IYF Bangkok

“IYF Bangkok stands as the most powerful experience I have yet had at any church event,” said youth minister Scott Giles.

Our last evening began with a huge banquet. While waiting for dinner a small group of Americans, Filipinos, Thai, and one or two Nepalese began an informal drum circle. At first it was not completely in sync, but gradually it began to lock, and finally groove. Then, without any direction or words, everyone converged on the dance floor—Korean, Japanese, Chinese, Filipino, Thai, East Indian, Sri Lankan, Nepalese, South Indian, American all came together in a moment outside time. All our differences—culture, nationality, social class, economic status, first-world or third-world—dropped away. We danced together as one body, alive in God’s unifying Spirit.

There are no words really to describe this moment, no way to convey the power and the message we all understood. God’s joyful Spirit was present: equaling, unifying, ecstatic!

God’s community was palpable and achingly beautiful in that moment.

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photo
by
Justin
Troxell