After a couple of days of debriefing our first month in Asia, we’re on to ministry in Thailand! (Our fifth country of six already – how can it be???) This time around I’m with Team 1 Accord (Tanner, Noah, Alexa, Yu-Mei, and Bella) in Chiang Mai. We’re serving with a ministry called Bella Goose – a cafe/coffee shop business ministry that, among other things, provides a safe and sustainable work environment for people facing all kinds of difficulties in life. (You can learn more about Bella Goose here.) Through BG, we’ve been connected with a bunch of different ministries across the city to serve with during our time here! This means that our weeks are fairly interesting, as each day tends to have us in a different location.
Here’s what a typical week will look like for us!
SUNDAY: Sabbath rest day. Whether you see it as the week ending or starting with rest, either way, rest is essential!
MONDAY: Adventure/ATL day – an opportunity to further explore the city, go on a nearby adventure or excursion, or just rest some more before the week kicks into gear! As always, the freedom of this day is an opportunity to intentionally engage with the people around us and point them to Christ as we explore: a further way to be ever “living on mission”.
TUESDAY: For the team, this is one of two days at a children’s home which we get to serve at as a children’s ministry opportunity. For me as a raised-up squad leader, this is our “squad leader day” where I’ll hop on a call with our leadership in the States and check in/connect intentionally with my co-leader, Josie, among other responsibilities.
WEDNESDAY: Our second day for the week at the children’s home, where we’ll play with the kids (both inside and outside playtime are involved here – unless it’s raining. It is rainy season here after all 😉) as well as teach a lesson and do an activity! Tuesdays focus on history and geography, while Wednesdays focus on reading and writing. The kids at the home are in an environment where both English and Thai are spoken, so we get to converse easily with them despite not knowing the local language – a blessing for sure 😊
THURSDAY: We stick around Bella Goose to help out with part of their job-preparedness/life training nonprofit program. We get to help research and collect material for future training curriculums – which may not sound exciting, but in reality, it’s the ground level of life transformations yet to come through these programs in the future!
FRIDAY: We help with projects and manual labor around Bella Goose and their partners’ properties – from painting to, well, so far it’s just been painting. 😂 But who knows what the next weeks will bring!
SATURDAY: After a 45 minute ride to another part of the city, we spend the day at a different children’s ministry, another children’s home/shelter, where we get to hang out with the kids, do activities, play games, teach Bible lessons, worship together, and so on! Our first time there included sharing our testimonies and praying for the kids – which is huge because even though the program is Christian, many of the kids come from Buddhist backgrounds. So they get to hear about the love of Jesus through this ministry that ends up meeting practical and spiritual needs!
Thailand is a majority Buddhist country, and in many ways it feels spiritually oppressive, with idols, temple structures, and spirit houses lining the streets. It’s easy to get overwhelmed or desensitized to the ever-present idolatry and overall spiritual attacks. But we have the privilege of getting to live and serve and love here for the next month or so, because the Lord has brought us here – and it’s His love, His truth, His Name that breaks every chain. Though we may not always be able to immediately see it, the victory is the Lord’s, here and everywhere. Hallelujah!
Some photos from our first forays into Chiang Mai:
ขอบคุณ (Khap khun kha) (thank you) for reading!
