CQ

This is a short talk I gave at church this week

We serve a just God, who grieves deeply for the exploited and oppressed. Our God loves children and values them intensely.

Those priorities are vividly clear in scripture and in the example of Christ.

Matthew 18: 5-6 says…
And whoever welcomes a little child like this in my name welcomes me. But if anyone causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a large millstone hung around his neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea.

Isaiah 1:15-17 says…
…Learn to do good; seek justice, rescue the oppressed, defend the orphan, plead for the widow.

I would like to summarize for you our journey over the past year that has led my wife Marta and I into uncharted spiritual territory.

While we were on vacation last summer, Marta and I stumbled upon an episode of The Oprah Winfrey Show. Ricky Martin was her guest and child trafficking was the subject. We were stunned and horrified to hear that over a million children around the world are being enslaved and forced into prostitution. UNICEF reports that worldwide, an estimated 1.2 million children are trafficked each year. As these statistics sank in, our hearts began to break for these children who are being exploited for profit. That night we got on the internet and began researching to find out what Christians were doing about this. We initially found only a few organizations including one ministry called International Justice Mission. They are a human rights organization made up of Christian lawyers, law enforcement, and social workers. They work with local governments in the developing world to rescue slaves, and to protect the weak, oppressed and exploited – including children.

Soon after that trip we talked to our small group about this horrible practice. Come to find out, another couple from the group had seen the same show and had a similar reaction. They also searched the internet and discovered through a Barclay Press article an organization called Remember Nhu, founded by Carl Ralston. Josh called Carl and the next thing we know he’s flying out to meet with us and speak at our church.

At the same time, in my role as the administrator of a Christian High school, I had been working with a team of teachers and staff to find an organization that we could partner with to provide missions opportunities for our students. Partnering with Carl was beginning to seem like it could be a good fit.

A few months passed and in one of our small group meetings Josh told us that he was going to Thailand with Carl in January. I immediately felt moved that I should go as well.
Three months later Josh and I, along with a member of my staff from school (Steve), were headed for a visioning experience in Thailand. We spent time visiting and learning about various ministries that are serving children at risk of exploitation. In the Northern Thailand hill tribes area it was estimated that between twenty to forty percent of the children will be trafficked into exploitive forced labor.

One day on our trip, as we arrived at an orphanage home, the children were singing praise songs. One girl captured my attention as she sang with an incredibly worshipful spirit. Her eyes were closed, and she looked so present with God in that moment. After the singing, while the children began to play some of the games we brought for them, I walked around looking for the opportunity to meet this little girl. I found her and gave her a hug, and she asked to be picked up. Through an interpreter I asked her what her name was and she said it was “Mae”. We walked into the open air dining hall made of grass and bamboo and found some coloring books. We picked a picture and began coloring it together. This is a

I asked the orphanage director Tutu to tell me Mae’s story. She said that Mae’s father was a drug dealer and was killed by police in a raid. Her mother has a birth defect and cannot earn enough to support Mae and her brother. This puts them at risk of being tricked into exploitive labor. Thankfully for Mae, Tutu was able to take her in and will provide her with a high school education and possibly college. This is a very typical situation and reason for a child to move into one of these homes.

After meeting the children I was compelled that I must do something. I was committed, whether my school would be able to commit or not. This kind of intense passion typically finds a way of disappearing from one’s mind as time passes, but this time, that was not the case.

Gary Haugen, president of International Justice Mission addresses why we, as followers of Christ, many times do not act even when we have knowledge of the oppression and poverty of others? Haugen’s response is that it is because of our own poverty. It is because of our own poverty of compassion, poverty of hope, and poverty of purpose.

Compassion:

On this journey I have learned that compassion is about humbly and honestly suffering with others. On the train ride back from Northern Thailand toward Bangkok I felt a tremendous burden for the people I met. People like little Mae and Tutu, the home director. They would be staying while I would be leaving and eventually make my way back to a very comfortable life. But the burden has not left me and I pray that it will not. It is from that burden that I am compelled to act.

Purpose:

God has a plan to demonstrate his goodness to the world. He could send a spiritual vibe from the sky, but his solution is you and me. He is not asking much, but just that we take that first step. One step at a time in obedience and faithfulness toward the things and people God cares about.

Hope:

Our hope is not in what solutions we think we can offer. He is the director of this orchestra and we have a small part to play. Scripture is clear that he cares for children and the oppressed greatly. If we are faithful to our little part he will multiply our efforts as he did when the little boy gave his lunch to feed the 5000. If it were my daughter, I would want someone to do something for her. There is hope in saving just one child from this sort of life.

After much prayer and discernment, my school has committed to partner with Remember Nhu. Our desire is to have an ongoing relationship with the children and staff of a new orphanage home and to take ownership of the responsibility and blessing that comes from funding and support its work. We plan to take a group of students, staff and parents there at least annually. Our first trip back is this summer. Our team is going to develop relationships, capture vision, and begin making plans to implement the orphanage home. We expect to be stretched, challenged, and changed by God during this trip, and we are committed to pass on the vision to our community when we come back.

I have recently been challenged to closely examine the things that Christ cares about. I have asked myself if I care about the same things. It is hard to wrap my mind around the fact that Christ is aware of all the suffering in the world. He knows of every child in forced prostitution, every lonely widow, and every hopeless soul. In fact, he not only knows about them, but also is suffering along with them. He is seeking redemption for every last one of them. If only my heart were able to feel that kind of compassion for just a few.

Gary Haugen writes, “Perhaps a next step in our development as children of God is a capacity for compassion permanence- a courage and generous capacity to remember the needs of an unjust world even when they are out of our immediate sight.”
This is the kind of compassion and courage I humbly pray for.

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