Ministry in Malaysia. Oh what a challenge it has been. I’m struggling even deciding where to begin. In my last blog, I told you about the 15 beautiful girls that we get to live with at the foster home. However, I didn’t tell you about our team challenges, Auntie, or what ministry looks like.
Let’s start with team challenges. We got to Malaysia, trying not to have expectations, but let’s face it; we had just left Thailand: the land flowing with milk and honey. We had air conditioning and a whole five-story house to ourselves. We were a block away from a mall and had a contact from America. To put it frankly, we were spoiled. We arrived to Malaysia and found out that our boys would be living in a home two streets away with 13 foster boys. We also realized that there was no air conditioning or house to ourselves. Oh, and the food was similar to that of India. No one was too ecstatic about that. However, the biggest hurdle for our team has been the separation. We’ve lived in community for three months; it’s hard to have that taken away. We’ve been here a week now and still aren’t used to it, but we have found ways to get together and try to maintain as much community as possible.
Number two: Auntie. Auntie Elaine is our house mom at the girl’s home. She is in charge of 15 girls, add us in and she has 19 girls to take care of. This woman has got to be under some stress. Well, actually, it’s very obvious that she’s under some stress. It’s a difficult job. She has to get the girls up in the morning at 5:30, make them breakfast, get them into the van to go to home school, teach the home school, orchestrate snack time before finishing school, get them back home in the van, get lunch together, then maybe have time for a nap before she starts on dinner. She’s been doing this since February, and if I were in her position, I think that I would already be a little burned out. Kids are a lot of work.
With that being said, Malaysia is very culturally different from America in its parenting style. This is the thing about Auntie that has come as the biggest shock. Malaysia doesn’t have an issue with beating children if the child has done something wrong. It’s awful, and it’s shocking. When Josi told one of the girls about this cultural difference, she told her that in America if parents beat their children they go to prison. The Malaysian girl responded, if that was a law in Malaysia, there would be no parents. It breaks my heart that a whole generation is being brought up by a generation that has probably been brought up to beat your children to get them to behave. Even in a Christian foster home. Where is God in that? I think the parents of Malaysia need some Holy Spirit parenting because it’s just not right.
Finally, I want to address our ministry for the month. Apart from working as a team to build community in a place that is not conducive to it and to loving the foster girls through the abuse and pain, we have set ministry with the church here. In the morning, we split into three separate groups to go do ministry. Josi and I teach at the home school while Ashley and Jessica help Pastor in the church office and Garrett and Michael help do manly jobs like moving sheet metal and work outside. For me, teaching in the school has been challenging and rewarding. The first week, I had two Sri Lankan refugee girls and a Malaysian girl. The second week I had a class of boys who were supposed to be on break from school but had been sent to home school instead. I will continue to teach the three girls the rest of the month. I’m enjoying using my degree in English to teach them grammar and sentence structure. I also teach them basic math, like calculus and trigonometry. Just kidding. They have made it to algebra though.
Although this list is definitely not an exhaustive list of what has been going on in Malaysia, I hope this gives you a better idea of the month so far. Please pray for our team as we are learning how to love through tough situations.
Thanks for reading!
