Hey everyone!!
So I’ve officially been in Cambodia for about a week and a half. Travelling from the US to Cambodia was a lot harder than I thought it would be. We left on Saturday the 14th and had a nine and a half hour, overnight flight to Istanbul, Turkey. In my head, the easiest way to transition from time zones was to stay awake the first flight and sleep pretty much the rest of our traveling days. Looking back, that definitely wasn’t the best idea. I muscled through the first overnight flight, and to be honest, I was pretty much dead the rest of our travel days. We landed in Turkey and I slept through our two hour layover; we had another nine hour flight to Thailand and I slept the whole time; then we had a twelve hour layover. Most people in my squad took that time to go out to Thailand and get a preview before we go back in December. I stayed in the airport, watched a movie, walked around and got coffee and food. We then had an hour flight to Phnom Phen, Cambodia and went to a hostel to stay the night (I’ll add pictures at the bottom, we were sleeping in a room that fit 18 people). The next day we drove about six hours and dropped off one of our teams in the city they would be doing ministry, and arrived in Siem Reap at New Day New Life, which is the ministry that I will work with for the entirety of my time in Cambodia.
I’ve been told that we got into Cambodia on Tuesday, which makes a total of four travel days (but because of time difference we pretty much skipped Sunday), but my sense of time and place was so messed up I swear we had just three Fridays in a row. The first day or so was used getting to know our hosts, resting from flights and we sent off another team to go do ministry. After that we had three or four days where we just toured the city, we found coffee shops that previous racers had been to, went to the markets a lot and just messed around and had fun. However, after the first day or so, time seemed to drag on once again, I could see from social media posts that my other squad mates had already started doing ministry and as much as I loved being a tourist, that’s not what I came here for. So those first couple days were a weird mixture of excitement at being in a new place and doing fun things and also feeling like I was wasting the time I had here. I wanted to serve and I wanted to help the community around me.
So finally Monday rolled around and it was our first day of ministry. From what we had been told we would be going to different villages everyday and teaching the children English and Bible stories. The way our day was set up is we would start with breakfast happening from 6-7am, at 7:15 the teams staying at base would gather for prayer, then we’d get in the vans and head about an hour out to the village. We’d do our first “class” and gather the kids, play games, sing and dance, and watch as our hosts taught them, we’d then have a break for lunch where we’d set out a tarp and eat the delicious food our cooks made for us and we got fresh fruit every morning. We’d then take a nap for the rest of our lunch time, then go back to the village, gather children, and teach again before heading back to base for rest, dinner, and team time. Monday was a lot of fun, it felt like I had finally gotten to help in ministry and do what I was called to. Tuesday was similar, and at the end of the day we had to walk through some water to do a house visit with a new believing couple that was farther from the village. That experience was especially encouraging because it felt like I was really getting out of my comfort zone with what we were doing. Wednesday hits, me and a few girls work at a fish farm in another village and it was super fun and an amazing experience, but a long with this comes doubt too. I had this thought enter my mind that I struggled with for a few days, it felt like even though I was here, doing as much as I could to help our hosts and the missionaries from AIM, it felt like our team wasn’t actually accomplishing anything. Like we would go to the villages and play with the kids, but we couldn’t actually teach them because of the language barrier, so it was like I was just observing what my hosts were doing and that the same things would be happening even if my team wasn’t here. That was really discouraging and I think most of my team was starting to feel the same way. You could sense that during the times when we couldn’t be helpful we weren’t as energetic or enthusiastic about the work we were doing and our hosts noticed too. They gave us feedback about our attitude and when Eliza (my team leader), told us, it kind of confirmed the doubts in my head that we weren’t actually helping out our ministry. It was hard to hear and rolled around my head for a while. But our hosts were also asking that we help them in the little things, they didn’t necessarily need us to be teaching and doing the big things. And that’s where my mindset changed. I think God did put us here to help, but our ministry isn’t necessarily to help make connections with the kids. They’re going to be here long after we leave and our hosts will continue to see them long after we leave. In my head I came here to serve the kids, but now I think I am here to serve our hosts. I’m here to do the little things like when we’re cleaning the house, I’m going to try to be so helpful that my hosts can just sit back and take a break while we clean, or during ministry we can serve and prepare lunch so that our hosts can rest from teaching. God changed the way I saw helping. I thought I came here to serve in one way, but God showed me that the way he wanted us to serve was different than that, and at first it was disappointing thinking that me being here was useless, but it’s encouraging to know that I’m here to give my host rest where I can. So heading into this next week, I’m excited to have this new mindset of serving, getting closer to my team, and having the attitude of servitude that God wants for me.
Thank you to everyone who has helped me get here financially and has been praying since I’ve left. I am so excited to see how God works in and through me.
P.S.
Some of my teammates are not fully funded yet, if that is something God is putting on your heart or you are interested in donating to them, please reach out to me at (805)-825-7759, I’d love to direct you to help them continue serving!!
What an amazing lesson. We’ve read that we are the body of Christ so many times and yet we don’t always grasp it. There are so many ways to serve and they are all equally important. I was recently reading about Jesus eating the feet of the disciples and this dirty carries so much more meaning. He was serving and being humble, but it was such a basic need. It was the lowest position that no one would want or care to do. We often see the big picture and want to make a big impact, but like you’ve heard from God, sometimes you just need to wash feet and it makes s bigger impact than you’ll ever know. What ever y’all is before you, do with an your heart. Love you so much and thank you for sharing.
Just found your other blogs today, I signed up but had only seen Lexi’s blogs. Love hearing your perspective, it is quite similar to Lexi’s. I am glad God showed you His plan for (some) of you service and ministry. We have found that often it IS to encourage and help(cleaning etc) them, so they can concentrate on their full time mission there. No task is too small when you are serving and being God’s hands and feet. Just like my last night in Florida, I babysat two of the kiddos so Chris and Sarah could enjoy the special dinner. They knew they could relax and enjoy themselves as the kids were happy and safe with grandpa Kip :). And as I told Lexi, you may not know the lives you affected until you meet them in heaven and they tell you in person. So proud of all of you, especially team YADA! Love and miss you all. Lifting each of you up in prayer daily if not several times a day. Give everyone my love, and let them know I am actively supporting them.