Breakfast and blessings: Global Mission Fellow Sopha Touch reflects on his work at Wesley’s Chapel and Whitechapel Mission

Sopha Touch (aka Tony), a Global Mission Fellow from Cambodia, reflects on his work at Wesley’s Chapel and Whitechapel Mission for homeless people during the Covid19 pandemic. He is pictured  with Revd Dr Jennifer Smith, Superintendent Minister at Wesley’s Chapel and Leysian Mission. 

Hello, my beloved brothers and sisters in Christ,

This is Sopha Touch or you can call me Tony, a Global Mission Fellow from Cambodia. I am serving here at Wesley’s Chapel with the young adults’ group.  I am glad to be able to use my gifts and presence to serve with them and to see our lives grow together. Even though we can’t have fellowship together during this pandemic time, God is faithful and is teaching us how to be together as one, even though we are apart. We now use social media, especially Zoom, to meet up and do some bible study, games, activities, and to talk and share how we are, so we don’t feel lonely and we can overcome during this time. 

Besides working with Wesley’s Chapel, I also spend three days per week working with Whitechapel Mission which supports homeless and needy people. It helps them get their life back on track by offering hot food, showers, clothing, job advice, universal credit advice, as well as help looking for shelter etc. Because of the lockdown, some of the people are desperate and feeling overwhelmed, as I do sometimes too.  My heart really worries about homeless people - how will they survive if the government requires our Mission to close down? There are a lot of charities closing down, but thank God our Mission is still open, and us staff are happy to serve them, although volunteers can no longer come to help. We start early and cook hot British breakfast which we serve  from 7-9 am. We see new people every day, we are blessed and happy to be able to help them during this time of crisis.

Please pray for healing and pray for us  staff and all the people in the Mission, because if someone has coronavirus it could  be easy to transmit it to everyone even though we are social distancing. But in Jesus we trust, He will protect us. Even though things don’t sound good, I am not afraid. The words of John Wesley always come to my mind and encourage my heart “The best of all, God is with us!” And one of my favourite bible verses for now and forever is “For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain.” Philippians 1:21

May the Blessing, Love, Joy, Peace, Wisdom of Our Lord Jesus Christ be with you always.   In His Love, Tony 

To read more about the Global Mission Fellow programme click here