When Team Beloved Warriors touched down in Pattaya, Thailand at the beginning of November, I wasn’t excited. It looked like a typical resort town. We didn’t know anyone. And I already missed my friends, who were all in different cities around Thailand. But the Lord had a plan.
Over the course of the month, we met with pastors, believers, and short and long-term missionaries from several different countries, and had the chance to serve with a few of the ministries that are at work in Pattaya. My video from this month highlights a few of these ministries, but I’d like to tell you just a bit about them first:
AGAPE Home:
This is a preschool/daycare for 4-6 year olds from low-income families. These kids get dropped off by their parents before they go to work as street food vendors, trash collectors, taxi drivers, etc. Pray for these sweet faces that you see, that they would know the love of Christ through AGAPE. pattayachurch.org
Light for Asia:
Joseph and Sai York head up Light for Asia, which seeks to spread the gospel literally all over Asia. In Pattaya (where it started), however, their main outreach is to Chinese tourists. Three times a week the Light for Asia team goes to the pier (where all the Chinese tour groups eat dinner) and hands out free Chinese Bibles to anyone who would like one. Pray that the Lord would use these Bibles wherever they end up, and that Light for Asia would continue to be blessed with funding to keep going. www.lightforasia.com
Tamar Center:
Tamar is one of the ministries that brings light into the bars of Pattaya, in order to love on the girls inside and provide them ways out. They start with bar ministry, and invite the girls to English classes at their center. For girls who leave the bars, they offer job training in sewing classes, handicrafts, and restaurant/bakery work. Pray that they would continue to have favor and protection as they enter the bars, and that the girls inside would know the love of Christ through the people at Tamar. tamarcenter.org
[Please note: for the protection of both the girls and this ministry, I intentionally did not film the faces of the girls we talked to in the bars. I don’t believe you have to see their faces to know how loved they are by the Father, and yet how broken they are by the world.]
Pattaya Praise:
This is a once a year, 4 day worship event all around Pattaya. Christians from Thailand and from all over the world come together to worship and declare the name of God throughout the city. Not only are worship sessions held at different places (markets, bars, etc) during all 4 days, but there are also opportunities to serve the city and its people in tangible ways. This year that included cleaning Walking Street, just one of the many streets that make Pattaya the number one destination for sex tourism in the world. As we literally took brooms and soap to the street and scrubbed it down, we sang and prayed and joined together as believers to bring Christ’s light to the darkest of places.
p.s. You might recognize the soundtrack for this video as “God of this City,” performed by Chris Tomlin. What you might not know is that this song was originally written by Bluetree in Pattaya, about Pattaya. OUR God is the God of Pattaya, Thailand, and greater things are still to be done in there!
