Where to begin? The last time I blogged it was about the start of my month not looking like I thought it would. Well, it's only gotten crazier…
The last you heard from me I was "Asking the Lord" what to do on the streets of Cambodia. Since then, our team was asked to pick up and head to the country of Laos. When I first heard this plan I was a little skeptical. Laos? What is that? It's been a country for how long? And it's a closed country?! What are we going to do there?
My skepticism didn't matter much, we were going. The bus ride there was hands down the most traumatizing travel I've had all Race. 4 hours into the 19 hour bus ride the air conditioning stopped working. We pulled over for a few hours to try and fix it but it didn't work and there was no other option but to power through. The roads to Laos were unruly! It was a traveling sauna/roller coaster/circus. My iPhone savvy friend had an app that said the temperature inside the bus was 91 degrees. Unbelievable. All you could do was laugh really. We all knew that in a week or so we would all be laughing about this experience. Oh, and did I mention there was no bathroom on board? ya.
Ok, moving on. We finally made it to Laos and connected with an underground ministry that will be left nameless for obvious protection reasons. They were absolutely incredible and God is doing some remarkable things through their ministry. We were the very first team to visit them and they were very appreciative to have us there even if just for a short time.
Our goal there was two-fold. One, we were to serve this ministry and be a blessing in any way possible. Two, scout out for other ministries the World Race could partner with in the future. Since Laos is a closed country and open evangelism would end in your imprisonment you can imagine our hesitancy in sharing goal #2. "Hey, you seem like a nice guy doing nice things for people… do you by chance love Jesus?"
Despite our hesitations, God moved (no surprise there). Sitting in a coffee shop, picking up our laundry or even visiting touristy places we would run into people from all over the world with ministries doing awesome things all around the country. We got their info and Lord willing we will be able to send World Race teams their way to serve them within the year 2014. Such a cool experience.
I am now sitting in a coffee shop possibly blogging one of my last blogs while on the race. I head to Malaysia in the morning and from my understanding we will be working with a ministry in an area dominantly Muslim. It will be illegal to share our faith in Jesus. So I'm imagining it not possible to blog about the details of my month while there. I will do what I can 🙂
I can't believe that today marks my 290th day on the race with only 44 more to go! I will be touching down in LAX on December the 7th.
So many thoughts already sprinting around in my mind about post-race plans but I am trying my best to stay present, to stay focused on what God is still doing here.
Please continue to keep me and my team in your prayers. I will be in touch as much as possible.
Love you all,
Jolene
