Ever Heard of Pchum Ben?

This coming week, we get to be in Cambodia during a huge holiday called Pchum Ben. This is a Khmer holiday that culminates at the end of Buddhist Lent, which this year will happen on October 1. The officially observed days for Pchum Ben are October 1-3.

I only just learned about this holiday upon coming to Cambodia, so before anything else I want to acknowledge that my own knowledge to share is very little. But from what I’ve learned in the meantime, Pchum Ben is a time where families gather together from across the country to bring offerings (especially food) to pagodas. At the pagodas, they offer what they’ve made to monks and to the spirits of their dead ancestors, whom they believe are released/called up to interact with the living during this time. Because of the Buddhist belief in karma, families offer food to the spirits to create merits for their journeys in purgatory. This can lead to some fearfulness, though, as many believe that improper or insufficient offerings will lead to their ancestors cursing them.

This website goes over a lot of the basics of Pchum Ben if you want to learn a bit more!

Because everyone is gathering for the holiday, we won’t have any structured ministry in the villages or at school for those first days of October. Part of our goal during those 3 days is to take time to intercede for Cambodia as spiritual warfare intensifies. This holiday brings together Buddhist practices as well as ancestor worship, overall leading to a heightened fear of evil spirits. And it’s justified – Khmer people are very open to spiritual things, and in general will welcome spirits via spirit houses and such. Pchum Ben is even heavier and more dangerous in that sense than normal, because families directly call on spirits to come when they make their offerings. Even at a church service I attended this weekend, there was acknowledgment of the coming holiday and the spiritual heaviness over Cambodia as a result – it’s a big deal, especially spiritually, and has to be acknowledged as such by the believers here. 

All that said, please consider taking some time on October 1-3 to pray for Cambodia with us!

Prayer Requests for Cambodia during Pchum Ben:

• protection over local believers and extra strength and faith for them in this time
• that believers in Buddhist families would stand firm in their faith despite the difficulty of this time, that they would shine as lights to their family and community and that God would show them how to still honor their parents without compromising their faith in Christ
• openness to the Holy Spirit in the midst of festivals celebrating what’s not of God
• supernatural encounters with Jesus
• open eyes and ears and hearts to the truth, and that truth would be revealed even in the midst of lies
• opportunities for believers to speak life and truth into people observing this holiday, especially those observing out of tradition or requirement
• that hopelessness or fear or anxiety stirred up by Pchum Ben would drive people to seek peace and true, secure salvation – and find it in Jesus
• that God’s power and goodness would overcome evil during this time! (And always, but especially these days!)