For safety of the women we have met this week I will not be using their real names. I also will not be using the real names of the bars. They will be known as bar 1 and bar 2.
This week my team, along with a few other teams, have been on bar ministry. Our schedule is filled with a lot of prayer for the women, the men, and for us as we prepare to go out and let God use us in any way He wants to. For two hours in the morning our teams spread out in the alley filled with over 30 bars and pray for the night to come. God has been speaking to us all in different ways, but a common theme that has been shown to us as a whole is that revival is coming to Chiang Mai. God was here before us and will remain here after us, but most importantly He is here in the midst of the chaos.
“Just as the birds surround and fly around the bars, as am I surrounding this place. My coverage is greater than a bird’s coverage of a place. I have this place in the palm of my hands. I am coming back for my beloved women. They will know how deep my love for them is. Stay in me and trust me. I am greater than any doubt.” -God
Our God is a God that keeps His promises and many of us have have been reminded of this with all of the scripture we have found and shared as a group.
“I will give them a heart to know me, that I am the Lord. They will be my people, and I will be their God, for they will return to me with all their heart.” Jeremiah 24:7
These dry bones WILL live! Ezekiel 37:1-14
For two hours in the afternoon we continue ministry by going out to the bars to build relationships and hangout with some of the women. During this time we laugh and love and spread the joy and love that God has given us. On Monday, God led us to bar 1 where we became very close to a few of the women there. We have connect four competitions, laugh until it hurts, and remind them of how beautiful they are. I continue going back to bar 1 every afternoon because of the wonderful relationship we have made with these women.
For two hours at night we have the option of either going out to the bars or staying back and interceding for the ones that do go out. Monday night I went out with two of my teammates and we made a great connection with a few of the women from bar 2. This bar has been my favorite bar to go to at night. We played pool and had a great time laughing with each other. It was amazing seeing the women have fun and genuinely laugh with us instead of entertaining men. The second time I went out I was so excited to go see my friends from bar 2. I was eager to get there and just simply hangout and love on them. Someone earlier that night mentioned that when light enters darkness, darkness always pushes back. I saw it happening that night. I enter bar 2 and all of my friends from there were busy entertaining old men and it broke my heart. I didn’t know what to do besides leave and wait for the men to leave. They were so happy to see me, but answered with “I can’t hangout. I have to hang with my friend.” After discussing this, praying with Ariah, and patiently waiting for the men to leave we were able to end the night with these beautiful women. They were still so excited to see us and play pool with us.
The moral of the story is not that I am the one meant to save these women, or even the men here in Chiang Mai. The most important role I play in this fight for human trafficking is to love on the women who are deceived into thinking that they are not worth anything. That their only worth lies within the wallets of the men who purchase them for sex. By being obedient to Christ’s call to love the least of these, and especially the ones who are the hardest to love, He is able to use me as a vessel to shower these women with His unconditional love. He does not judge them for their acts, and He does not love them less because they don’t know Him. But as I channel His love to them, their eyes can be opened to the truth. That they are valued and loved more than anything they can dream or imagine.
