Restoration can come in all forms. For me this month, restoration was a word God placed on my heart from the very beginning. Restoration to me means the renewing of the soul back to the original form.
The first part of Psalm 23: 3 states “He restores my soul;”. In Thailand, everywhere I look there are people that need their hearts restored back to Jesus. Men and women have strayed so far from the love and mercy that our Father offers in search of an instant gratification that is gone within minutes.
A street over from where we live has a huge night market where hundreds of people come to buy souvenirs with a McDonald’s and Starbucks a few doors down, but the most heart wrenching place for me has been the one place I can’t go.
Unnoticeable to most of these tourist and families that come to shop and eat, there is a building where international traffickers are holding girls as sex slaves that are sold each night through a window. The men stand outside and look in the windows to the girls that are naked and only hold a number to identify themselves. The numbers have different colors to signify details about the girls including “this girl is underage” or “this girl is a virgin.”
I was disgusted at how acceptable and blatant the sex industry is with so many people in bondage and yet very few people willing to do anything about it. Women being sold for a profit every night and men buying what is sold.
I cried out to God and prayed for Him to save these women. To show them more. I also prayed that the men buying the women would have their eyes opened, but most of all I prayed for the traffickers to have their hearts softened.
God opened my eyes to the passage Mark 7: 20-23 – And He was saying, “That which proceeds out of the man, that is what defiles the man. 21 For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed the evil thoughts, fornications, thefts, murders, adulteries, 22 deeds of coveting and wickedness, as well as deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride and foolishness. 23 All these evil things proceed from within and defile the man.”
I realized that I needed to pray harder for the traffickers that their hearts would be filled with the Father’s love and they would see the error of their ways. I don’t believe that people are born with hate in their hearts. These men have hearts that are calloused and scarred too. A shell of a heart that is in need of restoration.
If these traffickers found God, their whole lives would be changed and they would no longer be comfortable in the job they do. They would fight for God’s love to be shown to these girls. The devil would lose his power and heaven would gain another son of the King.
Help me pray for Thailand and the international traffickers all over the world that their hearts would encounter the one true God, who would cleanse their hearts and bring restoration to their lives.
No traffickers = No women being trafficked.
