Week 2 in Thailand

Welcome back!!

I was a little late getting my first newsletter out, so this one should be a lot shorter because I am not trying to cover as much material, but no promises. Sometimes I get carried away with my typing :)

A few disclaimers I should have made a while ago: 1) I format these newsletters for reading on a computer, so I realized that if you are reading on your phone, its probably all funky and I am so sorry about that! I’m going to work on that!

2) I have a new SIM card for my phone here, and therefore a whole new Thailand phone number, so if you have tried to text me and I have seemingly ignored you, I am so sorry, I just never got the message. If you would like to talk with me, you can message me through email, social media, or on What’s App (585) 530-7219.

3) I am going to use nicknames when talking about the Thai friends I am making, just as a way to honor their privacy, but still providing some details for you all so that you can better be praying and supporting them!

This week the new short term team arrived and they are AMAZING. They are all students or recent graduates from Simpson University in California, and the way we have bonded with them has been wild. They truly felt like family even after just a few short days. It has been such a breath of fresh air to work with them and I am so thankful for the friendships we have built.

Sunday (June 9th)

Afterwards, we went to church at Deeper Life, which has their service later in the afternoon. Jack, one of the short term team members shared his testimony which was so powerful. Through that, one of the girls who has been involved in our church circle for about 8 months, decided to give her life to the Lord. I’ll be talking about her a lot more, but for the sake of privacy, I’m only going to refer to her as G.

We talked as a team about how for Thai people, the decision to follow Jesus comes at a high cost, often bringing with it tension with family and friends. In Thai culture, to be Thai means to be Buddhist, even though a lot of the people are not strict practicing Buddhists. There are people who have been in the church circle for over a decade now who still haven’t made that important step to personally accept Jesus. With that in mind, I am so grateful that God used Jack’s story and brought G into His family, and that I had the ability to be here for it; to see the fruit of other people’s labor. It was a refreshing reminder, that even the small relationships we as interns are forming now, might come to fruition 8 months, 2 years, or maybe even longer, but that our labor is never in vain.

After church, the congregation all shared a meal together, and then a lot of us hung around the coffee shop, talked and played games. As an extravert, that people time filled me up so much and was a perfect start to my week.

Monday

Even more than the actual activity, I loved the time we had in the car on the way there. Two of the Thai’s met us there, but we got to drive with one of them (I’ll call her M) and she was so open to talking about her culture and her faith. As of right now, she is not yet a believer, but she has done a lot of research on Christianity, and is close friends with G. She was telling me how she was happy that G found peace through knowing God and becoming a Christian.

In that hour long car ride I also learned so much about Thai culture, and M gave a really good example of the differences between Western and Thai culture. She said “as Westerners, you are taught to ask questions and think outside the box. It’s not that we are taught to think inside the box, we aren’t even taught that there is a box.” This phrase really helped me understand the Thai culture more, and why it seems like so many people are “passively” living their lives. It also explains more why it is so hard for Thai people to decide to follow Jesus, since they aren’t taught to ask questions or to think against the grain of everyone else. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, just a cultural difference between what I am used to and now what I am running into.

Num, Oui, and M also talked about the fact that a guilt-innocence based gospel message will not be effective with Thai people. Buddhists believe in the cycle of reincarnation, and that it will only be ended when you reach nirvana. However, they still do believe in hell, but that it is just a temporary place where you experience more suffering for the negative things you did during life. Because of this temporary view of hell, it doesn’t scare Thai people when Christians say “if you do not believe in Jesus, you will go to hell.” To them, that is just a temporary thing. What will resonate however is an honor-shame approach, representing the gospel by highlighting that our sin brings shame on us, but that instead of needing to strive to restore honor, Jesus came and bore all of the shame to gift us the honor of knowing God personally. This whole conversation was so cool to me because this idea of guilt-innocence, vs. honor-shame was something I learned about in the classroom this semester and then I was getting to see how it plays out in real life.

Tuesday

We were able to walk around one of the large local temples and spend about 20 minutes observing and praying. I was really expecting to feel a spiritual heaviness and darkness, but I personally didn’t feel that, although other members of my team definitely did. What really hit me was a sense of overwhelming gratitude for my salvation. We saw so many people bringing incense and flowers to golden statues, and all I could think was how grateful I was that my God is not stationary in a temple, waiting for me to come to him, but that He is active and on the move! That He came down to Earth in the form of a human! That He already crossed the divide to bring us close to Him! I don’t know if I have ever grasped the weight of that until I saw people desperately seeking help from a man made golden statue. But, wow, what freedom I have in Christ! I was also so grateful for the long term team here and all of the other believers who are actively working to push back the darkness and claim ground for Christ. That there are people who are daily walking, clothed in the armor of God, and showing His love to the lost and broken!

Wednesday

One of the ministries that Deeper Life partners with is Rahab, an organization that is seeking to help women leave sex work, by providing community and alternative means of employment. We were able to go to their office and learn more about the various programs they have, some of the challenges they are facing and also the difference they have been making. One of the main things that they do is have volunteers go into the bars, buy the girls soda and sit and talk with them. It isn’t the flashy and dramatic taking girls out of prostitution that we often think of, but it does make a difference. For a lot of the bars, the girls earn comission on each drink they sell, so when we as volunteers come in and buy soda, we not only are helping the girl financially in a non-expolitative way, but we are also taking their time, so that is a few less hours that they are available for other purchases. Many of the girls who have come out of the bars through Rahab’s work now have their own businesses, so we bought crepes and smoothies from their small businesses as a way of supporting them.

This past week I had church small group scheduled for the same time, which meant I was unable to go into the bars, so I still have limited knowledge on how it plays out throughout the night. However, some of the team was able to go in to talk with the girls and the rest of the team was able to walk through the red light neighborhoods and pray over them. Hearing their stories and takeaways from that night during the debrief were heavy, as their hearts were breaking at the injustice and exploitation that were taking place. The statistics on sex tourism in Thailand are absolutely shocking, and it is devestating to realize the large scale scope of the industry. It sounds weird, but I am looking forward to being able to learn more in the coming weeks and be able to volunteer with Rahab. As I do, I will share more on Rahab and their work. If you are interested, you can visit their website to learn more in the meantime.

The Rest of the Week

On Thursday we were able to travel about 3 hours out of the city to go to an Elephant Sanctuary. I can’t even begin to describe what a cool experience this was, but also the way it refreshed my soul. I didn’t realize how much I needed to get out of the city for a second and just experience being in nature, surrounded by mountains. While the elephants were super cool, my favorite moment was swimming in the river. Someone on the team said that this river was what they think David meant in Psalm 23- “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters. He restores my soul…” Sitting in the water, I couldn’t help but be filled with gratitude for the Good Shepherd, and for the fact that He has led me here, at this time.

On Friday we had our final debrief with the team, which is a much longer discussion about the entire week and our takeaways, and then in the evening we hosted another game night. This time the theme was Hollywood, so all week Ella (another intern) and I worked on decorations, and it was so fun to watch it all come together. These game nights are a great way for the church to connect with new people and kickstart some relationship forming. The night was a huge success and we had quite a few new people come who had been invited by the Simpson team, which was a huge win.

The weekend started with a visit to Chatuchak Market, which is one of the world’s largest weekend markets, and then we were able to connect with Thai friends in the afternoon for coffee and dinner. It was so much fun getting to form deeper relationships with this particular Thai friend group that I met for the first time last week. On our way back to the apartment that night, things went from 0-100 really quickly, and all of us interns found ourselves unreasonably irritated and frustrated, over small little things that usually would not matter. It was the first moment I’ve had here that was just overall negative and unpleasant, but it gave us a real taste for what long term work is like. It isn’t all glamorous and fun, there are annoying moments just like life at home. I am so grateful for Emma and Liberty (two of the other interns), and the way we were able to all work together well, verbally process the night, and end up laughing. On Sunday we had church in the morning, followed by another meal and more fellowship with the community, and then we ended the night with rooftop volleyball as a last hurrah before the Simpson team left Monday morning.

Praises!

• Praise God for G’s salvation and the celebration of seeing another person come into the body of Christ!

• The way that we were able to click so fast with the Simpson team and form such deep friendships. God is working in each of their lives in such cool ways and it was a privilege to get to have a glimpse of that

• Continued feelings of peace and contentment being here. I think I anticipated feeling one extreme or the other about living here, and instead I have just felt consistently content and comfortable.

• Again, the huge praise of the other interns I get to work with and the way they both challenge and comfort me

• Praise God for the fact that He is already at work here, in the Buddhist communities, in the red light districts, in church communities, in universities and so much more!

Prayer Requests!

• Pray for G, as her decision to follow Jesus is just the beginning of the rest of her walk. Pray that as a church family, we can continue to support her and invest in her, and that God would continue to draw her closer to His heart.

• Pray for M, that she would continue to be curious about Christianity and have the boldness to ask questions and to believe.

• Pray for the Thai people that are still lost, and feel the weight of needing to earn favor from their gods. Pray that they can find the freedom and joy that comes with knowing that Jesus came to us, even in our shame, and bought us honor.

• Pray for the women working in the Red Light districts, and the Rahab volunteers who are daily confronting the injustice that is occuring.

  • I would also love prayers for me as I prepare my heart to go into the neighborhoods this week and witness some of the disgusting things that go on. Pray that even in those dark places, the light and love of Jesus would shine in me.

• Both Liberty and I got sick this week, so pray for fast recovery and that we would be able to rest well and get back to 100% soon. Pray that even while we are sick, we would not whine and complain, but that we would find our strength in God.

As you probably noticed, gratitude was a huge trend this week for me. I am just blown away by the goodness of God despite how undeserving I am. Part of that is being so thankful for the fact that I am even here in the first place, and that I have a community back home praying for me and supporting me. Thank you so much!

With gratitude,

Kaitlyn