Boy meets girl. Boy marries girl.
Boy has been to Russia to minister there before they met and together they decide to go back.
Boy and girl move with their two young children to SIBERIA and help plant a church. They buy a teeny tiny apartment and have two more children. They learn Russian, wear lots of warm clothes and fall in love with the men and women they meet in the freezing north. They send their friends in the States pictures of very, very low temperatures on the thermometer.
All of their friends shiver vicariously.
Several years later Boy and Girl decide God is moving them to a different place. A much warmer and happier place. But a place that needs God all the same. Boy and Girl pack up their four children and move to Thailand to plant more churches.
Boy and Girl send their friends in the States photos of all six of them in tank tops with sun-kissed shoulders. We all wonder what this next adventure will have in store for them. Sun, for sure.
They soon discover that one of the greatest needs in Thailand is helping young women become released from poverty and the sex trafficking industry with the hope and promise of Jesus. Boy and Girl can’t help but wonder if this is why God took them to Thailand.
We’ve known our friends Les and Debbie for over fourteen years and have watched them globe-trek with four kids in tow for the last six years. We admire them, we love them and we believe in what they are doing.
Whitney over at Bel Kai Designs helped Debbie create a very special piece of jewelry to help raise awareness and much needed support for Les and Debbie’s ministry in Thailand. The Fear to Freedom necklace is symbolic:
The flower is an orchid. It symbolizes the beauty of Thailand.
The color is orange. That stands for the fight against human slavery.
And the word is “freedom”. It stands for freedom in Christ.
Whitney has graciously offered to donate 40% of each sale to Les and Debbie’s ministry and to offer one to one of my readers too! This necklace is gorgeous and I’m so proud to be able to help give one to one of YOU!
To enter the giveaway simply leave a comment before 9pm Pacific Wednesday night about a freedom you are thankful for.
What freedom are you thankful for?
Les and Debbie’s ministry organization
To BUY a Fear to Freedom necklace click here.
I’m thankful for the freedom to worship.
Wow, Sarah. One of my sweet friend’s is in Thailand doing the same thing. I wonder if their paths have crossed?
All glory to Him!
http://www.wonderfullymadejewelry.com
I am thankful we can worship Christ in America without the threat of death.
freedom from slavery to sin- absolutely the best freedom I posess in Christ
I am thankful for the freedom to take my easy life for granted. That sounds bad but let me explain. I think being too busy with kids or having some financial struggles or whatever makes my life hard. I am thankful for being reminded by things like this that my life is wonderfully blessed and easy. In fact it’s so easy that I have the luxury to worry about what I’m going to wear or about how we’re going to afford to let our kids do yet another activity. But other women worry about how they are going to feed their children. They don’t have the freedom to worry about getting their kids on the right soccer team. Being incredibly blessed is a freedom we take for granted. Praise God for where He has put me and may He continually remind me to use my blessed life to offer compassion to those who need it.
I am grateful for the freedom a dear childhood friend has to serve as a missionary in Thailand. (As well as a sister in Haiti & Africa and me in my own home, where my family is my current mission field.) We serve an awesome God and have wonderful opportunities here in the states to worship, serve and grow. It is not so in the rest of the world. We need to remember that…
I am thankful that we can worship our God freely…and that we can read our Bibles, and share Christ with others…..without worrying about prosectution….Our God is an Awesome God….
I am thankful for the freedom through the blood of Jesus Christ which allows me to live eternally. What MORE do I need? He has chosen and saved me… I am the blessed one. No other freedom matters. He is my EVERYTHING..He is MY ALL!
“Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.”
I am so grateful for the privilege to be an American and all the freedoms that entails. We are truly blessed. Wow, to pick one…I am grateful for today…hmmm…it will have to be the freedom to be able to choose and marry the one I love! I love my husband!!
What beautiful feet your friends have! What am I thankful for? That there are people like your friends Les and Debbie who are willing to obey God’s call to share the Good News with others wherever the Spirit leads them – family in tow! I am personally thankful for my family. I love them.
I am thankful for the freedom of knowledge. So many people we meet here are unaware and fearful of the unknown. They are “stuck” in sin and don’t have the tools to seek or to know that God is who he says he is. So many of them have never even heard of Christ or the freedom He provides. So today I am thankful for all that I have been exposed to and got those before us loved us enough to make it possible to do what we are called to.
I am thankful for the freedom from my life before Christ, when I was lost.
I am thankful for the freedom to have a relationship with God, to go where I want and experience his glory in the outdoors, and to share what he is doing in me openly with others. Thanks for sharing your friends story!
I am so thankful for the freedom to worship/talk/love Christ in the open!
I am thankful for the freedom from the bondage of sin!
I’m thankful for the freedom we have in going to church whenever we want!
I am thankful for the freedom to take my kids to church & show them who Jesus is without fear for our lives.
I’m grateful for the freedom from condemnation–for there is no condemnation in Christ.
What a great story.
I’m thankful for the freedom of speech – the chance to share truth.
I am thankful for the opportunity to grow from women like you so I can pass what I’ve learned on to women in my own MOPS ministry
I’m thankful for the freedom from shame and condemnation.
I’m thankful for freedom of speech.
I’m so grateful for the freedom in Christ to give my burdens to him.. to not walk through trials alone, ever.
I am grateful for God choosing to place me in country where I can write my thoughts-right out there for everyone to see. I am grateful they can write back and tell me the way they feel-good, bad, kind or hurtful.
That is an absolutely beautiful necklace, and I’m so glad to hear about this designer. Thanks for clueing me in.
I am thankful for so many freedoms — to worship Christ freely, to speak of Him, to write of Him, to teach my children of Him without fear that something will happen to me or them because of the knowledge they have, just because I live in the country that I do.
But I’m also grateful for the freedom He gives me to be who He created me to be, and I think of that Ginny Owens song, “Free to dance, forget about your two left feet . . . free to sing, even joyful noise is music to me . . . free to laugh, ’cause You’ve given me Your love and it’s made me free. Free from worry, free from envy and denial. Free to give, free to live, free to smile . . . . ”
FREE!
My sweet daughter is going to going to go to Thailand and spend 3 weeks with her friend, a former exchange student…. I didn’t know the human trafficing was so bad. What God given friends you have to try to help fight it…. kathy
I am thankful for the freedom I have, living here in the US. I am also thankful for the freedom I have in Christ. It is so terrible, the sex trafficking that happens all over the world. I am a big supporter of anything that brings more awareness to us spoiled Americans!
Freedom to engage in Christ-centered friendships & community and be formed by it… freedom to be loved just the way I am… to be enough. Freedom to be married to the man I love and not someone I’m forced to love! Such a beautiful thing and I long for these young ones, these children enslaved to injustice, to know this freedom.
grateful for the freedom to provide for my kids without being forced into selling them to get by.
I’m grateful to have the freedom of loving my God without persecution. I’m grateful to choose the man i love and able to marry him. i’m grateful to have as man children I choose. I’m grateful for the oppertunity to protect my family. I’m grateful for the troops who protect our freedom.
I’m thankful for the freedom to worship freely with other believers. It’s something we definitely take for granted in the US.
Hmm, I was going to say I appreciate my freedom to worship God….but I think more important than the freedom to worship.. I have the freedom to SEEK God. I’m not stuck in a cultural prison where I am forced to do what my parents and other family members do. I have the freedom to attend a different church if I feel led and not stay in the same church as my older generations. I am so thankful that there are so many resources available to me to help me rise from my sinful nature, from my pain and SEEK God’s face. I am not alone! I have the freedom to have God be vibrant and real..and I am going to take that freedom.
Freedom to be who I am
Great giveaway and great question!! I’m just so thankful that I have the freedom to choose whatever I want to do, worshipping the way I want or even just going out whenever or where ever I want!
I am thankful for the freedom that comes with being a daughter of the King of Kings!
I am so thankful for my husband who is so patient with me and loves me as I am and for Jesus who is Lord of all!
Yes, freedom to worship our Lord, HAVE a Bible and share the Gospel. I have a friend and just learned of someone from our new church who serve in Thailand, too, working with these women. Awesome ministry. Need lots of prayer.
I am thankful for my freedom in Christ, the freedom of opportunity I have been given in American…and the freedom to CHOOSE to be a world influence, not to be influenced by the world.
And I am thankful even now that soon and very soon I will be free from rejection that has unfortunately made its way down the family line. But NOT anymore.
BREAKING FREE.
the freedom of opportunity I have been give in *America*, that is.
Who took my coffee!? Oh wait, I don’t drink coffee. Therein lies the problem folks.
I am thankful for the freedom to Love Christ, Serve Christ, Worship Christ etc.
I know we all take that for granted everyday.
I am also thankful for the freedom Christ gives us. We are free from bondage and death. He loves us that much.
I am so thankful I have the ability to worship God and am not forced to bow to anyone else’s gods. I am studying Daniel right now and what an amazing example of worshipping God in Babylon when it wasn’t even safe too! I’m so thankful for my Freedom!!!
the “it is finished” freedom, the price already paid for me to live free of shame, free from condemnation.
what a story. I’ve never known that kind of bondage… thank you for sharing.
I’m thankful for the freedom to simply BE who I am and still be deeply loved by the Father.
I’m thankful for the freedom of being able to say the name of Jesus in public.
In the past, I would have answered with some physical freedom. But in the last few month, God liberated me from feelings of guilt. Guilt for things I didn’t do but felt responsible for. It allowed me to understand freedom in a completely new way. So I am thankful for the freedom that God brings into each of our lives, if we let Him.
I am thankful for the freedom of choice. I also had a struggling marriage. We both struggled with selfishness for many years and actually divorced and thought we were done.
God felt differently (thankfully) and began to work on both of our hearts. Yes, I chose divorce, but because God loves us so much he used that horrible period of time to give me a glimpse of just how much He does love me. Because of the freedom of choice I was able to choose to love my husband again and choose to make right the wrong I had taken in going through with the divorce. We re-married last August and I am so thankful to have the freedom to choose to love when things are great and when things are not so great.
Beautiful necklace; I LOVE the symbolism.
I am thankful for the freedom to be real and honest with God.
I am thankful that I don’t have to pretend that I fully trust or that I am fully ok with what He is allowing in my life, and I am thankful that I can be honest before God with my heart and still enter His presence and praise Him.
I am so thankful that the veil was torn and that He is a God who understands!
Wow, Sarah, just found your blog. Thanks for sharing your heart so eloquently. I am so thankful to have the freedom to love… and that God is ever enabling me to grow in it.
http://mrsrll.wordpress.com
I am thankful for the freedom from anxiety & fear!! I lost my Mom to cancer 4 years ago. And after having my son (11 months ago), I started dealing with the fear of death.. me dying, me losing someone else I dearly love & anxiety of not being totally prepared. And after lots of prayer & re-commitment, I have found a lot of freedom & knowing that God has me & my family in His hands. And that I have nothing to be scared of because God has not given me the spirit of fear!
i’m eternally grateful for the freedom i have to fail. it’s liberating to know that i can screw up and still fall right into His arms.
I am thankful for the freedom from sin…that we are free in Christ!
Thankful for the freedom to be ME.