I have been pretty obsessed lately with Suzanne Collins’ The Hunger Games.  I am about halfway through book 3 and yesterday while I was reading, God hit me over the head with a truth that I have known for a long time, but was challenged by in a new way yesterday. Katniss, the heroine of the story is visiting her friend Peeta in the hospital after he has been rescued from the evil Capitol who have subjected him to months and months of mental and physical torture. The Capitol has specifically tortured him by changing his memories of the heroine so that he will hate her and no longer love her, in their attempt to kill her. The exchange that insuses between the two is hateful and harsh as Peeta, who has always loved Katniss says, “Well, you’re a piece of work, aren’t you?” Katniss runs from the room and goes to her favorite thinking/hiding place and processess through why she was so hurt by Peeta’s comments. When she finally figures it, she says it is almost too mortifying to admit. “All those months of taking it for granted that Petta thought I was wonderful are over. Finally, he can see me for who I really am. Violent. Distrustful. Manipulative. Deadly. And I hate him for it.”

As I read these words yesterday, it was like God hit me over the head with a 2 x 4. There have been many times when I have found myself angry with God and if I examine the cause of my anger its because I realize I can’t fool God. He can see past all the fake niceness that I portray, the hiding of who I really am and even the lying to myself of who I am. He sees the insecurity, the meanness, the selfishness and the bitterness that are pushed down in my heart and that I don’t let anyone else see. As I processed through this thought, I thought about the fact that even though God sees all of the crap in my life, he somehow still loves me and wants to be in a relationship with me. Why is that? Why would he want to be around me when I don’t even want to be around myself sometimes? One word. Jesus. Because of what Jesus did on the cross and offering himself to die in my place, when God looks at me, he doesn’t see all that crap. He sees Jesus and the blood that was shed for my sins. Does He wish that all that other stuff wasn’t there? For sure, and He wants  me to work on fixing it, but that doesn’t stop him from loving me. He created me with all those flaws and yet he continues to love me. So the point in all this is How awesome is this fact? That God loves me even though he sees all the junk in my life that I try to hide and even through all of it, He faithfully loves me and wants whats best for me. 

- Melissa

“We celebrate the already. We anticipate what is to come.”

This is a quote from a prayer led by Sara Groves during worship at IJM’s 2012 Global Prayer Gathering (GPG).  It’s also how I would describe this year’s GPG weekend, in a nutshell.  (And I must confess, it is VERY hard to cram all that happened at GPG in a nutshell, or even in just a paragraph or two, but I will do my best!)

This year was my first time attending IJM’s annual Global Prayer Gathering.  Having seen friends return from previous years’ gatherings transformed, full of passion about prayer and overflowing with excitement for what God is doing, I went with the hope that I would get a glimpse of how God is working in the world and a gain a deeper understanding of the importance and power of prayer. I was not disappointed.

Much time was spent hearing how God has been faithful over the past year, answering many prayers and restoring hope around the world: Land restored to the widows and orphans of Zambia it was stolen from; the precedent-setting conviction of a Cambodian official for his involvement in providing protection to known traffickers;  justice for women and children in Ecuador who suffered domestic and sexual abuse;  freedom for Men who were wrongly accused and illegally detained in Kenya; citizenship for the members of the Hill Tribe in Thailand; and the hope and continued restoration provided to many children, women, and men through aftercare partnerships around the world.  These are only a few examples of the many answered prayers we celebrated.

We learned from IJM field staff the critical and most pressing matters that needed to be lifted up in prayer, and then we prayed. And oh how we prayed. I experienced such an amazing feeling of connectedness in prayer, such a deep sense of how, while we prayed together in one voice, God was intently listening and moving.  I returned home with a strong expectation to see what God will do next, and such excitement to continue praying.  

One of the Field Directors shared this vision: “The world is full of injustice. God hates this injustice and wants it to stop. We, his people, are his plan for stopping injustice.” We are all invited to be a part of this plan for stopping injustice; we are all invited to pray.

You can respond to this call to pray and learn more about the critical prayer needs for IJM’s work around the world by signing up for updates at IJM.org/PrayerPartners.

You can also  read more about this year’s Global Prayer Gathering at IJM.org/gpg .

- Robin Soendlin

After learning about the issue of human trafficking through Purchased, my husband Alex and I recently traveled to Cambodia to understand more about the situation in that country. We were able to visit The Daughters Project, one of Purchased’s partner organizations. Below is an account of our visit.

A highlight of our trip was visiting The Daughters Project inPhnom Penh. We had heard about this project for while, since it is a partner organization for Purchased and founded in part by a friend of ours! However, being there in person was a whole different story.

The project is a vocational training program for girls at risk of or recovering from exploitation by human trafficking. They make prom dresses designed by our friend Nicole, which are then sold at Sophia’s Bridal and Prom store here inIndianapolis.

Meeting these girls made a huge impression on us. They are overwhelmingly sweet, kind and welcoming! They made us feel right at home the moment we arrived at their workshop.

However, this was one of the hardest parts of the trip for us as well. Hearing about how some of the girls we were spending time with were literally moments away from being sold by their families was truly heartbreaking.

Dark Reality

InCambodia, families that are in desperate poverty are sometimes willing sell their daughters to earn money (other times, families are also tricked into this kind of “opportunity” thinking it is a legitimate job).

It’s one thing to know that these things are happening, but to meet people that it affects is a whole different story. As a woman, it’s an especially hard reality for me to swallow. It’s difficult to find words to express the ache in my heart as I think of these women and others around the world that have been affected by this issue.

Finding Hope

The encouraging thing is that this program identifies girls through relationships in the community, and provides a way to give them hope for a different future!  The girls live together in a safe house and are able to share life and meals together, when they’re not at the workshop. They have some beautiful green space to relax outside of the city.

We were able to visit the girls’ house, and had the most delicious lunch we had anywhere inCambodia! It was wonderful to see where they live and spend time together, which was a welcome retreat from the fast pace of the city.

Processing

These girls have made a strong impression on us. We’re completely overwhelmed by the immensity of the problem, and how many other women out there are affected, each with her own story. But like any problem, the first step is making a difference for one, two, or even ten women.

As we’ve been wrestling with this, we’ve been looking for the good. We’re encouraged to meet women whose lives have been changed. Conversations with these girls show that their lives are much different than before. They enjoy living together, and are now making plans for the future, like sewing or working in shops.

We’re also encouraged about how God is working through people who are using their energy and resources to help. There’s no way to know for sure, but these stories can now have endings of hope – not of perfect lives, but of a profoundly different future.

CGI and The Daughters Project

The Daughter’s Project is in its second year at Center for Global Impact (CGI). If you feel called to become involved or know more, go to www.myCGIstory.com or www.cgidaughters.com.

A Couple Cooks

If you visit our blog (www.acouplecooks.com), you can give back to one of the organizations Purchased supports! For any page that you click, the ad revenue that is generated is donated to Center for Global Impact (The Daughters Project) and International Justice Mission (IJM)!

Last summer I lived in Cambodia where human trafficking is incredibly prevalent, a very in your face sort of thing.  There is a sickening feeling that starts in your gut and ends in your throat when you see a known brothel, or when you see men walking into a karaoke bar, flanked with guards and filled with little girls disguised in layers of makeup and provocative clothes.  In the United States, I had never had that sickening gut feeling until a few months ago.

I was in a mall, and it was like time slowed and I noticed image after image that glorifies the sexual exploitation of women.  Belt buckles and signs with the word pimp stamped on them in big gold letters.  I saw a group of probably 13 year old kids making jokes about pimpin.  The boys talk, and the girls respond with laughter.  They have absolutely no idea what they are saying and what they are laughing about. 

Slavery was made illegal in 1865 under the 13^th amendment.  No one would call themselves slave owners now.  Not even in jest.  No, we just think it is perfectly acceptable to call each other pimp and brand the word on decorations, stickers, and clothing.  It is even fun to dress as a pimp for Halloween.   Would you dress as a slave owner for Halloween? 

I am enraged by our glorification of the pimp.  Why do we not look at pimps as the sex-offenders and slave owners that they are?  Forcing or coercing a child to have sex with people for money, and then taking that money.  That is what it is.  Pimps have the ability to manipulate girls into their control and there is little hope for release.  They beat their women, brand them with tattoos of the pimps name, isolate them from the outside world, but provide a nice dinner and clothing before sending them out to the streets. 

Slave Owner and Pimp: Different words, same meaning.

Out of curiosity I googled “songs with the word pimp.”  One search I encountered these results:

21 artists with “Pimp” as part of their name
107 Songs with “Pimp” as part of the title
2595 Songs with “Pimp” as lyrics

Those numbers are staggering, and most likely conservative. 

I think we get so used to the beat of the song, that we forget the meaning behind the lyrics.  We just enjoy the sound and sing on.  It is not until we stop and think that the meaning comes to light.

Here are a few lines from Three 6 Mafia’s “It’s Hard out Here for a Pimp.”

Wait I got a snow bunny, and a black girl too
You pay the right price and they’ll both do you
That’s the way the game goes, gotta keep it strictly pimpin
Gotta have my hustle tight, makin change off these women, yeah

You can say that this song is a commentary of life and injustice on the streets, but you would really have to read into all of the lyrics for that to hold even a little truth.  What this does is make pimpin ok because it is “necessary” or “the way life is.”  You can just look at the lyrics and find the disgusting truth of the word pimp.  The truth is that pimps control women; sometimes psychological abuse, sometimes physical abuse, most of the time using both.  “Gotta have my hustle tight, makin change off these women, yea”

My heart hurts for the kids I saw at the mall that day.  Are they to continue to grow in a culture in which pimpin is something funny and acceptable to joke about?  I desperately want them to understand and believe that controlling others is wrong, that a person’s value is not found in sex and money.  I want them to see that by treating a word with complacency and making it into a joke, we become numb to the meaning and it slowly becomes not an issue to us at all. 

Words have power.  If we allow the word pimp to become commonplace, we are then ignoring and eventually accepting the actions behind the word, dismissing the word and the action as something funny or glamorous.

The sexual exploitation of women and children is as far from funny or glamorous as it gets.

Fighting on,

Katie

Are you interested in knowing more about some of the upcoming events Purchased has to offer in 2012? Just go here for a list of our dates and events. There are many things coming up that you won’t want to miss, so mark your calendars now.

Registration for this year’s Run For One 5k  run/walk open’s in just a few days! We’ll be gathering again at Eagle Creek Park the morning of June 9th to continue our efforts in raising awareness of  human trafficking.

If you participated last year, you know that you don’t want to miss out. If you weren’t able to join us, make sure to be there this year. In addition to hearing some good information,supporting a good cause and spending a Saturday morning getting in some exercise with some good friends, you’ll also have the chance to win one of our great door prizes.

Registration is now open. Click here to sign up.

We’re looking forward to having you join us to help make this year’s Run For One even better than last years!

Many of you, by now, have heard the story of how Purchased began. It originated as one prayer to ask the Lord how to help in the issue of human trafficking, and one vision from Him to bring awareness through a concert. Who could have guessed, that four short years later, we would be celebrating after a very successful first fundraising dinner?

Certainly not me. I never could have dreamed how God has taken this thing, “Purchased” and shaped it, refined it, grown and stretched it, and blessed it into what it is today. It is my prayer (and my suspicion) that He will continue in the years to come as well!

This past Friday, however, was a significant step in our organization’s growth. The Illuminate dinner was a huge success! We all came away thrilled with the turnout, and blown away by the amount of money that was raised to help educate and raise awareness about human trafficking!

We had over 20 volunteers donate their time to help cook, serve, clean, and set up and tear down whatever we needed. The dedicated Purchased team of eight spent countless hours giving of their time and energy by planning, making phone calls, assembling silent auction packages, budgeting, mailing, and praying for this event. Over 40 businesses and individuals donated items for our silent auction. Two guest speakers offered their time to help teach us about the issue. Nearly 150 guests attended our dinner and helped us raise $11,000!

We want to say THANK YOU to everyone involved with the Illuminate dinner. We sincerely appreciate your continued support. Your efforts are making a difference in the abolition movement. We look forward to another surprising year with Purchased!

“Purchased educates people on the issues of human trafficking, sexualexploitation and abuse with the hope of promoting abolition by empowering others to join in the movement.”

Our first annual Purchased Fundraising Dinner, Illuminate – bringing stories of slavery to light,  is only days away! We’re busy getting things ready and putting together the final details. If you haven’t already done so, register here before it’s too late or all of the seats are filled.

In the meantime, we’d like to take a moment to thank the following event sponsors:

Barnes & Thornburg

IPL

Palmer-Fernandez

Starbucks  (2902 West 86th St.)

Josh Stoneking

Kendyl Adams

We’re so thankful for your support and encouragement as we team together to further bring awareness of human trafficking to our world!

Check out what our friends at A Couple Cooks are doing…

http://www.acouplecooks.com/2012/02/a-couple-cooksgoes-to-cambodia/