Hello everyone!
This week I was able to start working - and I just jumped right in. Sunday night a World Race team arrived. 35 people were on the squad that came in, and they were split into teams to work in different areas of Lighthouse in Action. I don't know a lot about World Race, but if you're interested in finding out more you can check out their website here: www.theworldrace.org I have a group of 7 living with me that will focus on working with Love Acts in the red light district, and with kids in the slums.
The core purpose of Love Acts - showing the love of Jesus through actions.
Working with the team, getting them moved into my house, and figuring out what my ministry times were going to look like - along with language lessons, and graphic design work in the afternoons created a busy week for me. Tuesday I celebrated my 26th birthday in Thailand. Complete with coffee, Thai lessons, dinner with new friends, FaceTiming with friends from home, and a birthday cake. It was a good day :)
Wednesday night I was able to go out with Bethsaida again to the red-light district to work with the kids. When we meet with the kids we pick a spot that has decent lighting in front of a store, or business that's closed for the night. When we arrived on Wednesday we found that in the spot we had chosen the week before a new bar had opened up, and there was no place for us to meet with the kids. As we walked down the street, we found a new spot, and we sat and waited. After half an hour of sitting, no kids had come down the street. Eventually we looked up and saw one of the boys we had spent time with last week walking down the street. He came running over and sat with us for a few minutes, excitedly asking if it was time for gifts yet because he wanted shoes. Looking down, he walks the streets with bare feet every night. We explained we would have them in three weeks, and he smiled and wanted to learn more letters and animals in English.
Wednesday night that one little boy is the only kid we saw. As we were walking back to our bikes Bethsaida looked over and said, "The only thing that's predictable about this work, is that it's unpredictable." And I was starting to understand what she meant by that.
Thursday night we were back out in the red-light waiting for more kids. This time it was almost an hour that went by until we saw one little girl come around the corner with her mom. She came running over and sat with us, excited to learn. As I taught her the alphabet, Bethsaida began talk to the girls mom. After they left it was almost 11pm. Bethsaida had found out that the boys she had connected with, whom we hadn't seen, had been moved to sell flowers in a different area, but she wasn't sure where. We decided to try and go find the boys to reconnect with them. We searched for quite awhile, but weren't able to find them last night.
So this is what my ministry is looking like at the moment. It's not looking for spectacular things. It's allowing the love of Jesus to shine into a kids life - even if it's just one kid when I go out. It's still worth it. As I prepare to go out tonight - thankful that my cold is on the mend, and that it's not raining - I can only pray that God brings the kids that need it the most today. And maybe even leads me to find the boys that have been moved.
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