Walls in the journey.

I’ve been sitting at my computer for the past hour staring at this screen.

I’ve started this blog many times and have erased everything I’ve written so far. I’ve invited you to be a part of this journey with me, and to be faithful to that- I need to invite you into what is happening right now in Pattaya. But I’m not sure how to do that. I’ve hit a wall. 

God has been teaching me about walls lately. We all are on a journey and we all hit walls sometimes. Sometimes they are just minor inconveniences, and sometimes they are so massive, they seem to bring life to a complete halt.

There is a wall currently here in Pattaya, and I need share it with you.

If I was able to share with you, you will remember that part of my job has been to help Freedom Stones decide the future of the jewelry project. Through my research, opportunities explored, and input, the board of Freedom Stones has decided to close the project in Pattaya and focus solely on the site in Cambodia. So I have come back to Thailand for my last three months to help the artisan’s transition to their next steps and essentially close this site.

There have been many moments of feeling like I’m staring at a wall lately. And at the wall, many questions come:

What will the artisans do next? Will this affect their faith and trust in God’s goodness and provision?

Could I have done more? Have I failed in coming here?

What happens next for all of us?

I listened to a sermon on the walls in our journey lately, and they listed the three options we have at the wall. We can stop in fear and paralysis, we can lose hope and give up, or we can walk forward in trusting faith. The man speaking said “God’s will is for us to journey through the wall as we trust and follow Him together. We walk forward knowing He gives us victory in the end.”

So I don’t have answers to all the questions in my mind. I don’t’ have certainty about what is next, but I do continue to ask God for trusting faith….not only for myself but also for the artisans and everyone else in this journey. I ask for it for everyone who reads this.

I told you before I need you with me in this journey, and I want you to know I still do. I have a lot of questions, but I also trust that I serve a God who is in control and gives me victory. Please pray with me.  Pray with me for the artisans as they stand at the wall of uncertainty.  Pray for this wall: for the trusting faith that God is in control and is working even in situations such as these.

I also pray that in whatever wall you are currently looking at or will look at eventually- whether big or small, something difficult or maybe just uncertain- that God gives you trusting faith to continue walking forward. In Him, through His cross, we already have victory and that is the promise that never leaves regardless of what wall we face. 

Living in tension.

 Simply put, if you’re not willing to take what is dearest to you, whether plans or people, and kiss it goodbye, you can’t be my disciple. –Jesus

I read this verse while sitting in the Mumbai, India airport for 8 hours. I had just spend a month visiting family and friends in America, enjoying the beautiful PA outdoors, drinking pumpkin lattes J, and enjoying time to rest and relax. While sitting in the airport, I was surrounded by people of different nationalities, all speaking a foreign language. While this should probably be normal to me by now, it seemed to hit on a new level.

My heart was hurting as I sat in that airport. I felt like I had a place my heart was going back to, but at the same time- that meant I had to say goodbye to another life with a wonderful community of family, friends, and Church.  Honestly, I remember sitting there thinking my heart couldn’t handle it anymore. Sometimes it feels like my life is divided into separate lives and sometimes, I’m not sure how to handle that.

While sitting in the airport, I also was reading from the book “The Insanity of God.” Warning: don’t read this book if you don’t want to be convicted on many levels. The book is about two people who go to serve God in a hard place and as a result, struggle with a lot of questions.

They ask God:

Do things always work out for those who are obedient?

Does God really ask us to sacrifice- and to sacrifice everything?

What happens when our best intentions are not enough?

Is God at work in the hard places?

Is it possible to love God and to pretty much keep living the life I already have?

Would He really allow people who love Him dearly to fail?

Sitting in the airport or sitting on my floor, writing this blog, in Pattaya, I ask the same questions. I ask Jesus, why my heart has to hurt so much sometimes. I ask why He asks me to go around the world again when sometimes I fail to see the purpose, when sometimes it can feel like I’ve failed…and when sometimes it’s just hard.

But as I continued to read “The Insanity of God,” the authors didn’t just sit in the place of questions. They sought out people who know what real suffering and persecution is. They heard their stories and saw the ways God has worked through extreme suffering. They asked these people how God can be in the midst of the questions, how He can still truly be good, how their hearts can hurt so much and still trust God.  And they summarize the lesson they’ve learned this way:

Before we can grasp the full meaning of the Resurrection, we first have to witness, or experience crucifixion. If we spend our lives so afraid of suffering, then we might never discover the true wonder, joy, and power of a resurrection faith. Ironically, avoiding suffering could be the very thing that prevents us from partnering deeply with the Risen Jesus.

Talking about the followers of Jesus that they met, the authors write: They are willing to take that risk because they believe that, ultimately, good WILL defeat evil. Love WILL finally overcome hate. And life WILL conquer death forever by the power of our resurrection faith.

Now that I’m back and settling in a bit, my heart doesn’t hurt so much. I’ve stepped back into my life here:  with my friends, my job, and my routine. And my “Thailand-life” continues.

But I’ve found myself asking- is there supposed to be a struggle? Are we meant to be in the hard places, struggling to see the light so that Jesus alone is glorified? If you’re not willing to kiss goodbye what is dearest to you, you cannot be my disciple. That doesn’t necessarily mean we need to physically let go of all things with value to us. But we need to hold them with open hands.

We need to live in the tension, in the struggle, in the midst of the questions, so we can witness the crucifixion in order to experience the resurrection. 

Let's do this together. Live in the tension with me?

Last week I went to prison.

...to spend a day cleaning the cells and hallway, because no one else does. I also handed out sandwiches and water because the prisoners may not get any other food or drink while there. And while taking a break from cleaning, I played with the three little kids that are locked away simply because their moms have been arrested and they have no where else to go. 

This afternoon I went into the slum just down the road from my house and played with the children that live in houses smaller than my bedroom. I held the hand of a beautiful Cambodian teenager who doesn't attend school, doesn't speak fluently the language of the country in which she lives, and is at-risk for ending up as one of the many girls sold into the sex trade. 

And tomorrow...I board a plane to America. 

While I am more than ready and have been unable to wait for this month back home for months now, it still feels a bit strange. 

Our world is full of contradictions. We have poverty sitting alongside immense wealth. We have people living in slums at night and working at day to build high-rise condominiums. We have children and women in the bondage of slave labor so that people overseas can buy the shirts they make. 

And I actually have a choice to leave a place where many people would give everything to have that chance. 

I thank Jesus that He has given me the choice. 

But I also sit with Him and talk to Him about how to deal with this world of contradiction we live in. 

Please pray with me to have eyes that see the hard contradictions surrounding us. And lets talk together about it. 

Also, please pray for me while I'm home- pray for a month that is restful, but also filled with opportunity to share with others. 

I would love to share more with you, so if you would be willing: please come to hear me share on April 7th in Pottstown, PA. I will post more details in the next few weeks but please....mark it down! I would love to share with you : )

Let's get uncomfortable.

"Our job is to expose injustice so it becomes so uncomfortable that people have to respond."

I heard this quote spoken last weekend at a conference for people ministering in the urban setting. There were 200 of us gathered in Bangkok together to pray, discuss, and share about God's heart for the city. His desire for justice, hope, peace, and joy in a place where girls spend their youth believing they will simply grow up to sell their body on the streets, where boys hide in alleys sniffing glue, where men refuse to become fathers, and women live their entire lives believing they have no worth.

We discussed these areas of darkness and pain, but we also shared the seeds of hope: the places where Gods light has shown forth because His children refused to look away anymore.

We visited the Klong Toey slum in Bangkok, the oldest and largest slum, where about 100,000 people call home. It was a visit that my mind will not forget, with pictures of people crammed into places like I have seen before. But I also won't forget the glimpses of hope-

Like this family- who can now have a substantial income from making and selling sushi, after receiving a micro-loan from a couple who refused to turn away:

And the glimpse of home found within this coffee shop, located in the slum, employing their neighbors and providing a safe place to come:

Another quote I heard this weekend was that ministry, bringing hope to people, "is all about relationship. Mission in the city has to be personal. We have to know names. It's about building friendship."

We do projects well. We plan out-reaches and kid's programs, we raise money for good causes, we even collect food and clothes for those in need. But do we live a lifestyle of valuing relationship, of being available?

I confess: I don't.

I do my work and ministry when it is time, but outside of that time, I still walk quickly on the street past the woman and her baby who sit begging in the same spot day after day. Maybe giving money isn't the best answer and maybe I don't know what is, but I can still ask her name. She is worth that.

An, my friend from the Klong Toey slum, is worth that.

And you know the funny thing? The quote at the beginning of this entry was said by Shane Claiborne...from Philadelphia.

He wasn't talking as someone who has come overseas to minister in the slums. He is a guy that refused to look away to people with names down the street from him...in America.

So I'll ask you the same thing he asked us this weekend: "What would it look like if God's kingdom came into your neighborhood? And are you willing to let Him use you to do that?"

A Christmas like no other.

On Christmas Eve, instead of going to a beautiful candlelight service and coming home to read “A Night Before Christmas,” I was in a hotel room watching the one TV channel available in English and eating chips from a shack down the road.  And on Christmas morning, instead of waking up to the white snow covering the ground, I woke up to the sandy beach and crystal clear water of Thailand. And finally, while I usually would be resting after opening presents with family with “A Christmas Story” playing 24/7 in the background, I was looking for an internet signal so that I could Skype with a few family members and friends.

While it didn’t feel like that much of a sacrifice to be sitting on the beautiful sunny beach instead of at home in the snow, the reality of living in Thailand did hit me as I missed my family, friends, and Christmas traditions. Yet God blessed me immensely by sending my mom to me to celebrate Christmas, experience my life in Thailand, and simply to love me by spoiling me with nights at hotels with comfortable beds, cheeseburgers, and gifts from America.

So honestly…the reality of my first Christmas away from home hit me a bit later after I was back on my own, getting ready to start back at work. Actually, the reality of everything hit me…hard.

I wanted to go back to my nice Christmas vacation, laying in a hammock staring out at the ocean, forgetting about my daily life in Thailand.

Really, I just wanted to hide.

I wanted to hide from the darkness I feel as I walk down the street. I wanted to hide from the fact that there are thousands of girls and boys selling their bodies not far from me as I go to sleep at night, many of which have no choice. I wanted to hide from the fact that there are slums just walking distance away from where I live in my comparatively nice comfortable house. I wanted to shut my eyes and ears from the families sitting in prison, because they have been trafficked into Thailand and now stuck with no proper documentation and no country wanting to take responsibility.

And more than anything, I wanted to hide from the fact that I feel so hopeless in the midst of it all. I didn’t want to face the fact that I’ve been here for over 5 months now and still feel like there is so much more I could be doing.I wanted to close my eyes and escape the pain and and feelings of guilt.

But then God pointed me back to the cross….and spoke over me:

It is enough.

He is enough.

As we just celebrated: Jesus Christ, came as a baby to save this world of lost, broken, and hurting people. And His sacrifice is enough.

Do I always see the reason that I’m here? Do I always feel like I’ve made a difference or that I have a purpose here? No. But has God called me here? Yes.

And that is enough.

Let me share with you some of the ways we remembered that this Christmas season here in Pattaya: 

Treating our artisans to a special lunch out for Christmas.

Christmas party in the slum. 

Christmas caroling. 

Sharing the Christmas story...notice who had the privilege of being Mary ; )

The line-up for receiving packages of cookies: I've never seen kids so excited over cookies for Christmas. 

Spend this year with me remembering that: He is enough. 

Turkey and stuffing: Thai style.

This past week was Thanksgiving. 

And yes, even here in Thailand, us Americans gathered around a long table filled with the massive amounts of mashed potatoes, stuffing, green beans, sweet potatoes, and miraculously...even turkey! Like usual, I ate too much and still have leftovers in my fridge. The holiday continued as I spent hours online yesterday looking at the Black Friday deals, as my friends and family in America fought over parking spots and big screen tvs. And even this afternoon, I hung up my strand of Christmas lights and package of ornaments in my room. 

It's that time of year. 

But this year is different. I sat in my pajamas drinking coffee as I skyped into my family's Thanksgiving dinners. As I shopped for Black Friday, I was sitting in a t-shirt and shorts staring at my computer screen. And no matter how much I believe it will happen, when I walk outside there is no crisp cool air and leaves on the ground. 

It seems unsatisfying at times. It's ironic actually. This holiday meant to be a time of thanks and gratitude has made me even more aware of the unfulfilled desires I have. Instead of resting in the blessings I have been given, my mind has been listing the many things that I don't have this year. 

But it's going to stop. Because although I may be thousands of miles away from so many friends and family, sweating while eating turkey leftovers, and missing out on waking up at 3am to wear an elf hat and join masses of other crazy people...

I am blessed. 

...in enormous ways. 

So while my "What I'm thankful for this year" list may be a bit different, here it is. 

Thank you, Jesus for new friends.

Thank you for Your light that overcomes the darkness. 

Thank you for a week of Pattaya Praise- to gather in this city and sing your praise. 

Thank you that Our God is Greater.

Thank you for parties in the slums and new ways to celebrate this holiday. 

Thank you for adorable little faces.

Thank you that rain will never stop the fun. 

Thank you Jesus, that while things feel unfamiliar and even lonely at times, You are enough. Thank you that you alone are enough to fulfill all my heart's desires.

"For such a time as this."

I've been working on this blog for about a week now...well sort of...

You see I came back from Chiangmai about a week ago (a northern part of Thailand) and it had been two weeks full of learning, meeting new people, and God revealing to me so many things. I came back to Pattaya excited and ready for new things and at the same time, drained and running on empty.   I also came back to a week of more interviews with Freedom Stones, a broken shower, no Internet, one less usable bathroom in my house, a week straight of massive thunderstorms and rain, oh and new hole in the ceiling in the middle of my room, which worked out really nice with the rain. 

It felt like a whirlwind. 

It's a new week and some of the parts of my house have been fixed. But I still don't have Internet and the interviews are still coming. This week is also Pattaya Praise: a week of worship throughout the city, with 20 teams coming from around the world to join. 

It still feels a bit like a whirlwind. 

But its has felt a little different lately. I'm not sure why or even how to explain it, but God has given me a new sense of trust in His timing. 

I watched a movie about Queen Esther on Friday. Esther is selected as one of the many women whom the king can select to marry. She goes through months of preparation, months of gaining the king's trust, and then finally she is given the chance to sacrifice her life for her people, the Jews. Esther has been taken from her home, separated from everyone she loves, been forced into a situation where she feels like an outsider, and then is told she must risk her life to stop the massacre of the Jews. 

When being told of the choice before her, she is told: "Who knows? Maybe you were made Queen for such a time as this." 

Maybe she went through those months of  spa treatments, reading before the king, missing her family...for such a time as this. A time to put her life on the line and save her people. 

"A time as this" was not a time for an insignificant task. It was big. It was a history making event. 

I've learned a lot lately. God has poured new information into me, introduced me to new people, broken my heart many times over the injustice and hurt around me...sometimes it still feels like a whirlwind. 

Perhaps one day...in a few weeks, months, years....I will hear "Kelly, you were appointed for such a time as this." 

Timing seems to be everything. Perhaps now it is my time to learn, soak in culture, gain wisdom, and sometimes do without Internet or a working shower. But I do know I am so excited for the day when for "such a time as this" comes. Right now I will rest in the timining of now. 

Maybe your "such a time as this" hasn't come. Maybe it still feels like a whirlwind. 

Rest with me in this time. Because honestly, I've been putting this blog off for a week now and I'm still not sure if what I've written really makes sense. I don't know entirely what is happening. I don't have the answers about the future.

I am just resting in what is now. Let's wait for "such a time as this" together.

So while this didn't share much about my time in Chiangmai, here are some pictures of while I was there : )