Hear the Sound of a Generation

I love how God heightens your sensitivity to His presence on mission trips. His Word offers fresh revelation, your heart is stirred deeper during worship, lyrics to praise songs you've sung for a million times suddenly leap out with new meaning.

Last night, during the first night of the Festival of Hope, Dougie and the band jammed out to "Salvation is Here" with thousands of young adults and kids from Cambodia jumping in the air. As we sung the lyrics "Here the sound of a generation, making loud their freedom song," I suddenly realized this was the freedom cry of the new generation of Cambodians whose parents/grandparents/relatives have been scarred by the horrible genocide. This new wave of young Cambodians were shouting out their freedom from fear, shame, and death -- and declaring all honor to Jesus! So cool!!

This morning, I had an opportunity to speak during day 2 of our leadership training for church leaders in Cambodia. Such an honor to share the training with Sherri May from Healing Place Church and Pastor Mundo Menses at Life Church. Ms. Sherri spoke about the importance of training and investing in our youth and Pastor Mundo did an incredible bring-down-the-house message exhorting the leaders to fulfill the Great Commission. I spoke about the importance of leadership and relationships. Specifically, I talked about how to build new relationships, sustain relationships, and how that translates into church partnerships. Really interesting to be speaking on such an oft-talked about subject in a foreign country with young church leaders. Most of them seemed to be engaged -- which is the biggest win when you're speaking with a translator! -- but hopefully they all learned something new too.

I heard yesterday that the churches in Battambang have pretty good relationships for the most part, but there is always the undercurrent of division when it comes to money, power, and politics. My prayer is that God will unite them and help them proatively share resources and leverage their differences! We've already seen much of this church synergy with the massive church volunteer teams that have come to help with the Festival of Hope - I can't wait to see the long-term fruit that will come from this festival weekend!

Miss everyone -- praying for all the incredible new services this weekend back in Jax!!!

Jenny Huang