One night, while praying on a balcony in Chiang Mai, Thailand, I asked the Lord a question that had been heavy on my heart after touring two Buddhist temples the previous day: What would it take for a country that is 94% Buddhist to be turned upside down on its head? His response: They need to see Christ.
That month, I was working with an organization called Lighthouse in Action, founded by Emmi Khanthana, an incredible woman of God who is dedicated to ending human trafficking in Thailand. That month, I went out to the bars where women and lady-boys were being bought and sold every night. But when I walked into the bars, they didn’t need to see another Christian missionary. They needed to see Christ.
That same night, God brought me to John 12:24, which says, “I tell you the truth, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds.” I needed to die. I needed to learn what it looked like to really die to myself and instead, have Christ come fully alive in me. To walk in the freedom that He has already given me. The freedom that is already mine. The freedom that was just waiting for me to wake up, grab hold and take possession of it.
Why?? He answered so clearly: “Because there are nations inside of you. There are nations inside of the women in those bars.” And I believe that there are nations inside of the women in the U.S. who are being trafficked every single day in our own back yards. People groups who are waiting for them to encounter God in such a way that propels them to go out and set other captives free.
Not too long after that, the Lord really began to open my eyes to the war that has been raging against women and why the enemy so desperately seeks our destruction. In Genesis 3:14-15, God cursed Satan, saying,
Because you have done this, cursed are you above all livestock and all wild animals! You will crawl on your belly and you will eat dust all the days of your life. And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.
I will put enmity between you and the woman. Enmity is defined as “hostility; the extreme ill will or hatred that exists between enemies.” When God created woman, He gave her the name Eve, which translates to ‘life bearer.’ But since that fateful day in the garden, women have been seen as enemies to the kingdom of darkness and Satan has used every tool in his possession to destroy the very bearers of life because he knows that to destroy a woman is to destroy the nations that the Lord has placed inside of her.
Sex slavery and human trafficking has got to be one of the cruelest and most devastating ploys of the enemy to destroy the life inside of a woman. But here we are, in 2013, with approximately 27 million people enslaved in the Sex Trade. And that doesn't include the men who buy them; the men who are just as bound, just as enslaved, just as much in need of being rescued and having their lives restored and redeemed. We can't afford to sit and do nothing. So in the words of Elie Wiesel, I leave you with this:
There may be times when we are powerless to prevent injustice, but there must never be a time when we fail to protest.
It's been almost 2 months since I returned to the United States after spending a year overseas on a missions trip called The World Race. And it was one of the hardest, most incredible adventures I've ever been on with the Lord. But during the last year, the Lord has taught me so many things.
One of the biggest takeaways for me on the Race, outside of having my identity as a daughter of the King firmly rooted and established in my heart, was that I have a voice that is both powerful and carries authority. And it is coupled with a deep conviction to live out Proverbs 31:8-9: “Open your mouth for the mute, for the rights of all who are destitute. Open your mouth and judge righteously. Defend the rights of the poor and needy.”
Over the last year, the Lord has been calling me out of hiding and calling me out of silence. And I believe that He is calling me to use my voice to fight against oppression and injustice. To open my mouth and speak up for those whose voices have been stripped away. For those who have lost the will to fight for themselves. That is the Lord’s call on my life and I believe that He is calling me to Beauty from Ashes Ministries to begin living that out.
Before this year, I’d never really had a heart for women. In fact, after spending four years attending a women’s college, I was quite sick of hearing people talk about women’s right and fighting against women’s oppression. But during this past year, the Lord began to break my heart for women, specifically those trapped in the sex industry and the sex trade.
While in the Philippines, I got the opportunity and distinct privilege of working with a ministry called Wipe Every Tear. While there, I lived with women who had been bought, sold, and forced into the sex trade. Women who had been betrayed by the very people who were supposed to love, care for, and protect them. I met girls on the street who looked like they had barely hit puberty. 12 and 13-year olds who climbed into cars with grown men who took them to God knows where for the night.
And my heart broke. And it still breaks. Because they are worth SO. MUCH. MORE. They were created for more. They were designed for more. They were made for freedom. Radical, life-altering, liberating freedom. The kind of freedom that sets others free. And more than anything, I desire for their hearts to be set free.
That is my desire for my own heart as well and what I hope to acquire by interning at BFA. My desire is to spend another year being discipled and working in an environment where the truth about my worth and my value will continue to be ingrained in my own heart and where I will be pushed to deeper levels of freedom in Christ.
In doing so, my prayer is that the Lord would use me, my story, and my voice to pour into the lives of the women I get to meet over the next year and that they would encounter the God of the universe who desperately longs to fulfill the promises of Isaiah 61 in their lives.
If you would like to be a part of this journey and join in on the fight to rescue women from the sex trade, please check out My Campaign and pray about what God would have your role to be.
If you know me or you've visited this blog before, then you know that I am currently in the process of moving to Fort Myers, Florida to begin a year long internship with Beauty From Ashes Ministries (BFA) where I be working to rescue women and children in the sex industry.
When the founder of BFA, Julie Shematz, first began doing strip club OutREACHes in 2002, there were less than 5 ministries doing this specialized type of outREACH in the United States and zero in the rest of the world.
You may wonder why this is such a problem. Well, here are a few statistics that were releases in 2008.
1. Human Trafficking is now considered the 2nd largest and fastest growing illegal trafficking activity in the world. (United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, 2008)
2. The United Nations estimates the total market value of human trafficking at $32+ billion-a-year. (United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, 2008)
3. 80% of victims are women. Out of those women, 50% are children (under 18).
(Trafficking in Persons Report 2007 U.S. Department of State)
4. A prostituted child is forced to serve between 100 to 1500 clients per year.
(Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, 2007)
5. One million children are forced to work in the sex industry every year. Between 100,000 and 300,000 children in America are at risk for sex trafficking each year.
(Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, 2007)
6. Among the millions trafficked each year, hundreds of thousands are teenage girls, and others as young as 5, who fall victim to the sex trade.
(Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, 2007)
7. Child pornography is a multi-billion dollar industry and among the fastest growing criminal segments on the Internet. (National Center for Missing and Exploited Children)
8. As many as 2.8 million children live on the streets, a third of whom are lured into prostitution within 48 hours of leaving home. (Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, 2007)
9. The average age of entry into prostitution in U.S. is 13 years old.
(Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, 2007)
Now, as of June 2013, there are over 180 ministries doing strip club/sex industry outREACH in the United States and worldwide. And I am looking forward to being a part of it.
However, in order to take part, I need a total of $18,000 to cover the cost of housing, food, transportation and ministry supplies for a year in Fort Myers. This will enable me to devote an entire year to ministering to women in the sex industry and introducing them to the God who desperately wants to bestow upon them a crown of beauty instead of ashes.
If you would like to take part and join the fight to help put an end to Human Trafficking and Sex Slavery, please check out my campaign at: http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/rescuing-women-from-the-sex-trade/x/956254 and considering giving a financial donation to make this possible :D Thank you so much for your support!!
Welcome to Justice in the Red Light District, a blog dedicated to raising awareness about sex slavery and the practice of Human Trafficking, not only in other parts of the world, but in America's own back yard.
In two weeks, I will be moving to Fort Myers, Florida to begin a year long internship with Beauty From Ashes Ministries (BFA) where I will be working to help rescue women and children trapped in the sex industry. BFA is a grass roots, pioneering ministry that is dedicated to reaching and assisting women and children involved in and/or associated with the sex industry; commercialized sexual exploitation, trafficking and adult entertainment.
Through outreaches, professional counseling, discipleship, mentors, and art and equine therapy programs, BFA seeks to minister to women in the sex industry and introduce them to the God who desperately wants to bestow upon them a crown of beauty instead of ashes (Isaiah 61:3).
So please, join me as I embark on this journey of stepping into what the Lord has for me during this next season of my life and allowing him to bring me to deeper places of freedom in Him as I go out and fulfill the call He has on my life: to open my mouth and use my voice to break the chains of oppression and see the captives set free.
