The Unreached & Chiang Mai Photography Part 1

I am typing this in Georgia after two weeks of training that has blown my mind with a new community of alumni racers that walk in faith unlike I’ve seen before. 

God is doing a new thing. Again. 

40% of the world is unreached as in they are likely to never hear the the Good News of Jesus. 1% of ministry funds go to unreached people groups. 3% of our missionary forces goes to the unreached. It’s about time we send our resources to go where they are needed the most.

The populations of the unreached are expanding faster than we are sharing the One that lives among them, suffers with them, and won the victory over all.

Jesus said he wouldn’t come back until every single people group had heard the Good News, and He said it was our job, as we have Christ in us, to accomplish this by the Spirit (Matthew 24, 28). “Us” is every Christ follower since his time.

This is not a western or white man’s religion; it started in the East. The fastest growing churches are not in the West. Countries in Africa, Asia, and, I witnessed first hand, Latin America are now sending Christ followers to share of the beautiful love of the Savior to those who haven’t heard (Romans 10:14). 

We are intentionally looking at the pure Word of God. How it relates to different people groups. How the Kingdom Jesus brought related to all. How we are going to bring Jesus not America. 

We aren’t aiming to change their culture or even the form in which they worship; we are inviting them into the Luke 4:18-19 Kingdom where all is made right.

…To go and to stop for the one as Jesus would in humility and love, all the while learning from them as well in the aspects of Creator that they carry.

My group and I leave January 29th to go to those who are likely to never know Jesus, the love of my life.

We have been working with refugees every Friday night in a neighborhood called Clarkston, Georgia that has 180 ethnicities, 90 of which are unreached – there is no Gospel movement among these people groups. These are families that got approved out of refugee camps to come to America.

We’ve been serving with a youth program in Clarkston. These high schoolers and middle schoolers came from families that fled their countries due to some form of persecution. Now that they’ve made it to America, it can be extremely difficult to pay back the debt of their plane flights and work their way into society as fast as the government requires. 

If you are a Christ follower I encourage you to look at God’s heart throughout the entire Bible for every single nation to know His love and encourage you to be a part of His mission whether through working with refugees, going to, praying for, or giving to organizations reaching the unreached.

You can learn more here: Stratus, Joshua Project, Open Doors. Watch movements among the unreached in these amazing films: Sheep Among Wolves, Free Burma Rangers.

As you can see from my fundraising bar, I still need more funds to be able to leave in a couple weeks. If you feel led to partner with God’s mission in this way, please pray and consider donating! Thank you! 

…

Just a month ago my team and I were going out on the streets hanging out with prostitutes. Prostitutes constitute a group of people that have broken my heart time and time again throughout my missions journey. In Granada, one of them was a single mother who we assured we were not going to judge. 

We sat on the steps as nighttime surrounded and looked into defeated eyes. She told us her husband drank too much. Now she was a single mother doing this. Jose shared powerful testimonies and love with her, and we got to pray with her.

Then, we ran into a prostitute Jose had shared Jesus’ love with for two hours another night. She didn‘t know if she could pray or read the Bible with us since she had been drinking. We assured her she could. That God loved her and saw her right where she was at. 

We asked if she wanted to read the Woman at the Well story (John 4). She did in joy out loud in Spanish. We asked if she wanted to repeat after us in a prayer of asking for more of Jesus in her life, and she did. She hoped that we’d come back to see her again. 

That last week on the field with K squad I got to lead two others that God led me to stop for in a prayer to receive Christ as their Savior! The Lord is moving unlike I’ve seen in Granada, Nicaragua.

Another woman cried to us her story of being raped at a young age. Even so, she had the light of Christ surrounding her and pursuing her. She poured out love to us. 

In honor of those woman I just met, I think it’s finally time to share photos from Chiangmai Thailand and a blog I wrote all the way back when Covid started and my first trip ended 8 months early.

The next blog I will post includes the story of a local woman I did ministry with who was tricked into sex trafficking, but God led her out and into faith in Jesus from Islam. 

I’ve heard many more stories of women abused or in this industry. And I see, just the same as those who have never heard of God’s sacrificial love and resurrection, Christ as their hope. He takes it seriously. He’ll stop at nothing to reach those He loves….