A recent storm caused the power to go out at my house. It stayed out for over 24 hours. That really doesn’t seem like a long time, but it was. It went out at about four-thirty in the afternoon. Okay. No problem. It wasn’t too hot that day, it had been storming… hence the power loss. It was still light out, so we could see to move around. With no electricity, entertaining ourselves became somewhat of a challenge. No television, radio, or video games to eat up our time. No access to the Internet either. We were off the grid.

That evening, after dark, we lit our few candles and sat in the den together. We talked about random stuff until it was bedtime. Everything had been fine for everyone until then, but it was at that moment that my ten-year-old son realized his room was DARK. As we searched for a solution that would allow him to sleep in his own bed instead of mine, he came up with the solution himself.

A fingerlight. These are just tiny little flashlights that you wear on your fingers like rings that have one tiny LED bulb of light. It wasn’t much, but in his room of total darkness, when he switched one of them on, we were surprised at how much light it provided. That one little light dispelled enough of the darkness for my son to feel good about sleeping in his own bed.

This weekend I attended a women’s conference at my church. It was a sold out crowd, both in numbers and in eagerness. We ladies had twenty-four hours away from our normal routine to be refreshed and renewed. We were ready! One speaker in particular struck a cord with many of us. Christine Caine is on the speaking team at Hillsong Church in Australia and she had come to share her heart with us. Friday night she talked to us about strengthening our faith at its core. Saturday her message was way different. Christine is a leader of the A21 Campaign. I had never heard of that. She kept referring to it, and yet I had no clue what she was talking about. Then she told us.

A21 Campaign is all about ending human trafficking on our planet. Right now 27 million people are human slaves. Most of them are women. No. Most of them are girls. In Eastern Europe due to the extreme poverty, families are selling their daughters into slavery every day. Parents are accepting as little as $250 for them. Some of them, most of them think their daughters are going to find a better life. Most of them are told their daughters will be taken to another country and be given a job. What they don’t know is that they are not going to be given a job, rather, they are going to be sold into the sex slave industry. Other girls are just taken and never heard from again.

Every eight seconds a girl is smuggled across a border and thrust into a life of slavery.

Most are taken to Greece. Then they are treated in ways that no young girl should be treated. They are scared and alone. Abused, frightened, stripped away of every piece of dignity and innocence. Then the real torture begins. They are offered up to as many as forty men per day. I cannot even imagine. My delicate sensitivities don’t want to imagine it. I am sure yours don’t either, but hold on. It doesn’t end there. If and when a girl gets pregnant, she is taken to have her baby at an infant farm. The baby, after it is born, is taken away and sold into pedophile/pornography rings. Then the mother’s organs are harvested for sale on the black market. So much for our delicate sensitivities.

After hearing about all this, I felt… a little lost and disoriented. I felt as though something had been dumped in my lap, a huge something, and I didn’t know quite what to do with it. 27 million girls is a lot of girls. While we are not immune to this travesty in the US, most of it is taking place in Eastern Europe. What can I possibly do? Why did Christine burden me with something so great when I have no way to do ANYTHING?

I didn’t want to, but I couldn’t help thinking about my own fourteen-year-old daughter. If being a woman wasn’t enough to make me angry over this issue, being a mother of a young girl sure did.

Here’s what the Bible says about darkness. Evil abides in darkness. What is happening in Eastern Europe and in other places around the globe (including the land of the “free”) happens because of this darkness.

“Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into
the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed.” John 3:20

So when I asked God, “What am I supposed to do with what I now know is happening to millions of young girls around the world? Your sweet little girls?”

He told me to shine my light. I don’t have lots of money to help fund those on the front lines fighting and helping one precious little girl at a time, but I can pray and I can shine. I learned something from my son’s fingerlight. It doesn’t take much light to dispel darkness.

As believers in Christ, we are children of the light. Together we can do something about this evil.

So I am shedding some light on this horrible offense. We don’t want to think about it. When we do it makes us uncomfortable. It’s easier not to think about it. It’s easier to shake our heads, throw up our hands and give up. That’s what evil is counting on. It was once said,

“All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.”~ Edmund Burke

I am asking you to go to A21 Campaign’s website. www.thea21campaign.org Learn more. Inform yourselves. Don’t take my word on any of this. Then pray. Ask the Lord what you should do, if anything.

Christine told us of an encounter she had with a young girl who had been rescued through the efforts of A21. As she sat across the room from this young girl, the girl asked her, “Why are you here?” Christine began to tell her how she became aware of the issue of sex trafficking, and how she had been led by God to do something. How this same God had a plan for her life, who loved her and cared for her. Christine then told us that the girl looked at her and said,

“If all you say is true about your God… then why didn’t you come sooner?”…

So you don’t think you can do anything? I am here to tell you that you can. That we can. From now until I no longer feel the leading of God to do so, on the 21st of every month I will bring you an A21 Campaign update here on Cracked Pot Pieces. I will ask you to join me on those days to pray. Ask your friends to join us. Serious things happen when the women of God pray.

We have an audience with the Holy God. The Bible tells us that our fight is not with flesh and blood. Okay then. Let’s petition God to send his best to fight this battle. At the same time, those on the front lines have to face foes of flesh and blood. Organized crime is at the center of every sex trafficking ring. These are some serious bad guys. Those fighting the physical enemies need our prayers for protection. And for the girls even now who are living this nightmare? Let’s pray for their deliverance. For the men who perpetrate the abuse? Let’s pray for their exposure. We can pray their very attempts to participate in this crime are foiled at every turn. The sex trade is motivated by profits. No customers, no profits, no sex trade. There you go.

Let’s shed a little light.