Encouraging News about Bangkok
Well, I promised to share some of the great things God is doing in Bangkok the next time I blogged – so here goes…
Earlier today I shared my trip to Bangkok and Cambodia at church. The enemy hit me so hard – it was crazy… as soon as I finished sharing, I was bombarded with accusing thoughts, such as “You did terrible, you didn’t glorify God at all, you didn’t say anything you were supposed to say and said a bunch of stuff you shouldn’t have… on and on and on.
It was so bad that I was almost in tears! I’m not exactly sure why – and I knew that the thoughts were not of God… but to be honest, I’ve been sick with the flu all week and haven’t picked up my bible but maybe once or twice… so I also had thoughts like, “You are so lame – how can you stand up and speak when you haven’t even read your bible – you shouldn’t speak…” it was so bad that I actually had a thought, “I’m never going to speak in public again…”
Now I have had those types of thoughts before – but never as bad as today. Crazy. I don’t know why it was worse today than any other time… except right after I got back from Bangkok. Trip.
But praise God, after church I had a few people approach me and say that they were encouraged by what I shared… I almost felt like crying tears of relief. It’s weird – sometimes I feel pretty ‘confident’ when I’m going to speak – which probably isn’t good – because my confidence must only be in the Lord… but I think it’s much ‘easier’ sharing my testimony because it’s just my life – events that happened to me… whereas today I wanted to share some ‘factual’ events and statistics… and I had a slide show of pictures from Bangkok and Cambodia – and they didn’t sync with what I was talking about… it was actually pretty funny (I later heard from friends) – like I was talking about prostitutes, and the pictures from the Genocide Museum came up of human skulls and instruments of torture… ! Distracting.
Anyway – what I really wanted to share was about how God is moving in Thailand and Cambodia – the awesome ministries that are reaching out to women and children enslaved in the sex industry… in Thailand – Nightlight www.nightlightbangkok.org who go to the bars and talk to the women workers and mamasans, developing relationships with them and letting them know about their program where they can be housed and be taught a trade, have a paid job making jewelry.
Nightlight houses anywhere from 75-80 women on a regular basis. They even have a women who was a mamasan in one of the bars. They don’t require that the girls be Christian – but they do require that the girls go to daily bible study, church and hear the Word. So, it’s only a matter of time… I’ve seen Annie and Jeff Dieselberg in action and they are both amazing people. Like I said in one of my other blogs – Annie is the most humble, meek, firecracker I’ve ever met.
Then there is a place called “The Well” – they are very similar to Nightlight – they house the women and teach them a trade – jewelry – they also have a hair salon and also make beautiful greeting cards.
In Cambodia there are numerous ministries to women and children – White Lotus, Daughters of Cambodia, Chab Dai www.chabdai.org and Hagar International. www.hagarproject.org
God is doing amazing things through these ministries. I was so blessed to see what they are doing to help these women. I do hear of a lot of organizations that are anti-sex trafficking and I think what they do is great – but if their main objective isn’t to lead people to true freedom and salvation in Jesus Christ – what’s the point? Honestly – the devil doesn’t even care if people stop sexing, drugging, pimping, thieving etc. – as long as they’re still going to hell…
So I hesitate ‘endorsing’ any organization unless I have had some personal experience or contact with them… Nightlight is probably the only ministry that I spent enough time with to really say anything besides God is really moving there, and Annie and the Nightlight team love Jesus and love the women they reach out to. Spending time at the other ministries we visited were amazing as well… but honestly, by the time we visited the ministries in Cambodia, I was kinda burned out. That sounds horrible, but we did SO MUCH in such a short amount of time – the last place we went to I actually had to FIGHT to keep my eyes open. (the forth one in one day) I felt so bad, I was so tired… like my brain was on overload, ready to shut down.
I wanted to absorb everything, but didn’t remember much except that as far as I could see – they were doing a LOT to help get the women out of the sex industry, or helped prevent children and young girls from getting trafficked. As far as all of their main objective being that the girls come to know Jesus – I’m not sure…but I’m pretty sure they were all Christian organizations. I encourage you to look up their web sites – I couldn’t find one for White Lotus and Daughters of Cambodia though. Regardless, God is using all of these organizations to help a lot of women and children. There was a lot discussed about the business side of things, so that’s probably why my mind wandered a lot.
Anyways, I’m just being honest. Sounds pretty lame, but it’s true. I think if we had our schedule in Cambodia spread out more – I would have remembered more. But we only had two days to do everything – so I’m very grateful for what we were able to do in such a short amount of time. I definitely want to go back to Cambodia again, and stay for at least a week.
One other thing I wanted to share today (that I didn’t) was that across the street from the hotel we stayed at in Bangkok, there was a beautiful park. It was put there by a man who used to be a brothel owner who got saved! It’s so cool, because on one of the entrance walls, in gold letters – it reads, “Dedicated to the Lord Jesus Christ” 29th day of August 2005 “To God be the Glory”
That is so encouraging, and a testimony of God’s working in Thailand and the sex industry.
All in all, today went pretty well – considering yesterday I didn’t even think I’d be able to make it to church I was so sick. I had a fever and was in bed all day. But I had asked a few people to please pray for me and I know that God answered their prayers. I am so grateful for the people He has put in my life – and for Daryl, my husband. I know he was praying for me the whole time I was speaking.
I probably sound like kind of a dork sharing about a lot of this stuff, but oh well. I am so so so grateful for my Pastor – cause every time I share with him some of the stupid accusing thoughts I have and how lame I feel – he shares that he sometimes has the same kinds of thoughts about himself. And he’s amazing – he is so anointed, the way he knows and preaches/teaches the Word of God, ‘raw’ and real… to know that he also feels lame and beats himself up somehow helps me not feel like such a weirdo. He is so humble and transparent… not afraid to share his weaknesses, never tries to act like he’s someone he’s not. He preaches the Word so that no one can continue going to church and remain “comfortable”. I need that. I think we all do, if we want to grow.
God is so good, and I know that I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be. 
Thank You Jesus!
