We’ve been in Malaysia for two and a half weeks now, working in Georgetown on the island of Penang. I have enjoyed this month very much so far: it has been a great combination of work and rest, fun and duty, pushing through the mundane and enduring… the interesting.
We are working with Youth With A Mission (YWAM) to serve several local ministries.
Kawan is a Malay word that means “Friends,” and is the name of a ministry founded by an American man named Jody. On Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays from 10am to 3pm the poor and homeless can enjoy free breakfast, lunch, showers, a cool place to nap for the afternoon, and personal ministry attention and fellowship from the volunteers at Kawan. We are also helping to renovate the upper floors of that building, as well as preparing another building to be a training center for those people coming off the street who wish to devote their lives to being ministers of Christ. I have made a good Malaysian friend at Kawan whose name is Noah. He is a 68 year old man who has been on the streets most his life, and since accepting Jesus’ free gift of salvation over 10 years ago and being freed from multiple addictions, he has spent the rest of his life still on the streets but as a joyful and faithful witness and servant of Christ. Every Wednesday night Kawan does evangelistic outreach and holds a church service for all who are interested.
There is another ministry that we are privileged to participate in at a Seventh Day Adventist hospital in the area (though I myself have not participated as we were asked to be consistent with our ministry choices). At the hospital a group of us are helping to raise funds for kids who needs heart surgery, which costs about 30,000 Malaysian ringgit, or around $10,000 USD. The group has been wildly successful, praise God, in raising almost 20,000 ringgit thus far, and they’re shooting for having raised enough for one child to receive heart surgery. The original expectations were as follows: if they raise 1000 ringgit in any one day, that is a very successful day and they are treated to a free pizza party. Well, last week they consistently raised over 1500 ringgit each day! Just this weekend, the Lord’s blessing was on them to raise over 3000 ringgit in one day!!! So we praise God for that. 🙂
At least here in the city of Georgetown the people are so nice. Malaysia is an extremely culturally and religiously diverse country, with Chinese, Malaysians, Indians, and Arabs, Christians, Muslims, and Buddhists… living together not just peacefully but almost amicably! This isn’t a melting pot though, it’s a mixing pot. Sure there is a mutual cultural understanding and blend to some point, but each people group is visibly distinct, and so is each one’s religion. In fact, most of the signs here are in four or five languages: English, Malay, Chinese, some Indian language and/or some Arab language. English is widely spoken by almost all, to some degree. I’d love to tell you more about some of the people I’ve met, so read on in my next blog coming later today…
