Part of our ministry this month includes street evangelism. We pray, walk around the city, and ask the Lord to highlight people that he wants us to share the gospel with. I have two incredible testimonies for you straight from the streets of Siem Reap, Cambodia.
Story #1:
Fish pedicures are a thing here. Basically, you sit and put your feet in a small tank filled with a bunch of fish and they nip at your feet and eat away all the dead skin. It sounds as weird as it feels. I did not get a pedicure, but I did stick my hand in one of the tanks and all the fish swarmed my hand and gnawed on my palm. Completely painless, just a little ticklish. You can choose your fish size: small, medium or large. Some pedicure places include a free beer as well.
Emmy got a fish pedicure from a place that also had puppies you could hold. We pass it all the time on our way to Tuk Tuk Tacos (best guacamole around) and wave at the woman who works there. After the third time we waved, we all felt like we should go talk to her. When we got there she waved at us, hopped on a motorcycle and took off. We were a little bewildered because we thought the Lord led us to her, but regardless we sat down with the man who also worked there and talked to him instead.
His name is Red. He works at that fish pedicure shop with his wife Yati (the women who had just left) seven days a week with no break. He lives on a farm and sells the puppies for money. He has four children ages ten, eight, six and four. He talked to me in broken English all about the hardships of business, the Khmer Rouge and his puppies. As I was listening to him, I felt the Lord nudge me to share the gospel with him. I told him that we are traveling around the world to share about Jesus and asked him if he has ever heard of Jesus. He took a second to process what I had asked and then shook his head. I asked if I could share and he said sure. I shared the gospel with him and after he said briefly, “Oh yeah, I think I have heard that before.”
I asked him if I could pray for his business and family. He replied with an eager, “yes please!” Before I prayed he asked me, “What do I do while you are praying?” I explained that he can also talk to Jesus. I explained what it looks like to accept Jesus into his heart and what that means going forward. I told him that he can talk to Jesus whenever he wants. We prayed for him, smiled brightly and left. Carmen made an eye opening point that we do not need to go to a remote village to meet the unreached. People everywhere have not heard the name of Jesus. That is crazy to me, that someone may just not know. I was blown away at how genuine he was. He listened with a smile in his eyes and his heart was open. I believe he will accept Jesus soon, if he has not already. He was the sweetest man.
Also, while I was sharing the gospel with him, a three month old puppy literally crawled into my arms. No joke, there was no initiating on my part. If that is not a sign that the Holy Spirit is present, I don’t know what is.
Story #2
Buckle your seat belts. This one blew my mind. Back story. Last month in Thailand, two European travelers stumbled upon our village in the jungle of Mae Hong Son. One was named Dennis and he was from the Netherlands. They sat on our porch and talked to Bekah and I for about an hour. They noticed she was reading The Explicit Gospel by Matt Chandler and asked what The Explicit Gospel meant. We shared the gospel with them and explained how the book tackled issues with how people misinterpret it. This launched us into an hour long conversation about divine creation. We talked through a lot of things, he listened, we listened, we agreed on some things and disagreed on others. It was a friendly conversation.
One of the topics we discussed was the idea of coincidences. It started by me saying that even though the world is broken I see the Lord restoring it through pursuing us. I shared with Dennis that I believe he was meant to come to this specific village, sit on our porch and hear about Jesus because God is after his heart. He shared that statistically coincidences are bound to happen all the time. He shared a couple of instances in his travels where things have just worked out for the best. He believes statistics are behind it, instead of the “invisible hand of God,” so he called it. I asked him, statistically how many coincidences does it take to notice a correlation? I remember that he did not directly reply but I shared once again that I believe that all of those coincidences were God pursuing his heart. He said responded by acknowledging that the idea is soothing but not quite believable for him yet. We talked some more, shared some laughs, said our goodbyes and parted ways.
GET THIS. On the same day we met Red, we decided to stop at a coffee shop to rest for an hour or so. We were there for maybe thirty minutes and I heard someone say hello from behind me. I turned around and low and behold, Dennis himself was sitting at a table directly behind me.
Have you ever seen someone out of context and it takes you a solid thirty seconds to make sense of the world again? That was me. My thoughts were all over the place. Wait a second. I know you. Where have I seen you? Not here. Right? Where was I when I saw you? Wait, where am I? What year is it?
After those disorienting thirty seconds I put it all together. Dennis. Porch. Thailand. Coincidences. JESUS.
I was blown away and you could tell he was too. He did not blink for three minutes. You could see it in his eyes, he stared at me with a look of unprocessed awe. I am sure I was glowing with the confirmation of the Holy Spirit. He started asking me questions like, how I came across this specific coffee shop, what I was doing earlier that day, and how long I had been in Siem Reap. He remembered that last time we talked we had no idea where we would be in Cambodia, only that we were going. You could tell he was verbally processing and trying to logically piece together our surprise meet up. I looked at him and said “Wow what a coincidence!” We both laughed remembering our conversation.
I got his Facebook information just before we left to meet up with our team for dinner. To make things crazier, he is traveling to Vietnam next like we are! I playfully told him, “I am telling you, this is not a coincidence! God is pursuing you!” He laughed and said, “I think I am going to stick to my beliefs.” I said, “Fair enough, but if I see you in Vietnam, we are going to talk.” He laughed and we waved goodbye.
Everyone, pray that we coincidentally run into in him in Vietnam. I want to so bad. Even thinking about that, my stomach gets all fluttery. The Lord is after his heart!
HOW INSANE IS THAT. That gets me fired up and also frozen with awe.
Honesty time. This month has been challenging for me. We are working to expand AIM’s ministry here in Siem Reap through finding contacts for the long term missionaries. We are the hands and feet for them this month. This includes sending emails, researching, visiting organizations and hospitals and street evangelism. This is meaningful work, but our days are not as busy as I would like. In that space, I have struggled with frustration and guilt. I have missed being completely culturally immersed and tangibly serving the people of Cambodia.
But, it has been stretching in the BEST KIND OF WAYS. The Lord has humbled me to the max. It has been hard but I am so so thankful. I have learned so much this month, to explain it all I would need like 18 more blogs.
I came up with this analogy that I think fits what God is teaching me and basically is a metaphor for my life. It is like God and I are playing legos. I am trying to build a house, but every time I place a lego on the wall, it does not fit or does not look right. I look at my legos and try again, but every time I try to build my house I cannot seem to get it to look like what I wanted. Sometimes I get so frustrated, I don’t want to play legos anymore.
But when I look over at God and ask why am I so frustrated? He shows me that he is actually building a castle. He reminds me that he invited me to play legos and join in what he was already building. He reminds me that he gave me the pile of legos in front of me. Now every time I pick up a lego, I ask him where I should place it and it always fits. Sometimes I even look at my neighbors pile and ask him, why do they get to build the tower and I have to build the moat? But God gently whispers, don’t look at her pile, focus on where I am asking you to place your pieces. Every piece of the castle is important.
Through that process, I have begun to see the beautiful handiwork of the castle and the intricate imagination of Father that far exceeds my own. Now when I build with God there is peace, joy, and beauty in the process and I don’t have to see the full picture because I trust in God’s lego building skills. He has all the pieces anyway. Because he loves me, he reveals little mysteries of the castle’s beauty.
The Holy Spirit SPEAKS. He is answering prayers left and right. He is helping me discern the voice of the enemy and the voice of he Father in new and clearer ways. He is revealing ways I have been deceived. I will ask him questions and he will answer through a teammate or through scripture that day. I will call out to him and he will love me through the wind or a worship song. We will pray for the people of Siem Reap and he will open Red’s heart and direct Dennis’s steps to encounter Him. His love is intricate, intentional and EVERYWHERE. His ways are better than mine. His plans are better than mine. He has humbled me so much this month but also loved me so much this month.
Call to me and I will answer you, and will tell you great and hidden things that you have not known. Jeremiah 33:3
