It’s easy for us to look at victims and see the Lord’s heart for them. God wants to be their comforter, their healer, and their defender. It’s natural for our hearts to bleed for theirs and for us to extend love and empathy. On the other hand, it’s also easy for our hearts to become hardened against abusers. People who are harsh, selfish, who hurt us and others. We condemn them and pray against them. It happens almost naturally.
Last year, in Thailand, when I was prayer-walking through the Red Light district I saw a 50 year old white men fondling small little Thai women my age, I pleaded with the Lord and asked for protection for those women. I was asking God to be their hiding place and to come against what those men were planning. I asked for judgment and wrath against those men who so callously bought humans to satisfy their urges.
This year, my team and I have already gotten to work with multiple anti-trafficking ministries here in the States. In Georgia we talked with women in motels, I met and got to minister to strippers in strip clubs. In Tennessee we met people on the streets to let them know that there are services available to help them. I got to see the hurt and brokenness of these women up close and personal. And as my team and I prayed, we asked God for a way out for these women and their children, that He would be their provider and that He would rescue them from these situations.
I found myself again wanting to pray some really harsh things against the Johns and the pimps, but as I began praying against these men, these abusers, the Lord whispered something that I wasn’t expecting. He said: These are my children too and I love them, pray for them. And the phrase, ‘hurting people hurt people’ also came to my mind.
I actually hated hearing that. I didn’t want to think or look on these people with any love, understanding, or compassion. I didn’t care about their hurts. I wanted to reserve all of that for their victims, but God was doing something intentional, He was beginning to change my understanding and perspective of things.
When I was in middle school I began experiencing sexual harassment and assault from several different classmates. Never one person continuously, but many different people over time, that continued into high school and college. I still carry a lot of that hurt, feelings of powerlessness, and shame with me. For a long time I have held onto un-forgiveness in my heart that I buried deep down and have spent most of the past 7 or 8 years ignoring and running from.
I don’t want to humanize the people that hurt me, or the men that are buying and selling these women, that gets too confusing, it’s much easier to just write them off as terrible people, but the Lord reminded me that no one is one dimensional.
I am also reminded of the idea that sin is like a tree. Our actions are the leaves, our motives, emotions, and thoughts, the branches, and our heart posture and what we believe, are the roots.
What could be a root that causes people to hurt others? How did those roots get there? Is it possible that I could share the same sin roots as someone who buys, sells, and abuses other humans, but we just express our hurts differently? What truly separates me from them?
Without Jesus, the answer is nothing. There were times in my life were I manipulated and lied to get what I wanted, I can’t honestly say that I’ve never hurt anyone. Without Jesus I have a wicked and deceitful heart. It is only through a relationship with Jesus that I can learn what it means to forgive, to love, and to serve those around me with pure and unselfish motives.
Jesus takes the brokenness in us and heals it. He did that for me and He wants to do that for everyone. Jesus wants to Heal these people who have hurt me, to heal the people who hurt others. Jesus cares more about them than their sin.
Don’t read that and think that the Lord doesn’t care about their actions, He does. It hurts His heart, He is grieved. Time and time again in scripture the Lord commands and instructs us to care for the orphans and the widows and the aliens. The Lord’s heart is, and has always been for the vulnerable. Yet in His endless grace and mercy He extends opportunities for anyone and everyone to turn from their sin, repent, believe and be saved.
Today is Good Friday. Today we remember when Jesus died a terrible, horrible, unthinkable death. He did this for me, for the vulnerable, for you, and for the liars, the cheaters, and the abusers. He went to the cross asking the Father to forgive those who were actively abusing Him and calling down curses on Him. How can I hold onto un-forgiveness in the face of Jesus’ sacrifice? How can I say that what I have endured is beyond forgiveness? I can’t.
I am still learning what it means to bless those who curse me, but admittedly it’s hard. Forgiveness does not mean that what happened is ok. Forgiveness, grace, and mercy doesn’t always take away painful memories or scars. The Lord is calling me to grow up and to face hard truths, to acknowledge were I am letting pride and pain dictate my perspective, and to exchange that for His kingdom eyes.
Jesus loves the vulnerable. He wants to care for them and protect them and defend them. He wants to heal those who are hurting, including those who, in their pain, hurt others. Jesus wants His body to stand in the gap. To remind men that they are called to be mighty men of God, that they are protectors and not predators. To remind the forgotten and the broken that they are seen and loved and that healing is available to them. When I realize this, my mission field gets a whole lot bigger.
Much Love,
Morgan
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