It’s 2025!!!

It’s 2025!!!

by | Mar 29, 2025 | Cambodia, Compassion, Missions

Time is speeding by!! This reading blog has been neglected during the last few years! I have been continuing to travel and to help women to create sustainable income for themselves and for their children. I started Empowered Women Create as a non-profit and in August of 2022, I opened an Art & Creativity Center in Bonne Terre, MO.

This has been a busy and rich time of opportunity and convergence of dreams and ideas. How has your last few years been? Do things seem to be speeding up?!!

I want to be sure I am seizing the opportunities that each day provides, whether it be with grandkids and family or creating creative opportunities for others or helping people.

I am still reading, though not quite as prolifically as I have in the past.  While I was in Cambodia for 6 weeks, I bought and read

Cambodia’s Curse Paperback – September 4, 2012

by Joel Brinkley (Author)
3.9 on Goodreads
Cambodia's Curse

A Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist describes how Cambodia emerged from the harrowing years when a quarter of its population perished under the Khmer Rouge.

A generation after genocide, Cambodia seemed on the surface to have overcome its history — the streets of Phnom Penh were paved; skyscrapers dotted the skyline. But under this façe lies a country still haunted by its years of terror.

Although the international community tried to rebuild Cambodia and introduce democracy in the 1990s, in the country remained in the grip of a venal government. Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Joel Brinkley learned that almost a half of Cambodians who lived through the Khmer Rouge era suffered from P.T.S.D. — and had passed their trauma to the next generation. His extensive close-up reporting in Cambodia’s Curse illuminates the country, its people, and the deep historical roots of its modern-day behavior.

This was a very difficult read to hear of the continued oppression and difficulties in Cambodia, where I am now working with women.  Yet reading this book created an even greater respect & support for the people who are working to bring the love of Jesus to the Khmer. It also created a greater understanding of what they have been through, what they are gong through, and the society issues that are there.

Sometimes we need to realize, whether we are here in our own country or overseas in another, people have been affected by difficult situations, possibly violence and abuse that we cannot imagine. May we be sensitive to encourage and love each person that comes our way.

What book have you read lately that challenged you?

My Trip to Cambodia Ignites My Reading

by | Jun 9, 2018 | Cambodia, Missions, slavery

Let’s talk about books!

My Trip to Cambodia Ignites My Reading

Wow!  I was so affected by the 2 week exploratory trip to Cambodia.  To actually walk through “The Killing Fields” and the S21  Genocide Museum and to hear the testimonies and see the place where many were killed.  It is estimated 2 million people died during the time period of 1975-1979 under the Khmer Rouge.   I wept as I saw and heard and felt the horror and oppression of these people.  I was so grateful to meet one of the few survivors of S21, Chum Mey.  I was able to take his hand and look him in the eye and tell him how sorry I was for what he had been through and his family and his country.  We hugged and wept.  I bought his book to treasure his story.

Survivor: The triumph of an ordinary man in the Khmer Rouge genocide You tube of Chum Mey
I was also greatly affected by the ministry of Iris Cambodia there with the children and the families of the slums and with the rescue of children and women from the sex trafficking.  
Notice the polymer clay hearts on these dear girls…. I gave out 104 hearts to tell the girls and women in the bars and brothels and the slums that they are LOVED.  If you would like to help me prepare hearts to share for my September trip, please contact me or go HERE to my website.
When I returned home I continued to read and research about Cambodia:

and I watched the movie on Netflix   


I am also hosting a screen showing of the short film of the 10 year history of A21/Christine Cane’s ministry to end human trafficking.  
A21 10-YR
I want to invite you to come this Wednesday, June 13, 6 pm at the
Parkland House of Prayer in Bonne Terre, MO on the hill at Bonneville Plaza.
I will also share briefly what other ministries are doing as well as share what
I will be doing in September when I return to Cambodia.
You are important in the fight against slavery.  You can make a difference!
Let’s talk about it!
Some of the “You are Loved” hearts for the Have a Heart Campaign
will be available if you would like to participate in the “Buy 1 & Give 1.”
Blessings!  Let’s talk about books!

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