Ministry in Da Nang, Vietnam

^ at the beach with some missionaries we met from California

Xin chào! (hello in Vietnamese!) It is crazy to think I am already halfway done with my time in Vietnam. The time has absolutely flown by here! Mainly because my team LOVES it here! We are so blessed with tons of new friends and really fun ministry. All my blogs are caught up about Colombia and travel day, but I haven’t given any info on how life in Vietnam is going! I am planning on doing a series of blogs about culture and life here, ministry, and adventuring! For this blog, I’ll dive into detail about the ministry that we are doing here in Da Nang. If you have followed along on my instagram, you would notice that I haven’t posted many pictures from ministry. That is because there are certain people in the photos that we are not allowed to post for safety reasons with the specific ministry organization that we are working with. I am not sure if we are able to share much even after we leave either. I’ve had some questions about that so I wanted to clear the air!

For starters, our main ministry here in Da Nang is teaching english classes with College students. We have classes multiple times a day at coffee shops with a different batch of students from different universities throughout the city. My team prepares lessons based on their speaking level. Some topics have been travel, food/drink, family, Christmas, and basic sentences and phrases. Learning English is very important for the students because in order to graduate, they have to be fluent speakers. So having this extra learning time with English speakers is very helpful for them. We have met lots of students from different backgrounds and religious beliefs as well which has been fun to learn about! Because of certain regulations within the city (including it not being allowed to pray in public or evangelize) we have to pivot and invite those students to private coffee shop meet-ups to share the gospel in a more private space. In short, our ministry is very relational.

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^ English class and new friends!

Even if the laws were less strict around christianity, we still would have to take a similar approach because of the culture here. Most students are Buddhist or worship their ancestors. Vietnam is a Honor/Shame country, and when students are introduced to Christianity, they have hesitation because of the fear of bringing shame to their family. So, we build stronger relationships with them more individually by meeting up for coffee and slip in things of our religion in there. Most responses we get are the students either being very open to this new idea, or very hesitant and not wanting anything to do with it. It really just depends on their family dynamic. Through this, God has been teaching me to not be setback by rejection and that it is not about conversion. Even though it has happened, it is pretty rare that a student decides to except Christ then and there. But we are planting seeds within them, and it’s really all with Gods timing and trusting that he will continue to grow that seed and provoke questions about faith within them.

Last week, we were also given the opportunity to teach a 13 year old girl how to crochet! There is a group of 13 year old girls that are very vulnerable to human trafficking because of their age and their situation. Most of them have been abandoned  by their parents and are living on their own with no schooling. These girls have some older women as mentors that are teaching them life skills that would be helpful to them and getting a job. It was a very relaxing morning of crafting with one of the young girls and her menors crocheting and water coloring! She was so happy we were there and picked up crocheting really quickly! We were all very impressed!

^teaching crocheting and watercoloring!

Team Akouo has also been volunteering with Da Nang International Fellowship (we call it DIF)! We have been going there the past 3 weeks and have helped with hosting, youth group, cookie and cocoa stations, and prepping for a huge block party for a neighborhood by helping put together activities, baking cookies, managing stations, and I helped with photography! The nice thing about DIF is that the service is in English! The first church we attended was in full Vietnamese without translation which made it very difficult to stay engaged. We have made many friends and great connections with the community at DIF, especially the young adults. We’ve gone to some after church lunches with them, Christmas grill outs, bowling, and different events. God has really blessed us with this amazing community which will make it very hard to say goodbye in January.

^ bowling with new friends, Hieu and Louis and DIF young adults, cookie baking for block party, and grill out with DIF!

Another thing God has been teaching me here is that mission trips are not just to the middle of a village in Africa. They NEED to be everywhere. Every nation, tribe, and tongue, no matter how underdeveloped or developed the city is. There is always a need, and there is someone who doesn’t know Jesus. It is easy to get discouraged because our ministry doesn’t look like we all imagined, but God is allowing us to reach these students who might not have a physical need (like water, clothes, or food) but they have a huge spiritual need and a void within their hearts that they are searching to fill.

Thank you for reading yet another one of my blogs!! I am excited to fill you all in about daily life and adventuring in Vietnam very soon! Miss you all and Merry Christmas!

^amazing team picture for Christmas (w/outAdeline) & the gingerbread house made by 11 year old boys at youth group!

Ellie