Schelllooooooo from Thailand!! Or Sahwah dee Kah, as the Thai would say.
I love it here. A lot. A whole big lot.
I love the people, I love Emmi (the women who runs the ministry we work with), I love the food (minus the preserved mango I got from 7-11 the other day), I love my team, and I love my awesome co-leader, Sierra! Just love love love all around. I even love the privilege I have as a leader of working out the team’s finances, and here’s a little story about why.
Yesterday, I sat in a Starbucks with my wonderful fellow leaders, Alys and Sierra, sorting through our team’s finances for the month of June. This is a process that can take a bit of time. We write out a whole lotta receipts, enter a whole lotta numbers into our beautiful excel spreadsheet budget, and basically make sure that everything is hunky dory in the financial realm of our team.
After figuring out how much we needed to pay Emmi for that month’s rent and all of our orientation supplies, we stopped by an ATM and then headed to Zion Café (Emmi’s coffee shop/café/where AIM teams live.)
Alys and I went upstairs to give Emmi the money and after making sure that everything was correct, she looked at us and said so very sincerely, “Thank you. Now I can pay this month’s rent.” And in that moment I got a glimpse of how God intended life to be.
In God’s Kingdom, everyone breaks even. Many faithful supporters had given us money so that we could go to Thailand, which we in turn gave to Emmi so that she can keep her ministry running in Thailand, which in turn gives us a place to live/eat/serve out of.
And so it goes on and on, in this beautiful circle of life (Lion King moment.) Everyone is lacking nothing because their fellow brothers and sisters in Christ are giving everything they have in order to serve one another and further God’s kingdom. It was beautiful and THAT is why I LOVE team finances. Boom.
“All the believers were one in heart and mind. No one claimed that any of his possessions was his own, but they shared everything they had….There were no needy persons among them. For from time to time those who owned lands or houses sold them, brought the money from the sales and put it at the apostles’ feet, and it was distributed to anyone as he had need.” Acts 4: 32-35
