Meeting Linda and Renu

Last week I had the incredible privilege to meet two strong, courageous, humble, and beautiful women. Shared Hope International held an event in town and there was no way I was going to miss it! First I met Linda, the president and founder of SHI, she was all that I hoped she would be and more. The work of SHI and how far reaching throughout the world that it is truly amazes me. I feel like we were given so much information that I can't possibly sum it up in a short post so I will hit some highlights but it would be well worth your while to check out their website at www.sharedhope.org . First I loved Linda's passion. This is a woman who was literally placed by God into this position to change the world. She told us that she did not even run for Congress in Washington, her name was written in on the ballot and she was elected. She did no campaigning, spent no money to be elected, it was a placement that God had planned for her. From that position she has done incredible things for those bought and sold into sexual slavery and human trafficking. Her love and compassion for God's children oozed and she told stories of the horrors that she had witnessed and how God's love and Villages of Hope were bringing healing to hundreds. She was also able to show us a video of a undercover investigation that resulted in the arrest of two men selling a 13 year old for sex in Jamaica. Her passion was palpable as she explained that the work of SHI was a part of both the seller and the buyers receiving jail time. Even here in America they found in their undercover operations that the 13 to 15 year old girls will be arrested and the men that paid money to buy them were let go!! Unbelievable, as if the girls are at fault. We also saw footage of American truck stops being places where pimps bring their girls to be sold, 80% of these girls are on the missing and exploited list. This is in our country! We were blown away.
Next we met Renu. There are no words to describe the feeling of watching this beautiful, quiet young woman tell her story of being sold to a brothel in India from her home in Nepal by her adopted brother!! She went to visit him in the town that he was going to college in and she said he bought her a glass of juice at a restaurant...3 days later she woke up in a brothel. Although she attempted to refuse being a prostitute, ultimately there is no choice. Someone from Teen Challenge in Bombay led her to the Lord and she began to pray to God to help her to leave. In a way that only He can God answered Renu's prayer and the owner of the brothel accepted Christ and gave her money to travel home to her family. Unfortunately the stigma associated with her life in the brothel caused people to cross the street when she was near and to have no contact with her, as if it was her choice. She decided to call the number that was given to her by someone at the Teen Challenge, which ended up being her first contact with SHI, but not before she saw her brother who had sold her and stolen her childhood, her innocence, her dreams, and her life to that point. She said he turned white when he saw her and she said, "I forgive you". I was and still am in awe of Renu. She rocked my world in her next sentence, if Christ has forgiven me how could I not forgive him. Everything in me wants to justify hatred, anger, and disgust for this man and yet there stood Renu humbly and gently asking, how could I not? Moments in time, this is certainly another one for me, when my world view is broadened and the awe that I have for my Savior is ignited through His daughter. Renu sees her life as Joseph, what satan intended for evil, God has used for the good. Renu now works with SHI and she counsels young women rescued from the life she once lived. Linda asked her how she counsels them, and in her simple way she said, "I tell them my story."
This is I Am Sister, this is where we war for our sisters in bonds, this is where we do not accept this reality and we find a way big or small to do something to help organizations like SHI to fight the injustice and most of all to lovingly rescue and restore these children and young women who live a nightmare that we cannot come close to comprehending. This is where we do not just get uncomfortable at the thought and look the other way but we hear and respond and obey. We have seen His glory, we know this King and the same God who held Renu every night, who pursued her with His love, He who rescued now asks Whom shall I send? Here am I! Send me.