I apologize for being silent for too long. It is not my intention to keep you out of the loop. In fact, I actually want to shout so much from the rooftop for you to hear it all. So much has happened and so much is still happening and I just don’t know where to start and how to spit all the words and thoughts out.
For so many years of my life, I struggled with a darkness that seemed to consume me. Depression and anxiety overwhelmed me and the injustices of this world weighed heavy on my heart. In those years, I was angry with God and thought that He had abandoned me and this world. We have all experienced different “darknesses” in our lives that sometime seem like only the Lord will ever know the purposes for. After years of depression and anxiety, I have experienced depths of despair and hopelessness that only the Lord will ever really know all the details of and that only the Lord knew how to deliver me from. Even in knowing that the depression and anxiety was gone, I have still not come to a strong revelation and understanding of it but what I do know is that the Lord is bringing wisdom about, in His time and in His way, and there is unfailing peace and comfort in that. For example, He has been bringing me to scripture in His word where people struggled with many of the thoughts and questions I did so now I know that I was not alone in those feelings and then He has also shown me scripture in His word that has shown me more of the Lord’s heart for His kingdom, the way He protects His children, and His powerful wrath for those that hurt His people to give me reassurance that He never abandoned me or this world. I may not have the complete knowledge yet but God is the God of Revelation and Knower of all Truths and He wants to share His knowledge with us and He has a plan and a perfect time to do so. We just don’t realize and understand the perfection of his timing until it actually happens.
I didn’t realize until Cambodia that there was a fear that I used to hold onto in all this that the Lord was ridding me of and He wanted to share it with me. It has surely been the beginning to a new realm of beautiful wisdom that I am eager for more of. In Thailand and Cambodia, I kept thinking of the word “darkness” and how everywhere we go there is a different kind of “darkness” that we face.
In Thailand, there were children being sold by their families into sex slavery and a sadness that overwhelmed the people because they constantly had to make right the mistakes they made by giving offerings to their temples and receiving blessings from the monks.
In Cambodia, there was even more that broke my heart. . . not only were children sold for sex or labor but they were taken advantage of in more ways than I ever thought possible. . . there were the kids that came up to you on the street every time you came out and everywhere you went unrelentingly saying “yum yum” which was there way for asking for food. . . or what about the kids that were used by adults for begging or pickpocketing. . . they will get money, but you know that they don’t get to keep that money; it gets taken from them and used by the adults that handle them. . . or what about the kids with disabilities that are used by their families and put out on the streets to get money. . . or even worse what about the children that are purposefully disabled by their parents so that they can make better beggars. . . or how about a nation that was ravaged by the Khmer Rouge killing millions of their own people, wiping out a quarter of their country’s population not much more than 30 years ago (the leaders of the Khmer Rouge have just recently been put on trial for their crimes, and bones from the thousands of mass graves at the killing fields throughout the country still wash up after big rains).
I used to fear that learning more of these “darknesses” would cause me to fall back into depression and that I would be consumed by hopelessness and despair for a world abandoned by God, but NO. . . those darknesses do not deserve that kind of power. The “darknesses” we experience anywhere in the world do not deserve to hold that kind of power. God is present and He is the one with power and He is the one with the only power to defeat darkness. He is Light and Light is what makes the darkness known. . . and in knowing those darknesses, there is an unfailing peace and redemption that comes from the prescence of the Lord. The Lord was present when we were there and He is still present as we are gone from there and He is present as we go into the new places.
In Cambodia, God gave me a revelation and a word that I pray I never forget. God told me, “I delivered you from darkness. You will never know darkness again. That means that no matter what darkness surrounds you in the future, it will not consume you. It will not touch you. I touch you. I consume you. I am the Light that surrounds you.”
I pray that you will know the Light of Christ that is present in this world and that God will give the revelation of His power in this to you. Psalm 23:4 says, “Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me.”
The Lord has used the chorus of the song, Oceans, by Hillsong to encourage me in this. It is as follows: “Spirit, lead me where my trust is without borders. Let me walk upon the waters wherever you would call me. Take me deeper than my feet could ever wander and my faith will be made stronger in the presence of my Savior.”
Here are some videos from my teammate, Vallory, that give a glimpse of what the Lord is doing in these places. God is shining His light through the ministries of Remember Nhu in Thailand and Bykota House in Cambodia and He is not done by any means. All is not lost even though it seems like that sometimes; God will continue to redeem this world until the end of days. Please join us in prayer for the work of the Lord in these places and as we go out into new places.
Thailand! from Vallory Moss on Vimeo.
