Larry and I recently donated to www.love146.org, which is an organization primarily dedicated to stopping sex trafficking. Let me tell you why…
Reading Isaiah for the last few months has not been good for my lack of compassion about world wide oppression. God’s heart for the widows, oppressed, poor, and children is stated over and over again. God’s message through Isaiah is, “Stop your religious activity and take action about what I care about. That is true religion and fasting.”
The Israelites ask God, “‘Why have we fasted, …and you have not seen it? Why have we humbled ourselves, and you have not noticed?'” (Isaiah 58:3) In other words, they are demanding that God answer their prayers to end their own oppression in Babylon.
God says in reply (Isaiah 58:6-7), ““Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen: to loose the chains of injustice and untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and break every yoke? Is it not to share your food with the hungry and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter—when you see the naked, to clothe him, and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood.”
Then God tells them (if they do that), he will give them many blessings (vs 8-10) and answer their prayers.
A few years ago I was first really struck with the horrible sex trafficking problem when we attended our Centurions program. Larry Haugen received an award at our conference for his work through International Justice Mission http://www.ijm.org. I haven’t been able to get the picture out of my mind that they showed of how little girls were used for sex slaves. What broke my heart even more was how one of the older girls begged to be taken for the next client instead of one of the younger ones. She was trying to protect the younger girl. And we’re talking about an 8-year-old who already has been used and abused repeatedly.
I’m sorry this is so hard to hear about. But it’s happening all over the world. God cares about those little ones. We can be praying that He will reveal the wicked people’s “businesses” that are doing these despicable things. And we can give to support the organizations that fight against this evil.
We decided to give to www.love146.org because we are acquainted with one of the women on it’s Board of Directors. But we recommend both that organization and International Justice Mission.