This month is turning out to be everything I could have wanted from this year. When I first heard about our ministry for month two I couldn’t even contain my excitement. I thought, this kind of ministry is exactly why I was interested in doing the World Race. For this month, team Ethereal Flames and my team are working with an organization known as CORM. (City of Refuge Ministries: www.cormghana.org) Their mission is to rescue children from human trafficking situations and bring them to this village I am currently living in where they aim to bring restoration to their lives in every aspect. One of the ways that they work towards restoration for these children is through the Faith Roots International Academy, which is a Christian Private School they started here in the village.
My ministry this month, in many ways, looks a lot like my life back home did. I get to work in a second grade classroom with a wonderful teacher and working to educate these children while teaching them about the love God has for them and what it looks like to walk in that faith. Take away the minor details of this being Africa, and poof—I’m back at home. (Just Kidding!) I work at the school and once a week we leave to go out into the surrounding village areas to do community evangelism. Along with working with the children at school, some also live here in the village so we are able to spend most of our time with them. That time has looked like: helping them with homework, bible studies, rainy basketball/soccer games, devotions, movie nights, and so much more. Our time is being spent pouring into these children’s lives at every corner we turn.
These are children that have been taken, given, or sold to local fisherman. They keep the children and force them into slave labor working for them. These children stand little to no chance of ever seeing their families again. CORM goes through the process of intervening in these situations on behalf of the children and then rescuing them by bringing them to live in the village. Here, they also work toward prevention plans so that we can eradicate the need for the children’s slave labor altogether in this area. Until then, they have created another program called 7 Continents for single mothers that are susceptible to selling their children into this life. They bring the women here to educate them and teach them trades such as cooking and sewing to begin their own small businesses.
How is it that a kind of place such as this, that I never even knew existed, could already have such a huge piece of my heart?
The Lord has been teaching me this month that the desires He has given me are not in vain. I can use the passions He has given me for a greater Kingdom purpose than I ever even considered.
I have always had a great passion for ending modern day slavery in the context of human trafficking. I’ve never been able to explain why because I lacked the experience of working in that area, but I remember the moment that I found out what human trafficking was. I remember the conversation breaking my heart into a million pieces for the people that had to endure such experiences of someone else having complete control over their lives. This, however, wasn’t the path that I followed in my life. I believed the enemy’s lies that I couldn’t possibly make a difference, so instead I followed the path of education. I have also always had a passion for children, and education was a way I knew I could help children that came from a terrible home life. When you are a child, you don’t even realize the control that others have over your life. I worked my way into a classroom where I could be that difference in those kids’ lives.
This place has shown me that working with children in this area can happen. I can actually be the person that strives towards restoration for children that have encountered these terrible experiences in their lives through education. The kind of vision casting that the Lord has been doing over my life throughout just the past few weeks that I have been here is completely unreal and has thrown me into overdrive. Though it may not be the Lord’s plan for me to be with this exact organization or in this exact location—He has given me a new Hope of what He does have in store for me.
Stay tuned for more… or at least until I figure it out for myself.
My prayer for now is that the Lord continues to open my eyes to see in myself what He sees. I pray that He continues to break my heart for what breaks His. I want to see the brokenness around me through spiritual eyes of prophetic restoration instead of what the enemy tries to show us. Join me in prayer by asking the Lord’s hand to cover this village and all that are within it. Pray that the Lord’s hand guides them through the intervention and restoration of these children’s lives that have been stolen from them, but also for the prevention plans that are being established here to evade the future of human trafficking for these children.
