Do You Have a Heart For Humans Trafficked?

Do You Have a Heart For Humans Trafficked?                  Kelly Durant       1-14-18

Isaiah 61:1 “The Spirit of the Lord God is upon Me,

Because the Lord has anointed Me To preach good tidings to the poor;

He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, To proclaim liberty to the captives,

And the opening of the prison to those who are bound;

2 To proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord, And the day of vengeance of our God;

To comfort all who mourn, 3 To console those who mourn in Zion,

To give them beauty for ashes, The oil of joy for mourning,

The garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness;That they may be called trees of righteousness,

The planting of the Lord, that He may be glorified.”

2. When I was a kid I use to play cowboys and Indians. I didn’t have any brothers or sisters so I would get my grandmother to tie me up in a chair, like I was captured. I loved the challenge of getting free and I would get the ropes off many times only after a few minutes. So because she got tired of me needing to get tied up so often she started tying me up for good. After about an hour I would have to yell out to her, “Ok, you win, I give! Untie me, please!”

Have you ever been in a bound situation where you could do nothing to stop the dominion and oppression of someone? What a horrible feeling, right? It is nothing like the game I use to play, it is real fear and helplessness. I think many people have felt oppression and abuse from those of their own families. Abuse and control is done in many ways, but it is almost always done by someone who has an advantage over you, either with physical size, money, or by threats.

Maybe you have not had your hands tied, but possibly you have been abused by an employer who insulted you or never payed you correctly. Or maybe a violent abusive mate was in your past? And what about so-called friends who entrap you into some dirty business and you then have a big debt to pay?  Abuse is everywhere but due to embarrassment, people keep their secrets, and this is wrong and unjust. God’s solution is freedom in Jesus!

3. This month is human trafficking awareness month and the Salvation Army does its best to get the word out there that we are here to help free the oppressed! You should check out what our USA websites and YouTube clips inform, we are serious about helping people! Your brothers, sisters, and soldiers in the Lord will find safe houses for those escaping horrible situations! There not only exists the porn, drug, prostitution, slave labor exploitation world here, but in many other countries as well. We need to wake up and ‘Do Something!” as child prostitution and slave labor still persistingly exists, so what are you going to do to combat this evil?

Human trafficking is modern day slavery! It exists in many forms. We should all be shocked that there is more slavery today in the world than what ever has been! Here are some modern day slavery statistics that you probably didn’t know about. There are many websites but here is one I found at http://www.theworldcounts.com/stories/Modern_Day_Slavery_Statistics  Below are some quotes from the site…

‘There is an estimated 20 to 30 million slaves across the world today. It is hard to count the exact numbers of a hidden population.

90% of women and children who end up as Sex Slaves were victims of childhood sexual abuse before they were recruited.

You are in greater risk of being hit by a bolt of lightning than you are of going to jail, if you enslave a person in South Asia.

An estimated number of 800,000 people are illegally trafficked across international borders every year.

There are 161 countries affected by human trafficking.

The total yearly profit gained from human trafficking is a staggering $32 billion a year.

Majority of modern slavery victims are between the ages of 18 and 24 years old.

1.2 million children are enslaved through forced labor and exploited in the sexual industry each year.’      This is a lot to take in! How appalling and shocking, right?

4. Considering we are free from having a horrible monster over us controlling our every move making us do horrible things, (we are blessed by God!) we should feel conviction to help those who are suffering under this increasing plague of evil. The good thing is you are a part of this Army who does come through with Salvation. When someone speaks up, there are connections and ways to help people get into a safe and new situation.

One example, I personally took a Colombian lady one time to a safe-house in Georgia. She was escaping a violent ex-husband who had beat her badly in the past. The information about these victims is private, but I can tell you this, that it is true, anyone escaping prostitution, exploitive pimps, or exploitive bosses can get a new start by just stepping out to ask!

That is the big problem, those intimidated in these situations do not know others can and will help them!  What I love is Jesus took on this abuse in the very first sermon of His ministry!  He said: “The Spirit of the Lord God is upon Me, Because the Lord has anointed Me To preach good tidings to the poor; He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, To proclaim liberty to the captives.”

5. So here is my question to you, “Will you be like Jesus to announce to others that they can have liberty from their oppressors?” Would you call the police, or call someone if you saw an abusive situation, if you saw an underage prostitute or victim of a bad work situation? If you don’t care, watch out, you one day may need help away from an evil person and not find a way!

I often get upset when I see minorities, Hispanics or blacks, who see a bad situation daily and do nothing about it to help their own. Well, I get mad at whites too!  It’s just that for the past 40 years I have worked in communities of minorities! We have had friends that have told us that the ladies (immigrants often without papers) will take their 14 year old daughters to the beauty salon so they can make them pretty so they can prostitute them!?  If any young person here has ever been forced, we would like to know about! Forced sex leaves a scar but the good news is Jesus can heal those scars.  But you must be willing to be God’s instrument and voice!

Listen to this again: “He (God) has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, To proclaim liberty to the captives.” It is Jesus who heals and frees, but Jesus has no hands but your hands! Jesus depends on you and me to make that phone call, and to do our part and “do something” so that we bring healing and freedom to a person bound in suffering. Never fear the evil ones! God knows and God protects you from evil people when you denounce a criminal, illegal, horrible oppressive act being done on an innocent one!

6. The problem with the world today is too many people accept evil! Too many people are asleep, indifferent, or afraid to confront evil and call it for what it is! Be like Jesus, denounce evil! How was it with all of those want-to-be Hollywood actors and actresses? Those of the #metoo movement? To get to have a part in a movie they were forced sexually and then intimidated, threatened, and bullied so that they would not denounce the violators. Hundreds and hundreds kept silent until just last year! Abuse has always been rampant with those in power, with dictators and political leaders in high places. But it is all coming out to the light! And still there are rebellious horrible people like atheists who reject God’s command such as ”thou shall not commit adultery’, God had in mind to execute people who were exploiters.

These damaged folks had to live with all of that bottled up stress of oppression (which was killing them inside as they used drugs to cope) and the abuse often lasted for years! And these are only a few! There are mega millions still out there! And in the porn and prostitution industry they are controlled by pimps giving them addictive drugs and their entire bodies feel extreme pain when they don’t get their fix. All their money goes to the pimp for drugs! So modern day slavery is the same as torture, and all I can say is that those who manipulate, torture, and destroy children, youth, women, and the poor have to answer to God who will send their soul to a place of perpetual torture, hell! That is unless they repent!  

Here’s what Jesus said: Mark 9: 42 “But whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to stumble, it would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck, and he were thrown into the sea. 43 If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter into life maimed, rather than having two hands, to go to hell, into the fire that shall never be quenched.   You must proclaim the, “the day of vengeance of our God;”

7. So be thankful you are not being exploited (speak up if you are being exploited!) and be thankful you are not one who is exploiting! The ones being exploited live lives in hell everyday doing things that is making them old before their time! To not care about this is to deny the faith, what use is a so-called Christian who will not help another abused and in need?

The Salvation Army is animate about serving the poor and helping those in need, and helping someone away from a life of drugs or alcohol, away from a life of prostitution, away from a life of being used and abused is what a Salvationist does! Have you read our history? Who have you helped lately? Who will you help in the future? You might discover a friend of yours is being abused or exploited, so what will you do?

I am very proud that around the world the Salvation Army can help others. We are the ones who must do this mission: “To comfort all who mourn, 3 To console those who mourn in Zion,

To give them beauty for ashes, The oil of joy for mourning, If you have never helped a person find Jesus and His liberating comforting love, you are failing to do as He did and commanded.

8. 3 To console those who mourn in Zion, (This means helping spiritual Zion, the believers in God) What do you do to make others feel better? When someone is suffering, are you there for  them? And, “To give them beauty for ashes, The oil of joy for mourning”, in this case what does it mean? The ashes represent a total loss! We have helped people whose houses have burned down and if you were in their shoes it would be awful to need clothing, tooth paste, and everything! Being homeless is like losing it all to ashes!

But having your life in ashes also implies the spiritual, that you lost everything inside, it was burned up or taken by sin in conjunction with some evil person; you lost your innocence, your freedom, your dignity, your desire to live! So what is meant by this part, ‘The garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness’? People who have been used and abused and lost it all have a heavy or shockingly dry somber spirit that makes you feel depressed just to see their faces! And what is our role that Jesus gave the example of? To bring them a garment of praise!

This means we are putting clothes back on them and giving them a new life! We are giving them a reason to live and a reason to praise God that there is hope and that there are people out there loving them no matter what, helping them obtain their respect and joy again. You must look past their sin, you must love them as a creation of God damaged by sin, Satan, and evil people!

9. One last thing, I have been very mad, yes, very upset at my fellow Christians, when I or someone have brought into the church a visitor who obviously appeared to be a prostitute, a sinner, or an uneducated exploited farm worker and they were treated with disrespect. Why? Because some ‘perfect one’ was rude to get them to never come back to the church because they were undesirable! I’m sure this makes Jesus furious as He came to save the lost souls! Our mission is to save the “lost and the worst”! Abused suffering people do not need more shunning and abuse from comfortable Christians! One day God will reveal to these so-called Christians, that these exploited ones may have rejected church and Jesus because of their unloving shameful attitude towards them! I do not want to be in their shoes on judgement day.

So if you are doing your part, if you help only one soul in your life (but why not help 10 or even 100?) then you will have the blessings of God! You will be strong! You will be compared to a tree that brings shade and fruit! 3. “That they may be called trees of righteousness,

The planting of the Lord, that He may be glorified.”

Every time you or I do something to help another, we are establishing (planting) the ‘kingdom of God’ Jesus taught about! We are glorifying God when we do what Jesus taught us, to proclaim to others His Salvation by acts and deeds of kindness to who are in deplorable conditions! Get educated, learn the signs of people who are abused and for the love of Jesus, help them get free and be able to start a new life! Prayer…