I got an email today from Kristen and a phone call from our missions pastor letting us know the team got to Thailand safely and are doing well. If you want to know a little more about what is going on there, read a little about Rahab ministries (Rahab is the prostitute who helped out God's spies, showed her faith, and and was spared by God when Jericho was destroyed). This is what loving and helping people is all about. Too many times, people think that if you aren't talking about Jesus you aren't being a witness for God. However, this is what the hands and feet of Jesus are all about. This ministry is about meeting women in bars and having a salon to do nails and hair before prostitutes go out each night. It opens the door to building relationships with these women in Thailand and goes well beyond many "Western" approaches to evangelizing. This is the missional church. For others out there, this is what a relationship with God is all about. It's not just singing, preaching, living out a certain standard, and talking about Jesus. Many people think that people confessing and turning from sin is all that God cares about. But loving people and him is his greatest desire and most effective way of showing others what God really looks like. If you want to see what God is really about and how he meant for us to live, then please take the time to read about this ministry.
As my wife and other women are in Thailand this week, they will be working with this ministry and going out to the places where these women are to encourage, offer practical help to them in their day-to-day lives, come alongside, and offer hope. Please take a moment to read about Rahab ministries and remember to pray for this unique ministry that is there to just love and help women and their families.
http://www.rahabministriesthailand.org/mission.htm
Too many times, we think God only works in certain ways. Ways that we sometimes think are the only ways to reach out to people in our churches here. I have changed my way of thinking and have talked about how God is working in ways all over the world and how we can't put God in a box. As you read about Rahab ministries in Thailand, think about how similar or different that ministry is compared to churches and ministries here in America. And as a final read, read this list on How to Kill a Movement and compare it to the Rahab ministries. See how this approach in Thailand and in other areas of the world are looking outside the methods and thinking of many of our churches here in America to make a difference in people's lives.
