Shine a Light on Slavery: End it Movement

Last week I shared a little bit about our time at the Passion Conference and about how our hearts and eyes were open and broken over the things we learned about modern day slavery.  Its something that I feel needs to be talked about.  Something that was iterated over and over was how important awareness was when it comes to this awful situation.  Many people just don't know and if we can shine a light on what's really going on then maybe we can start a huge movement towards ending this terrible injustice.

Passion has begun its own awareness campaign entitled - End It Movement.  I think that's where I'm going to start today.  I'll share a few statistics and how you can learn more about human trafficking and slavery and join the movement yourself.  In coming weeks I want to share more about some amazing organizations that are working so hard - and so creatively- to fight this issue.

Just a few of the numbers (from passion's website):

• Slavery still exists.  It is estimated that there are anything between 10 million and 27 million slaves in the world today. 
• The reason for this broad range is that those people being counted are largely a ‘hidden’ population. 
• It is estimated that human trafficking alone generates annual profits of around $32 billion. 
• The majority of trafficking victims are between 18 and 24 years of age.
• 43% of trafficking victims are used for forced commercial sexual exploitation, of whom 98 per cent are women and girls. 
• An estimated 1.2 million children are trafficked each year. 
• Every minute, two children are sold into slavery.

Those are some of the numbers, but the thing is - slavery is not just numbers - its real people, real children - slavery has a face.

The end it movement is fairly simple - they are here to shine a light on slavery, to bring awareness, cause action and be the voices of the voiceless.

The awesome thing about this story is that there are many lives being saved - out of the bonds of slavery and discovering, recovering and finding a joy and peace in Jesus.  It was simply amazing to hear of the stories of these young women who are found and set free (which is usually not an easy task) and are now getting help, gaining strength and self confidence and finding their smile.  I truly believe that Jesus is the only one that can change and bring restoration to their lives and I am so thankful for the amazing organizations out there that are risking their lives and going into the dark places to save these precious people.  So, so thankful.

So what can we do?  Well, first you can start by learning and raising awareness yourself.  If you go to enditmovement.com you can sign their pledge, find out more info and start spreading the word - use your voice.  We can also pray - pray for God's people fighting the fight, for the ones in darkness and the ones who are struggling to find their way out.  You can give - like I said, so many great organizations doing great work - all of them are listed on the end it movement's website.  

For me, this is something that simply breaks my heart and I can't just hear what I heard and walk away unchanged.   We have to shine a light on slavery to bring action to end it.

Join the movement, let our voices be heard - go to enditmovement.com and learn more.

Linking Up Here:

Passion Conference 2013: In it to End it.

Please excuse my absence last week, we had the privilege of taking our college students to the Passion Conference in Atlanta, GA.  Sitting down trying to do a recap of our week is posing to be rather overwhelming.  There was so much that took place, so much that we learned and so much I want to share.  One post would not do it justice.  So for now, this will be a brief recount of what happened, later I will have more to share.

If you aren't familiar with Passion or 268 Generation, take a look over at their website.  They exist to see a generation committed to serving and loving Jesus.  This year 60,000 students filled in the Georgia Dome for four days of amazing worship, teaching, learning, growing and awareness.  It. was. crazy. - to say the least.  That is a ton of people - there were no shortages of lines (our hotel was fully booked and some days we had to wait over an hour for the elevator...we were on floors like 55 and 60 so stairs were a last resort, even though we had students go for it!)  But even though there were crazy crowds and insane lines our students didn't seem to mind much.  They gladly joined the crowds and were excited to enter worship each day.  I was glad to be among them - they really are a special group of people.

Thoughts on the Sessions
So Passion has a pretty good track record for bringing in great communicators - Francis Chan and John Piper are always there.  I really enjoyed both of these messages last week.  I loved that Chan focused on the simple yet powerful truth of God's word and how we can absolutely trust it.  When God says He will be faithful when we are faithless - we can count on that.  John Piper always delivers a message that stretches you. This year he preached out of the passages of Hebrews 10, 11 & 12 which unfolds the pattern of power to endure and embrace the suffering in the path of love for the cause of liberation - it was good, I will just tell you that.  Go and read those chapters if you haven't in a while.

Passion has launched a new awareness campaign that focuses on shining a light on modern day slavery.  The movement is simply called End It.  Our hearts were completely burst wide open on this subject while there.  We learned so much about this issue and its something that I feel compelled to share here on the blog.  There is too much for one post. So each week I will share something that I learned (or have learned since) about what's going on in our world when it comes to human trafficking and forced labor - what's being done and what we can do about it.  You might find some of it staggering, I know I have.  Thank you Passion for opening our eyes to such a grave injustice and challenging us to be in it to end it.

Thanks so much for letting me share about our week!  I pray that God would do immeasurably more than you could ever imagine in your life.  Have an amazing week!