Our first day in Pattaya was spent meeting with Jessica, who works with Bridges to the Nations and the Tamar Center. Her work here is inspiring. They do outreach in Pattaya, teach English, have events, set up safehouses where the women can be trained in alternative professions, and have worship outreach. Fifty years ago, Pattaya was a fishing town. Because of a nearby naval base during the war, Pattaya became a prostitution-driven town. It is now the number one town for sex tourism in Thailand. It is incredibly diverse in this sense…open bars with girls prostituting themselves, lady boys (men who are in any stage of physical alteration), gay men, and enslaved children. We learned about the poverty that drives girls into this lifestyle, the emotional trauma faced by the lady boys, some of whom were forced to begin taking hormones a very young ages by parents who wanted daughters instead. Listening to Jessica tell her stories with so much joy and so much love for the Lord, I felt myself begin to hope, able to see the brokenness in this world and God’s love for those trapped in it. I was filled with peace that I had not experienced since before this trip, and I was excited to see God bring healing to this place. However, later that day we walked down Walking Street, a street notorious for gogo bars and blatant prostitution. I saw the looks in the johns faces, the girls who screamed and chased after guys walking by, the policemen standing in the middle of it all watching it happen, some even participating in it, the bars on the windows where I knew enslaved children were being forced to have sex with paying customers…and I became numb with grief. I longed to see God in the midst of it all. I ached for a glimmer of light in the vast darkness. I’m still working through what I saw, still searching for the hope that Jessica found in the midst of it. Please pray for these beloved children of God, the girls, the lady boys, the johns, the pimps, the precious children…please pray that they would come to know the love of Jesus. Please pray for healing. “Greater things have yet to come, greater things are still to be done in this city.” Through it all, I’m clinging to God’s promises and trusting that God is faithful.