Friday, April 16, 2010

Rescue the Girls

For He has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son He loves. Colossians 1:13.

Imagine having to earn $500 - $800 a day? Imagine that if you didn’t you’d be beaten or your family was threatened with death? How do you do it? What if you are only twelve? A 12 year old girl.

A year or so ago, I was attending the monthly meeting of the Mayor’s Faith-Based Roundtable and learned that Atlanta was a hub for human trafficking and commercial sexual exploitation of children—the second leading illegal industry in the US after drug trafficking, it has surpassed weapons trafficking. You can sell a weapon only once; you can sell a girl over and over.

I learned there are at least 300,000 American children each year rented and sold, girls servicing 15-20 men a night. They don’t even get the money.

How do they get there? Parents may sell their children for drug or rent money or they may be kidnapped or they run away. Within 48 hours, 80% of runaways will be recruited into the industry. The recruiter/pimp provides her shelter, food, buys her things and takes care of her. After a while, he says he needs a little extra cash. Since he’s been spending so much money on her, can she help him out a little? He tells her he has some friends coming over. He gives her some drugs to make her compliant and the process of “breaking” begins.

What is God going to do about it?
He’s going to use you and me to promote awareness of the issue, especially in our churches—the perpetrators are in our churches. These rapists have fish symbols on their cars and car seats in the back of their mini-vans.

God can use you and me to encourage law enforcement to crack down on the pimps.

And He can use us to minister to the girls. Help bring the girls out of the darkness and into the kingdom. Visit www.livingwaterforgirls.org to learn how.