This month we asked God to really throw us into the fire. We have been praying the armor of God over us as a squad and really wanted a chance to get that armor dirty. Well, as you can imagine, God has answered those prayers. As you may already know from reading some of the other blogs, we are living in a hotel in Ho Chi Minh City during our 2+ weeks of ministry in Vietnam. While forcing us to tighten our financial belts a bit, sleeping in an air-conditioned bedroom with beds and hot showers has been awesome. However, the hotel is also our spiritual battlefield. The space on the ground floor between the lobby and the stairwell leading up to our rooms is occupied by ten or twelve hourly hotel rooms. Every night beginning around 10 p.m. the pimps start to show up. As the customers come in and make their purchases, the pimp will leave, only to show up mere moments later with any number of girls on the back of his motorbike. This has gone on all night, every night since we’ve been in the hotel. In order to get up to our rooms on the 2nd-4th floors we’re forced to walk through the hallway of sin. But it has been great to see the entire squad take this burden upon themselves. Every night during “business hours”, from 10 p.m. until 8 a.m. we have two people at a time praying in 1-hour shifts for the activities occurring right beneath us. Some of the squad have even begun to befriend some of the hotel staff in an attempt to plant seeds with those who continually manufacture an environment which welcomes evil. The saddest part of the story is that this very hotel used to be owned by Christians and used to house visiting pastors from out of town. The time has come to reclaim this building for the Lord!
** Update 9/23/08 ** Thank you to everyone who joined us in battle on Sunday night. We were able to rent one of the downstairs rooms from 12 – 3 a.m. and had people in there praying the entire time, asking for God’s mercy and blessing for Vietnam while simultaneously evicting Satan from God’s property. There were also a few stations set up in our own hotel rooms which were used for prayer, communion, worship, etc. Although I’d love to be able to write about some physical, tangible event which occurred as a result of Sunday night, I cannot. The hotel looks the same, smells the same, feels the same, and is used for the same thing as it was before. But Sunday night we came together, not as 33 individuals, but as one body of Christ. A body which is not afraid to stare evil in the eye and rebuke it. Much of the time I feel like David vs. Goliath on this trip….but we all know how that turns out! Thanks for your prayers and support.
This Sunday night we will be worshiping God and praying over the hotel, the “customers”, and all involved with the prostitution business downstairs. We’re even trying to rent one of the hourly rooms for an entire night, taking our attack onto Satan’s turf. I ask that you join us in this attack on the Devil. We will be waging our war from 11 p.m. until 3 a.m., which is from noon until 4 p.m. Sunday afternoon on the east coast. Please join us in reclaiming one tiny hotel in Vietnam for the Lord!
