Our work this month is working with a coffee house in Ho Chi Minh City (also known as Saigon). Customers come to the coffee house, and for the price of a drink, are able to come and speak with native English speakers. Speaking English is considered highly desirable in order to secure high-paying jobs with international companies. We hang out in the coffee shop, drinking coffee, and speaking English. Technically Vietnam is a closed country, so while we’re allowed to visit and “volunteer” during our time here, we have to be careful about what we say.
We’re not able to openly share the gospel as Truth, but we are able to share our beliefs and tell the customers about Jesus. So far we’ve had some really wonderful conversations and been able to build some wonderful relationships with the nationals here. One evening, I went out to dinner with my new friends and they gave me a tour of the city from the back of their motorbikes. It was by far one of the best days of the race I’ve had yet!
We are living in an affluent and westernized district of the city, surrounded by parks and shopping malls. It often feels like I’ve been dropped back into America and life is somewhat “normal.” We have hot showers, air conditioning, Internet access, and a kitchen. We get to hang out and watch TV in the evenings, work out in the gym in the mornings, and visited a water park for our day off this week.
Sounds like a dream doesn’t it?
But for whatever reason, I’ve been unsettled by it all. To go from a month like Cambodia where fourteen of us are living in close quarters and taking bucket baths, to the luxury of Vietnam has left me feeling like I’ve stepped out of the race and am back at home. And that’s not where I want to be.
I’m uncomfortably comfortable with being in a culture where material gains equal success and the job you have is more important than being obedient to the Lord. It’s been ridiculously easy to fall back into old patterns and ways of thinking, to the point that I worry about returning home to my “regular” life. Will I pursue to Lord as wholeheartedly when I’m back in the predictable rhythm of my days? Will my heart cry out to be filled with the Spirit and to live in days of worship and prayer? Worse, will I depend on being put into difficult and challenging situations like I’ve encountered on the race in order to pursue Jesus?
This month has confirmed more of who the Lord has formed me to be. My future in missions will not be in a setting such as we’ve encountered in Vietnam, but I’m learning to have my heart broken for the lost, no matter what their income or status in society. Our time here has reconfirmed the direction the Lord is leading me.
At first, I worried that these feelings of being unsettled in this society meant that I hadn’t changed at all, that I would return home the same person as when I left. Now I realize that feeling uncomfortable here shows how different I have truly become.
