Thailand!!
I’m in Thailand!! I’m also sorry for not writing this uppdate sooner. Yikes. We arrived here on December 7th, we stayed in Bangkok for a couple days as a squad and then split up to go to our different ministries for the month. Here are some big things that happened in the past few weeks:
We Left Africa!! Man oh man, I love that place. I spent a month in Kenya, Uganda, and Tanzania. Africa was such a beautiful season in my life. The Lord constantly surprised me with what He was doing and saying. He is always up to good, always in pursuit of the people He created. It’s hard to write about ministry there because we did so many different things, but in all of it I learned how powerful and sustaining the Lord and His words are. His words truly birth new life.
New Team!! At the start of Africa I was put on a new team, Team Redemption. Blessing. That’s the only word I have for that group of people. I was so blessed by them. The Lord taught me what it was to be in community with the body around me, a lesson I was thirsty for. Maybe one of the most valuable lessons I will take away from this season was summed up in something that was said to us at our Africa Debrief. “The glory of the Bridegroom is the Bride.” For the Bride to radiate with His glory we have to pursue truly being a body, calling each other into our true identities, fighting for each other, holding each other up. There is no room for division and apathy, that is what the enemy is sowing. The Father is bringing life, sowing into that is where I what I want my focus to be in the body. Need the Lord’s grace for that right! So He used our team to build each other up, to challenge, to grow, to learn, to fight, and I think just to laugh. They truly became a family to me, I’m so thankful for each one of them, and really look forward to having them in my life.
My New team is team ROAR. There are 6 orf us on this team, I have so much to learn from each person on my new team. One of us got the word Lion for our team, but as we thought and prayed through it, that seemed like a starting point. So after some time we came to this, the Lions roar comes out of it’s true identity, and that’s where we want to be, to be hidden and established in our true identities in Christ and for our lives to roar out of that place. Hence the name ROAR. I’m looking forward to seeing what the Lord will do on this team. It’s a hard transition for me, leaving my old team felt a little like leaving home all over again, but the Lord in His faithfulness prepared me for this, and will sustain me, and will bring me deeper into intimacy. So I’m learning that when things are hard prayer becomes a life line, not just a conversation I pick up and leave through out the day. I have to be thanking, praising, and pouring out my heart to the Lord or I won’t make it. Not a bad place to be.
Thailand!! We were supposed to be in Bangkok working with the Well, which is focused on ministering to women who are involved in the sex trade industry this month, but plans changed. Instead of Bangkok we are in a little fishing village on the island of Puhket Thailand. We are working with two missionaries here Dana and Cindy. We are helping teach English, cleaning up the neighborhood, and giving testimonies on the radio and in church. I was stoked about working with the sex trafficking in Bangkok, I know this issue is huge on the Lord’s heart, and I was excited to see what He is doing and saying in one of the most concentrated locations where this is happening. SO hearing that our location was switched was hard, and not working in that ministry is hard too.
One of the girls here gave a real legit reality check the other day. She was talking about how the Lord’s heart for the people we are around is just as strong as it is for the women who are being trafficked. It’s a privilege to be here, and to have the opportunity to love the people on this island, and a good time to sow into what the Lord is doing in Bangkok in prayer. The Lord is up to good.
Thanks for reading!
