Real-ness

Today the rain held off for a little longer than usual, so I made it off "the Compound" (the BSC Campus) and over to Phrom Pong on the BTS, and then walked the 5 blocks from there to Antique Cafe, waltzed up to the front door, yanked and...it's closed. Back tracked a couple of blocks and found an open Au Bon Pain that graciously offers to let you pay to use their wifi, so I took them up on the offer and here I sit trying to update the world on my life.

So it’s been 50 days. Here are a few things that have changed about me since arriving in Thailand:

1. My pantomiming skills have gotten excellent. It's funny the things that language barriers do to you, but I can now get from point A to point B in a taxi merely by waving my arms around. I dare you to challenge me to a game of charades. I dare you.

2. I wish I could go back to my childhood and eat all the vegetables that I hid in my napkins and refused to consume. My diet consists of meat and carbs. And then I get sick of Thai meat and carbs, so I go eat some American meat and carbs. SOMEBODY POINT ME TOWARDS THE VEGGIES.

3. I’m getting more adventurous. When I first got here, I was a little nervous about crossing the street by myself, and making it all the way from where I live in the center of Bangkok to the outskirts where the Clarkson's live via BTS and taxi seemed like an impossible task. Other places I've lived it was as simple as buying a map and reading it...bing bang bongo I'm there. But here, a map of the entire city of Bangkok is extremely rare, and if you can find one that you can also read, it will actually have intentional mistakes in it. Thailand prides itself on having never been conquered and colonized by foreigners, and thus as a means of self-protection does not produce maps of their greatest city that are accurate.

I’m making a visa run to Myanmar this weekend. Yeah...you can pray about that if you feel so inclined. Everything I’ve read has said that it is the “easiest” and “cheapest” border run that one can do while residing in Thailand, it’s just that I don’t speak Thai, Northern Thai or Burmese, and this is a solo trip to somewhere I’ve never been before. It’s exciting though. Makes me feel like an INDEPENDENT WOMAN or something. The first leg will be nearly 5 hours on a bus to Mae Sai, Thailand’s most northerly town, and then a “songthaew” to the border, at which point I will go through Thai immigration, cross a bridge on foot, and enter Burma (Myanmar). After making it through Burmese immigration (during which I will have to haggle about how much they’re going to charge me to enter their country - apparently crisp US bills result in a discount), I will turn around and do the same thing in reverse. Or so I’ve read. It doesn’t sound too complicated, right? Farang (foreigners) do it all the time. Small price to pay (~$40) to spend another 60 days in Thailand legally. If skeptical, feel free to read here.

4. My quantitative idea of what classifies as being productive has shifted to a less task-oriented way of thinking. It's now a productive day if I manage to have a few meaningful conversations, read a good amount, and make a trip on public transit to cross one or two things off my to-do list, such as getting my eyebrows waxed or buying groceries. Writing curriculum is this looming thing hanging over my head and even though I spend several hours a day working on it, it's not this thing that I can just "check off my list." So all of that to say, I'm learning how to measure my effort by my attitude towards it - am I making it service? do I find joy in doing it? am I really doing my best at pushing forward?

5. I'm aware of how "real" all of this is. As God continues to stretch me and teach me about prayer, He is also making me more sensitive to things that I was previously unaware of. In my last blog post I expanded more on the religious climate of Thailand. This past week I experienced first hand the way that Buddhism affects the lives of the people here in Thailand.

Last Friday, I went to visit Wat Pho here in Bangkok. When the Spotswood team was here, they visited the Grand Palace, Bangkok's most famous Wat and former residence of the king, as a group, but I was unable to go with them, so I had been wanting to see more of the ornate temples and statues that are the iconic image of Thailand. I honestly didn't think much of going to a temple - I saw it as a tourist attraction, the same way all of the other Westerners at Wat Pho that day thought of it. I wasn't prayerful before I went, while I was there, or after I left. I snapped pictures of the rows upon rows of golden Buddha statues. I paused to take in the ornate spires that came to a point up in the heavy gray clouds that would later dump flash floods on the center of Bangkok.

Before visiting Wat Pho and while I was there, I was saddened to see Thais praying and making offerings to Buddha statues and spirit houses, thinking, "What wasted effort," - to pray to no one, make offerings to nothing. But after I left Wat Pho and throughout the next several days, I felt a heaviness hanging over me. I started struggling with doubts; past areas of sin in my life seemed to rear their ugly heads. I noticed feeling intimidated about talking to people about Jesus, and I was fearful of going places on my own. I didn't make any connection with having been in a temple until Tuesday night, the night before I go to an early morning Bible study at the church I attend. I was alone in my room and just became overwhelmed with a sense of darkness - I was afraid, the way I remember being afraid of a bad dream as a child. I tried to press down the feeling, telling myself that I was too old to be afraid of the dark, and that I should roll over and go to sleep. Images statues that I had seen of dragon-like animals at Wat Pho started entering my mind, and fortunately I realized what I should do - pray.

I started praying out loud to the God who is Mighty to save, powerful to move mountains, never-ending in mercy, always successful in battle, and unrelenting in pouring out His grace on me. After a time I started to feel a bit better, but I still asked Liz if she would come and pray with me! She was sweet enough to get out of bed and come be with me, and we ended up having a great conversation that led me to better understand some of what had been going on. She had had a similar perspective on Wats and spirit houses when she arrived in Bangkok, but talking with someone in her Bible study helped her to realize something that I began to realize as well while we talked.

For those of you who don't know what a Wat is - it's a Buddhist temple, often very ornate, covered in elaborate patterns in bright colors and gold leaf. A spirit house, likewise, is a "mini-temple" of sorts. When Thai people break ground for a building, they believe that it displaces the spirits that are part of the land there. So, to appease these displaced spirits, they build a small, elaborate house on the property for the spirits to live in, and daily offer food and drink at the spirit house.

I realized in that moment it hadn't just been an "off week" - there had been a marked difference in my spirit since I had been at the temple. I by no means desire to draw attention to the enemy, but for some reason I never realized it until the other night - I willingly opened myself up to the powers that rule over those temples. There is God, and those who belong to Him, and then there is everyone else, who are under the authority of the ruler of the earth.

There is no middle ground - there are those people and places that are for God's glory, and then there is everything and everyone who are against Him.

Liz told me about a Thai woman in her Bible study who is a new Christian, and who has had some challenging spiritual experiences since coming to the faith. She had described experiences that she had had around the time of her salvation, and there after, that Liz and I had previously viewed as just really strange stories. As I mentioned in my last blog, this land has been given over to idol worship for thousands of years, and there are real demonic strongholds here. The Thai form of Buddhism is very wrapped up in animism and ancestral worship, and rituals take place daily that invite "spirits" into their bodies, their temples, and their spirit houses. I finally realized - these prayers and offerings are not being given to no one and nothing, but to a very real presence, and it is a presence that strongly opposes the work of my Lord.

It is for this reason that prayer has become increasingly important. Every spirit house, every Wat - of which there are so, so very many - is a reminder that although Christ defeated the enemy on the cross, that victory has not yet been applied to everything and everyone, as it will be at the time of his second coming.

It is my role, as an ambassador for Him, to be a distributor of that victory for which He gave His life. 

Every interaction I have with someone in which Jesus is represented, every prayer that is offered up, is pushing back against the evil one's forces through the power of my Savior. Hell has no power when confronted with the power of the King. 

It is for this reason, also, that your prayers are so important. First, for your own spiritual protection. As American Christians, we seem to have a different perception of spiritual warfare - we discount it's importance, fierceness and sometimes even its reality. While Satan cannot touch those whom the Holy Spirit has sealed and cannot cause us to lose our salvation, he can tempt us and intimidate us in an attempt to draw us away from the Lord. He has been successful to do so in my life again and again and it is for one reason - I was not praying. This is not to say that prayer will prevent you from sinning ever again in your life, but it will certainly open up your eyes to the things unseen, connect you to the heart of the Father so that you can discern the difference between His voice and the voices of others, and cause your desires to become like His desires. These are all things that Scripture tells us. We also have access to armor, and below is a prayer that was written by the leader of the class I'm taking on prayer - feel free to skip it and come back to it later.

Father, today I acknowledge that every battle in my life is not mine, but belongs to You. For I know that my real struggle is not against what I can see with my eyes, but with what is unseen - the powers of this dark world, the devil - who waits for an opportune moment to steal, kill and destroy Your work in my life, to ensnare me. 

Father forgive me, for I have not been self-controlled and alert. I've allowed myself to be lulled into complacency by the noise and distractions of the world. I have not resisted the enemy, most of the time at best, I pretend he does not exist. But Your Word admonishes me to stand firm in my faith, that if I do not, I will not stand at all. Lord, teach me to stand. Today, as You have instructed me, I choose to put on Your full armor so that I might stand against the devil's schemes and stand my ground when the day of evil comes upon me - that I might be strong in You and Your mighty power! 

I choose to "put on" Jesus! I stand firm then with the belt of truth buckled securely around my waist. Jesus, You are the way the truth and the life...I turn from all false teaching and philosophies of this world and I put on Jesus, the Truth. 

I put on the breastplate of righteousness - Jesus, there was no sin found in You, yet You took my sin on Yourself so that I might become the righteousness of God! This day, I turn from all sin that entangles me and holds me back, and I put on Jesus' righteousness. I choose today to fit my feet with readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. Lord Jesus, You are my peace, for you have destroyed the barrier that was between me and God the Father! Make me ready to give the reason for the hope that I have, for I long to share with others that You Lord Jesus are my peace! 

I take up this day the shield of faith so that I might be able to extinguish all the flaming arrows, the attacks of the evil one. The life I live in this mortal body, I live by faith in You, the Son of God, who loved me and who gave Yourself for me. May my faith in You increase as I hear Your Word and put it into practice - for You Lord Jesus are the author and perfecter of my faith. 

I put on the helmet of salvation and declare that salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven by which I can be saved from my sin! You Lord Jesus are the Christ the Son of the Living God! Jesus, You are my salvation! I take up this day, the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God, and I proclaim Lord Jesus that You are the Word made flesh, and You will accomplish all that You intend! Hallelujah! 

Father I choose this day to clothe myself with Christ, to be alert and ready to pray - to pray in the Spirit no matter the occasion or situation that I am in, with all kinds of prayers and requests. May I become one who is increasingly faithful in prayer. In all of these things, I put on Christ Jesus - and I take my stand! May Your power that is at work in me this day, be mighty. I ask all these things in the Name of Jesus, who gave Himself for me that I might truly live. Amen.

Secondly, for the spiritual protection of your brothers and sisters. The Scriptures also tell us (in 1 Kings and Daniel), that the Lord dispatches angels at His followers' request. Go to battle on behalf of others, and ask God to send angels to battle the oppression of the evil one. I say this partially out of selfish motives - if I could convey exactly what happened last week or felt that I should, I would convince you how much I really need your prayers! There is real oppression here, and it's unlike anything I've ever been exposed to. Please pray that I would stand, that I would not be intimidated, and that I would walk in the confidence of the One who saved me from darkness.

Third, pray for Thailand. This video is a great way to pray through the different issues, and has images that will help you to understand what Thai Buddhism is all about.

Praying for Southeast Asian Buddhists. from SEASIAN PEOPLES on Vimeo.

In coming to Thailand I hoped that I would learn things and grow as a person - I really believe that removing ourselves from our comfort zones enables us to hear from the Lord more clearly, and we are less attached to temporal things, and thus are more ready to be obedient. I hoped and prayed that being here would allow me to hear answers about my future, and would prepare me for seminary and my future in ministry. All of those things are happening, but in ways that I did not at all expect. I love the way that God knows what we need - that He is so different from us - lofty and holy and distant, and yet a Father who is so intimately connected to us and aware of the tiniest details of our lives.

Who am I that He is mindful of me? I am not my own.