I was supposed to spend most of my month in India on Miracle Street. I was supposed to pray for God to heal random people in the streets. I was supposed to tell others about Jesus. I was supposed to see the miraculous and impossible happen. I still did all those things, but I ended up spending a lot of time in Sonagachi, the largest red light district in India.
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When you walk the streets of Sonagachi you see regular stores and businesses. You see people walking around going about their day. You see normal men, women, and children. And you see the sex workers sitting in the front of their brothels.
The workers are young and old. They wear regular clothes. If you saw them on any other street in India, you wouldn’t think anything of it. But in Sonagachi you know exactly what they do, they sell themselves for the less than price of your lunch.
When you walk the streets of Sonagachi you see the 12,000 sex workers and the hundreds of brothels. You see the women who were trafficked in the past, were set free, and now choose to sell their bodies. You see the broken people who have no other skills. You see the police officers who turn a blind eye to the happenings of that district.
What you don’t see is American Christians flooding those streets to fight the injustice.
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Members of our team would go to the red light district with a few local long term M’s. We would do prayer walks, minister to the workers, pray for those who need healing, and just love people. Everyday I would leave the district heartbroken for the workers who live unfulfilled lives, I would also leave mad.
I was angry at the American church for not helping. I was mad because my heart was broken for these people but nobody back home was heartbroken. Everyone knows these things happen, but very few Christians actually do something about it. If you’re heartbroken, you do something about it, right?
I spent a lot of nights complaining to God about the American church for not doing anything to help these people. God didn’t really say anything most nights, I would eventually just fall asleep angry and wake up exhausted. When He finally spoke, He broke my heart even further.
He asked me if I knew the Christians in my neighborhood. I don’t. I don’t know the names of my neighbors. I honestly don’t know what my neighbors look like.
My neighbors might not know Jesus, but I wouldn’t know because my heart wasn’t truly broken for those who are separated from God. If it was, I would seek the lost daily. My heart was broken for the women in the red light district, but mainly for their circumstances not necessarily for their separation from God.
In India and America there are millions separated from the Father’s love. That is heartbreaking.
It’s heartbreaking that people can go their entire lives without hearing the name of Jesus.
It’s heartbreaking that Americans can die without knowing a Christian who cares enough to tell them about the love of Christ.
It’s heartbreaking when a Christian isn’t heartbroken.
We should be heartbroken for people’s circumstances and their separation. We’re supposed to care for the widows, the orphans, the homeless, the lost, and the least of us.
James 1: 27
Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.
So, are you truly heartbroken for the lost and their circumstances? Is it broken enough for you to go out and love others? Are you willing to go to the red light districts in India? Do you know your neighbor’s name? Is your heart broken for what breaks His?
