Hi Friends, I am sorry I haven’t been blogging lately, I have tossed around the idea of just quiting for good. I was encouraged via facebook to share a little about some of my life-changing experiences overseas.
Well, several months after Travis and I got married, we packed up everything and went to Aurora, CO to serve with Kingdom Building Ministries. It is an amazing ministry that disciples young adults and encourages them in their walk and how God desires to use them as Kingdom laborers. That summer we were supposed to go to China- but it was the year a US plane was shot down and travel warnings were issued for that country. So then we were suppoesed to go to Nepal, but a week before our team of 12 or so were about to leave, the king’s son killed the entire family and the country was under 24 hour state of emergency. So at the last minute we had to find a place to take our team and make travel arrangements and get visas etc…
Well, God was completely in the entire situation. We ended up going to Siem Reap, Cambodia. The home of Angkor Wat. We arrived and the missionary was so humble and kind and I remember our first visit, his eyes filled with tears with gratitude to God for bringing our team. It was and answer to their prayers. Our team would be such a blessing to them to help start some new works that summer. One was teaching English in a Teacher’s college, Teaching English on Floating School houses in the Tonle Sap Lake, and helping out at an Orphanage.
The poverty was unbelievable. Unlike I had ever experienced. The floating village was something very hard to describe. But I experienced something there that was unique. When we shared the gospel, they would say, “Is this true, this is good, this is good!” It gave me a new appreciation for the phrase “good news”. The floating village is on the largest lake in Asia where millions of people live in small boats, harvesting fish under thatched rafts- it is an unbelievable sight and smell. The monks rarely go out that far to these poor people.
Well, after our team taught in the schools and would visit homes/boats on the weekends, they held a gathering on land for the children and their parents. Some of the parents spoke up at the end and said, “As for some of us, we believe, but if you leave, who will tell us more.” Wow, how can you forget something like that. The reality that millions are dying without hope of Christ in some of the worst conditions in the world. It reminds me of the verse in Romans 10 that says:
How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them? 15And how can they preach unless they are sent? As it is written, “How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!”[g]
Anyways, that summer really confirmed that God had placed a special call on our family to go to those who have never heard of Jesus.
1 Comment
January 23, 2009 at 3:49 pm
I am glad you have begun to share these experiences. It is in recalling where God has led us in the past that often helps us understand where he is leading us in the future.