Our Shelter

Chris, Sarah-jo, and I arrived in Mae Sai after a five and a thirteen hour bus ride. We decided to leave the students for a few days and go ahead of them. It was 7am and we didn't even know where to say. We had a taxi driver take us to a guest house and hoped and prayed for God to bless us. He drove straight up to the border checkpoint and then took the last road on the left down into the market area which was a small China town. Literally in the middle of a crammed market area we were dropped off at the guest house. As we climbed the four floors with our luggage all I could think about was getting sleep, and after 18.5 hours on a bus with no sleep I was very motivated to climb those stairs.

We entered the room and were immediately blown away by the view of the mountains of Burma. With just a tiny river separating us from the closed nation of Burma a.k.a Myanmar, we were as close as you can get with a birds eye view. I went straight to bed and woke up after having a pretty crazy dream about being bitten by snakes. Chris also had some crazy dreams and we realized that our location was a huge spiritual stronghold and we needed to cover each other with prayer and create an environment in our room that was soaked in Gods presence. After staying in locations that were covered in prayer for the past two months we realized it was our turn especially if we wanted to have any joy or peace in this place of Spiritual chaos.

The rest of our team will join us on Friday and we will then go across the border to Burma so we can get visas for our last couple weeks in Thailand. We will do our best to soak this place in prayer and get perspective for the rest of our time in Thailand. It's overwhelming coming to places like this where there seems to be no glimmer of hope or sign of progress but, sitting in Gods presence and remembering who it is that we serve brings more hope than I could ever create.

"The number of Burmese women and girls travelling to Thailand through Mae Sai to enter the sex industry is increasing. 60% of them are under 18 years of age." (Aphaluck Bhatiasevi, "Influx of Burmese sex workers via Mae Sai on the rise," Bangkok Post, 2 June 1997)

"20,000-30,000 Burmese women are in prostitution in Thailand." (CATW - Asia Pacific, Trafficking in Women and Prostitution in the Asia Pacific)

The Lord says, “I will rescue those who love me.
I will protect those who trust in my name.
When they call on me, I will answer;
I will be with them in trouble.
I will rescue and honor them.
I will reward them with a long life
and give them my salvation.”
Psalm 91:14-16

My prayer is that the people of Burma will know God and cry out to him.