Tragic News

We have just found out that one of our "hosts" who God has used to develop all of the projects that we were apart of and uniquely gifted and placed in Cambodia, passed away today with upper respiratory problems. This comes as an incredible shock. He was young and leaves a wife and 4 children along with a team that admired him and looked to him for leadership. He was an amazing man and impacted my life in unbelievable ways while only knowing him for a week. 

While this is an earthly tragedy and we weep for his family and for those closest to him, let's praise God for this servant. A man who served the people he loved with vigor, leaving everything he had on the alter. A great father and husband and a visionary that ran a hard race in hopes of seeing Christ's message transform a country. His life was a true example of what it means to live be a "living and holy sacrifice...a spiritual service of worship." (Rom. 12:1)

Garrick, while breaking this news to our team, used this verse which I think is a great truth that we should hold in our hearts in a time like this:

Col. 1:17 "He is before all things and in Him all things hold together." 

We ask you to pray for these things in these difficult moments for Cambodia:

1.) Pray for his family, that the Lord would hold them tight in this moment. That they would feel his grace and his love as they deal with losing a father and a husband. 

(because of security concerns we want to keep his name and his family's name anonymous but our Father knows of this servant's family)

2.) That the rest of the team in Cambodia can deal with the loss of a brother, friend, and leader. More responsibility is going to placed on every member of the team in order to continue the work on the ground. Pray that God would give them strength

3.) Pray for the Cambodian people. This servant was loved by the Cambodian people both believing and non-believing. Pray that God would use this death as a catalyst to embolden believers to live out their faith and that those who are lost could see the hope that comes from living a life of faith in Christ even in the midst of tragedy. 

Fragile Group

God continues to move in the village where our dentistry team served. There is now a bible study group that had started there and we have heard reports that it is growing stronger!

However it is at this stage that problems can arise. Groups like this don't get to this stage very often.

Please pray that the hearts of the people in this group will be emboldened for the gospel.

Pivotal Man

We all know that one person that is incredibly influential in their community, a person that others look to and follow even though they are not powerful or a person in a formal leadership role. 

There is such a young man named Bunruon in the village where our team worked. When one member of our team asked him what he believed he said, "I'm almost a believer." When pushed deeper he said he had a hard time understanding why Christians don't always act like Christians and it was hard concept for him to understand. Throughout the week members of our team loved on him and encouraged him and he is getting closer and closer choosing to follow Christ. We've heard that this last Sunday he visited the local body of believers and brought his Buddhist sister. 

Lift Bunruon up in prayer and pray that the Holy Spirit would break his heart and open his eyes to the Gospel and that He could be used to influence those around him. 

What it Meant

Our feet are back on American soil and it's time to figure out what it all means. 

I apologize for not being able to update our blog and give more detail of our trip throughout the week. The daily prayer requests were created before we left and because of the internet connections and time constraints we weren't able to update the blog like we would have wished. With that being said we are so thankful for your prayers and support.

We were all touched in different ways by the things we saw and experienced: a culture separated from Christ, idolatry, poverty, and yet hope for a future. 

I hope that you will ask those that you know that went on this trip how the Lord spoke to them and used them. Because of security concerns I want to be vague on this blog but they will be able to discuss more in detail about the believers and followers of Christ who are being used by the Lord to make a difference in the kingdom. 

Here is what I've learned: 

Man is entirely evil and hopeless without Christ. Simply put, we have nothing to live for and nothing to gain from this life without the blood of Christ. It is the message of Jesus Christ that transforms culture and transforms lives. The selfless and sacrificial love of Christ changes hearts. 

The things we concern ourselves with in America are just as silly and pointless as the alters and empty idols that the Cambodians worship.

God doesn't just call some people or the spiritual elite to live this sacrificial love but he calls all of us who are members of His body to act as one and serve those around us. 

God is calling you to your Cambodia... your neighbors and co-workers and family and friends. He wants us to be proactive. To seek out the lost and the hurting in our world and be His hands and feet and love them as he would. 

Continue to pray for Cambodia and that God will continue to break the hearts of a people shackled by tradition and living without grace. Continue to pray that the Lord would raise up Christian leaders and strengthen and embolden his people Cambodia and here in the US. 

Thank you again for your prayers! 

Day 10

Prayer Requests:

1.) Ease of adjustment coming home- keep jet lag at a minimum

2.) That we would have many, many stories of God's power and goodness to share

3.) That we would never be the same

Day 9

Prayer Requests:

1.) Safe travel and good weather conditions (no snow storms in Minnesota!)

2.) Calm our spirits as we approach home.

Day 8

Prayer Requests:

1.) For many open doors to share the Gospel

2.) The Holy Spirit's leading for each of us

Day 7

Prayer Requests:

1.) Peace for our children and loved ones back home

2.) Allow us to focus on the mission at hand without being distracted by our surroundings.

Day 6

Prayer Requests:

1.) That God would use us to encourage our hosts and minister to the Cambodian people

Day 5

Prayer Requests:

1.) That God would bind our hearts to the Cambodian people and allow relationships to form

2.) Continued physical, emotional, and spiritual health, protection from sickness.

True Worshipers

We are one leg away from making it to Cambodia. The trip has been smooth and long and we are eager to begin our work and soak up Cambodia.

So many people and so many nationalities. Faces and languages from every corner of the world seem to surround us. You can't help but think about God's greatness. He knows them all by name. He knows their stories and their hopes and dreams. He knows their hurts. God is so much bigger than what we tend to think of Him. He speaks all languages and understands all people and desperately wants them to enter a relationship with him.

Pray that God would make us the servants that Paul spoke of in Romans 12: "living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God-this is your spiritual act of worship."

Thank you for your continued support and prayer!

Day 4

Prayer Requests:

1.) Ease of Communication/translation as we teach in schools

2.) Protection over Garrick and those he treats in the dental clinic.

3.) Unity among our team

4.) Protection against bad attitudes due to exhaustion

Day 3

Travel has been incredibly smooth. We are in Singapore about to board our flight to Cambodia. One more leg of a very long trip.

Pray for strength today as we join our hosts and get to soak Cambodia in for the very first time.

Prayer Requests:

1.) Safety for our group traveling to the village.

2.) Productivity for all as we begin our jobs.

3.) Flexible hearts

4.) Protection against spiritual warfare.

Day 2-Travel

Prayer Requests:

Endurance. Flexibility. Ability to connect with culture; a sweet time of worship with our Cambodian brothers and sisters.

Unique Travel Requests

Of course there are somethings that we would love to happen on our flights today. Smooth connections, our luggage arrives safely, blind and or lazy customs officials... what if we asked for those things but with a special emphasis we asked for something else. 

What if we asked for prayer for the person in the seat next to us or the flight attendant who is serving us or the family waiting to board? It would be a shame to fly to the other side of the world today to share Christ with people who have never heard and not share it with those who are on the journey with us. Pray for divine appointments and ready hearts. Pray that God would grant us courage and boldness and would open our eyes to those who are hurting around us, especially the person using our arm rest. 

Away we go. 

Prayer Requests:

1.) Safety

2.) Divine appointments

3.) A Samaritan's heart as we travel

Grace

What our God gives us is unlike any other religion. I know I take it for granted. I don't know if you do. 

A God who loves us and hears us. Hope for eternity. Sins forgiven... forever. Grace. The price of sin paid for in full by the Son of God's sacrifice. There are no hoops to jump through. No rituals. No searching for truth within our own being. No depending on our own reason and internal fortitude for safety. 

Theravada Buddhism, the most practiced faith in Cambodia, teaches a different truth. "Enlightenment" comes to those who are good enough first. We are responsible for our own salvation. Gods or deities cannot help mere human beings find enlightenment. In fact, to achieve enlightenment in one lifetime is seen as an incredible achievement. For most of humanity, however, it would take lifetimes to achieve righteousness. 

As believers in Christ we sing praises to a God who humbled himself and died the death that we should have so that we could be united with Christ for eternity. We don't deserve it, but we have it: Grace.

Prayer Requests:

1) Pray that the Cambodians would experience grace for the first time and break the chains of tradition.

2) Pray that we would live out that grace in a way that would glorify Christ. 

One Body

God, the Creator of all things and the omnipotent being in the Universe, designed us to be one. The institution of the Church was designed to be made up of unique individuals, with unique callings, and unique gifts to be used in accomplishing His greater plan for mankind. 

"Now All of you together are Christ's body, and each one of you is a separate and necessary part of it." 1 Corinthians 12:27.

Our team is no different. From spiritual gifts to occupations to life experiences, our team is incredibly diverse. Our prayer is that we would be that One Body that is discussed in Corinthians, acting as one unit made up of individuals, selfless and giving, and unified in the ultimate goal: that Christ would be exalted among the nations. 

Thank you as well for being such an invaluable member of the Body. Your prayers are coveted and incredibly essential in meeting this calling. 

Prayer Requests:

1) That our team would be unified as one body throughout the trip. 

2) That our Cambodian brothers and sisters would continue to be unified and devoted to each other.

3) That our hearts would be broken for the Cambodian people.

Necessity

We use it without thinking. It's almost like the air we breathe or the electricity in our house, and if it were gone... our lives would drastically change. Water. Not only water, but clean water-- non-toxic, thirst-quenching, soul satisfying water. 

Through a specific water filtration system that our friends in Cambodia have developed, they are reaching hundreds and thousands of people by meeting the most physical of needs. What we take for granted, the Cambodians thirst for and they don't even know it. They don't know why they get sick or why they have chronic headaches, but the answer is as simple as the most necessary of substances: clean water.

What a beautiful picture! Water is providing the way for sharing the love of Christ and His message for mankind. Just as they don't realize why they get sick or why their water is unsatisfying physically, they don't realize why their lives as a whole are unsatisfying spiritually. They continue to feel empty; their spiritual attempts to find meaning in this world continue to make them feel dry and parched. They are "thirsty" and they don't know why. 

For as Jesus said to the Samaritan woman, "Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. The water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life." - John 4:13-14

Prayer Requests:

1.) Pray that the Holy Spirit will continue to give the Cambodians a strong thirst for the gospel message.

2.) Pray for the physical needs of Cambodia and that we could be the true hands and feet of Christ as we try to meet them.

3.) Pray for our friends and that God would continue to give them the creativity to find ways to  impact their neighbors. 

4.) Pray that as Jesus Christ's body, sharing His message would be a necessity in our lives everyday. 

The 3 Minute Challenge

In one week our team will begin our physical journey to Cambodia. The spiritual journey for this trip, however, began much earlier.  We committed ourselves to pray for people that we had never met and that we don't truly understand and it has been eye-opening and even life changing. We're thrilled that you have decided to join us and are excited to see not only what impact your prayer life will have on Cambodia but the impact that it will have in you as well.  

Starting today, if you subscribe to getting our email updates, you will be getting short notes from us about what specific areas that we feel are in need of prayer from travel, to health, to responsive hearts in the people that God is going place in our paths. 

So, the challenge is this: 

Every time you receive an email update spend 3 minutes in prayer. Just 3 minutes bringing to the Lord these needs and praying for Cambodia. (Obviously you are not limited to 3 minutes but you have to start somewhere, right!) It will be hard at first but as we go along our hope is that you will be as moved by this exercise as we have been. 

Here are today's prayer request:

The Cambodian People: 

That God would continue to move in their hearts to allow them to see past their tradition and culture to seek truth and God's salvation plan. 

The Cambodian Church:

That our brothers and sisters would feel emboldened and impassioned by their faith and seek out ways to share with their family members and neighbors the joy of their salvation.