Week 5 - Searching for the Wrong-Eyed Jesus

Early last week, Jeff led devotions in the morning and asked us to read from James, chapters 3 and 4. In the midst of what Luther called the "Epistle of Straw," I found firm, gospel ground. I decided to take 3:56 to 4:10 and make a poem. I'm interested to know what someone else might come up with, so if you like, make your own and post it as comment. This was mine:

How great the fire
set by my tongue;
the world of iniquity untamable.
bitter jealousy, selfish ambition
arrogant liar: earthly, natural, demonic.
Disorder and evil; violence for pleasure.
lusting without having
envy without obtaining
Enemy of God

But...

Greater the grace.
Submitting to God.
Resisting the Devil.
Drawing near.
Clean your hands.
Purify your hearts.
Humble yourself.
He will exalt you.

Luther, that brilliant theologian, was also sometimes a blind, uninspired oaf. We are equiped by God's mercies, by His Grace. What I like about the passage is that everything flips after "but." "But," here, is the Cross, that great hinge of history on which everything depends.

This last week, we began our ministry on the street and inside/outside the bars. The organizer of the MST project, which is aimed among visiting, foreign men, has not yet returned to Bangkok, and so the men stayed behind Tuesday night to pray for the women on our team who ministered to the women in the bars. None of the girls would give me a very full account, but I do believe they felt somewhat overwhelmed by the darkness of the place.

On Wednesday, I joined Melanie and Tim--Emily was really sick--on the street to minister to speak with those begging. I directed only one conversation myself. Though I used only the most elementary of phrases, I was surprised at how well my Thai flowed. Tim met a man later on and we all sat down to dinner. The man added so many chili flakes to his noodle soup that the broth turned blood red. I took this as a personal challenge and attempted to keep pace with him, drastically reducing my ability to taste things later.

The greater part of our walk is down a dark, lonely section of Sukhumvit Rd. The beggars are often isolated and we only rarely encounter loud American women or a Thai man enthusiastically trying to sell me a suit--they believe the quickest route to this goal is by calling me something familiar in my own tongue, like "homie." When we reached the downtown district of Nana, however, the scene changed. It glowed with pink neon and was crowded with white men. Nana is where the party is. It's where the prostitution and slavery is. And it's where Anne is.

I call her Anne because I don't think it appropriate to use her real name. Anne is one of four or five children. The Hupes first noticed her mother begging on the street a few months ago and have since established a good relationship with the family. Good enough that Tim and Amy visited them at their Bangkok home just a couple of weeks ago. The problem with last Wednesday, when I first met Anne, is that her mom was not around. This was a new situation, Anne and her sisters being on Nana alone, and not a welcome one. When we arrived, a tall, foreign man was twirling her and lifting her into the air. I now had a front row seat to the Hupe's vision for ministry. Anne is maybe ten. Her sisters about fifteen and seventeen. They are in the Nana district every night, selling goods, literally feet away from a ceaseless industry of sexual exploitation. It doesn't get more "at risk" than that. We talked to Anne and her sisters for a bit, bought her some durian, watched her for about fifteen minutes. Then we left, helpless, knowing Anne would be there until dawn.

Prayer requests:

--that the women on our team would find a new boldness and joy in the midst of a dark place. Christ is the one true light and I want the women to have a courage that comes from knowing this, a courage that evil will find truly frightening.

--that Anne and her sisters would be able to leave the streets immediately. Pray for an opportunity to speak the gospel into their lives that would lead to this. In the meantime, be in prayer any time during the day. Know that at any hour in your work day - 9 to 5 - Anne and her sisters are spending their night in Nana. Pray the deeds of evil men would be frustrated.