Okay, where do I start? A week and a half ago I had a great opportunity to spend a weekend with some amazing teenagers. I brought a group of high school students (most from the service leadership class that I co-teach at Logos) to Koh Kong, one of Cambodias coastal provinces. The students that came were an eclectic bunch. They were from Cambodia, Philipines, Korea and the US. They ranged from children of wealthy business owners, missionary kids (including Alex, our 16-year-old), as well as some very low income kids who are in our scholarship program. Although the kids were diverse, the impact that they had and the impact that was had on them was consistent. Although I would love to chronicle the entire trip, it would take me a long time and your eyes would probably eventually glaze over. So I will just hit some highlights.
13 of us left from Logos before school on Friday Dec 3rd to drive out to the coast. We arrived in Koh Kong, got settled and met our host from World Team. We spent some time with him, got unpacked and went to our first project. Our first project was to spend part of the evening at a local school helping the students with their English. The school has about 120 students crammed into small, hot classrooms. The students range anywhere from beginners to intermediate English speakers and ranged from about 8-years-old to 18. This first night it took our students a while to get in the groove. What was expected of them was not totally clear. They could converse, play games, sing songs...etc, just as long as what they did was helping the kids with English. Our kids are used to clearly defined expectations but they did not have that here. However, after about 20 minutes, each of the 6 classrooms were buzzing with different activities. At the end, there were smiles, hugs and laughter all around. Some of our students were sad as this was the last time we would see these kids, or so we thought. Fast forward to Sat morning.
Saturday morning had us heading out fairly early (for a group of H.S. students). We drove about 10 minutes to a densely populated village filled with Cham people, Cambodian Muslims. Our stated goal was to pick up trash for them. Clean up. Make the area where they live a bit more inhabitable. So we did. Very diligently and joyfully. Our not-stated goal was to help establish a bridge between the Cham people and our World Team contacts there. Both goals were accomplished. However, God did much more than that. First, our project became publicized enough so that the government decided to get in on the action. They sent a large group from the Ministry of the Environment as well as some students that belong to their version of the Boy/Girl scouts. Second, much of the project was filmed in order to air on national television. Only God could orchestrate that. Third, he touched the lives of many, if not all, of our students.
 |
| Our team in front of the school wih some of the kids. |
 |
| Tirot, from our House of Faith, interacting with the kids. A natural! |
 |
| David, from our House of Hope, with Sharon leading a class in learning games. |
 |
| Alex was great to have along. I love being able to serve along side him. |
 |
| Some Buddhist monks attend this school. |
 |
| Our team lined up ready to pick up trash with representatives from the MInistry of the Environment and boy/girl scouts. |
 |
| Hara very focused on the trash at hand. |
 |
| Pree working alongside a very hard working girl. They made a great team. |
 |
| I loved interacting with the kids. |
 |
| Tirot throwing trash into the truck. |
 |
| Pierre and some other students led the kids in some songs. |
One example comes from one of the girls that came with us. She had never been away from her family overnight. Ever. She is from a Buddhist Cambodian home, comes from a family with means and is not someone you would picture walking around picking up trash willingly. However, God used some poor, dirty children from this village to soften her heart. They smiled big at her and helped hold her trash bag as they walked around together picking up trash. For one of the first times in her life, she was interacting with kids from the lowest social class and she really enjoyed it. God used this weekend to impact so many lives, maybe more so some of our own students.
Once we left the Cham village, we were going to go have lunch and spend the whole afternoon at the beach. Sounded like a nice, relaxing conclusion to the day. However, our students had another idea. They had had such a nice time connecting with the kids at the school from the night before that they wanted to go back. Khmer schools are in session 6 days a week so I knew that it was an option so I asked our World Team host. He called and the school was thrilled to have us back, but not quite as excited as our kids. In short, our team from Logos chose to cut their beach time short in order to go back and spend another evening with the kids at the school. I was so proud of their choice to do so. This second night was about 10x better than the night before since there was not a need for the kids to find their comfort zone. They were already there. They just jumped right in and hit the ground running. It was a lot of fun to watch.
Then on Sunday morning we headed back for Phnom Penh. It was a quick weekend but one that God to impact his kingdom in many ways. I was thrilled, humbled and blessed to be part of it. Thanks for sharing in our journey.
