Reflections on a Red Light

I can’t even begin to fathom into words what I saw last night.  I would say that I experienced it but it’s hard to experience something when you’re so void of emotion, so void of it because there’s something in the air that sucks the breath out of your lungs and replaces it with a numb.  It’s a numb that paralyzes you and renders you beyond your own control.  It’s almost euphoric, but not when you’re a son of God.  You recognize it immediately as a state only the devil can thrust you into. 

 

You have to be on guard.

I’m talking about Nana’s Entertainment Plaza, which is essentially the epicenter of prostitution worldwide.  Three floors of brokenness, bareness, humility, and grace… all waiting for Love to water its walkways.  Our five girls immediately took off knowing their mission.  Mark and I kind of stood outside dumbfounded for several minutes before decided we needed to walk around and pray before stepping into such a place.  The streets are lined with prostitutes waiting for someone to come buy them for an hour or two.  White and black men litter the bars with their lustful cravings, viciously eyeballing any woman that walks by as an object, an object that they could potentially unleash themselves on.

 

And family’s walk by with their children looking completely puzzled. 

 

That’s right: families.  Father’s covering their son’s eyes, mothers who pick up the pace, all after quickly realizing that despite their confusion, they don’t belong in this area.  I just stand in awe.  The Marriot, the Landmark, and several other major hotels surround this plaza like it’s no big deal.  Satan’s got darkness established in the middle of family vacations.  What the hell?  It’s no wonder so many businessmen are found in these parts… with their business partners.  And no wonder so many college guys wander down here.  It’s within walking distance.

 

Mark and I eventually set foot inside the plaza.  Girls beaconed us left and right trying to get us to sit down, to go inside whatever bar they were standing outside of.  Our pace didn’t change.  It was determined, regal, and not oridnary for that environment.  We both stood tall and walked confidently and proud… because with each step we took we summoned everyone’s attention around us.  And not just the girls, no.  The men that were there to engage themselves in their debauchery, well their illusioned freedom (which is actually slavery), everyone knew that Mark and I were there for another purpose.  Something only royalty’s capable of.  Of course we stood out – we looked everyone in the eye.

 

And my insides broke.

 

It’s hard to gaze into the eyes of a prostitute and, for me, not feel anything.  And I don’t mean anything sexual.  It’s as if your soul engages with their soul for merely seconds and you can sense their desperate cries for freedom.  FREEDOM.  A sweet victory that’s never graced their lips.  And they look at you and see that you don’t want their body.  Yet it hurts – because they’re not your ministry.  The men who avert their gaze from ours – that’s our ministry. 

 

We tried talking to several, but their quick to walk away.  They know that men don’t typically approach other men in these parts, especially when they’re the ones approached… and approached by two sons bearing a Kingdom.  No.  We’re there to recuse THEM.  

 

But it’s a horrifying reality to see many turn from freedom out of fear, shame, intimidation, and the like.

 

So Mark and I walk and pray some more.  It didn’t take long for us to walk out of the plaza.  After 15 minutes or so your spirit begins to suffocate, especially if you’re not used to such a electrifying environment.  The neon starts getting to your head.  We walked the streets some more and the sat motionless at what we had just walked through.  We couldn’t speak into words what we felt – nothing.  Pain.  Righteous anger.  We felt the Kingdom screaming inside of us – to be released.

 

God and I talked about injustice (another blog) that blossoms as a result of selfish desires.

 

It’s just insane to think about, to think that men travel thousands of miles to escape something for even a weekend, something that they don’t even know plagues them.  They’re all just searching for Truth.  They’re trying to find that thing that we’re all looking for at some point in our lives, yet that some of us have already found.  If only they would receive an approach or look us in the eye, their entrance to freedom would be a lot farther from that plaza yet a lot closer than they think.

 

Help me pray for these men.