to shove the gospel down their throats
before moving on to our next country.
I have, within reason, respected that guideline, but on Friday I didn’t
have time to listen to this guy for 3 hours and build a relationship with him-
we had to leave Bar Street by 1:00 A.M to head back to the guesthouse since
everyone who stayed back was waiting up for us. I listened to him for a few minutes and said, “John, I need
to cut to the chase because we need to get back home in a few minutes. I am very sorry for what has happened
to your girlfriend’s brother. In
times like these, when life is hanging in the balance and we have no power to
change anything, I have found that the only thing I can do is pray to God. Would you like to pray with me?” Even though he had just been preaching
to me about how all religions are the same, you can’t trust the Bible, and his
highest virtue is kharma, he agreed to pray, so I called the other girls over
and the three of us prayed for john John.
I told him the name and address of the café’ where we worked during the
day, and he promised to come and visit us.
To be continued.
