When I first saw her, I didn’t realize that I was looking into the face of poverty.
On one of my early trips to Cambodia, I was walking along an urban street and noticed this street vendor frying and selling rice cakes from her cart. I had been warned not to eat food from street carts, but I was compelled to patronize her little business. The cost for two cakes was 500 Reil (about 12.5 cents – and that was the tourist price).
Munching on the cakes with a small amount of leafy vegetable inside, I quickly did some math in my head to figure out the profitability of her sale. Considering cost of goods and other overhead, she might have made a couple of cents on my purchase at best. With some more figuring I calculated that this young woman, most likely a mother, makes around a dollar a day. Even double that amount places her below the poverty line by third world standards. When I offered her a few hundred more Reil as a tip, she looked confused because tipping isn’t part of their culture. I gestured that it was a gift, and she hesitantly but gratefully thanked me, “aw khun” she said and smiled.
What is Poverty?
Poverty is hunger. Poverty is lack of shelter. Poverty is being sick and not being able to see a doctor. Poverty is not having access to school and not knowing how to read. Poverty is not having a job; it is fear for the future, living one day at a time. Poverty is losing a child to illness brought about by unclean water. Poverty is powerlessness, lack of representation and freedom. The poor are also the most vulnerable to extreme forms of exploitation like human trafficking and slavery.
Business as Mission
My concept of effective ministry was changed by my encounter with the young woman selling rice cakes. Knowing that the immensity of the need in that one community alone far exceeded my resources, I wondered if there was a way to address the root of the problem. Traditional charity creates dependency and is not a sustainable solution to poverty. So later, when I discovered the Business as Mission (BAM) movement that is sweeping through the Church and human relief organizations, I was captivated by the possibilities.
As you probably already know, I have subsequently been privileged to partner with some good friends to form an organization called Marketplace Ministries Worldwide. Through MMW, we built and opened a restaurant (Divine Pizza & Ribs) in Phnom Penh, the capitol city of Cambodia. There we provide jobs, skills training, and transformational development to eager Khmer people. It is a Holistic ministry, showing the love of Jesus to people in need by ministering to each of them as a whole human being. This means addressing physical, emotional, and spiritual needs. It has been remarkable to see the effects of giving someone “a hand up instead of a hand out.” By providing jobs that pay a fair wage, we can immediately extract a family from the crushing grip of poverty. Being able to offer this kind of opportunity to people in the name of Jesus has been one of the greatest thrills of my life.
Transformational Development
With our emphasis on sustainability, reproducibility, and empowerment, we sent Michelle Murray, an American expatriate fluent in Khmer language and culture from 10 years experience as a church planting missionary with the Evangelical Friends Church, to be our “business missionary” at DPR. There she manages operations, provides training in vocational and life skills, and shares the Gospel through word and deed with our staff, vendors, suppliers, customers and neighbors.
We need your help
As we near the end of the first year of operations for Divine Pizza & Ribs we are incurring some unexpected costs and also need to raise additional support for Michelle. Please consider a one-time gift or even better a monthly commitment to support our business as mission. A little bit from a lot of people goes a long way.

We are grateful to our supporters who have already pledged and provided the vital funds needed to bring this ministry platform into existence. As always we depend on you to pray for us and for the staff at DPR. May God richly bless you as you have blessed us.
Shalom,
Jeff Davis
MMW – Board of Directors









