today i bought a girl out of sexual slavery for the first time.

didn’t expect that to be the first line did you?

i have never really had a heart for missions. whenever people would come and talk about missions i would just tune them out. “we’ve got enough problems here at home. why should i focus on people in indosulibinisia” i didn’t get the point.

i simply didn’t have a heart for missions.

if you’ve been reading me for a while, you know that back around december or january i started asking god to change my heart so that i could be ready to do whatever it was that he wanted me to do when the time came. obviously the quick answer to that was that he wanted me to be in ministry and i finally warmed up to the idea of it. my heart changed towards the idea of ministry.

but that wasn’t all it changed towards.

i’ve started to really have a heart for people who can’t do it themselves. what i mean by that is i’ve started to really care about the people that, no matter what they do, they just can’t get by on their own. whether it’s the poor, the sick, or in this case, the ones being taken advantage of. i’ve just started to really care about them.

it came to a head this summer after i read crazy love. i just started to really sit back and think about the “love god. love people.” concept. i talked a really good game about loving people and i even did quite a bit. i’d take care of my friends. i’d do things for people if i thought they needed it.

but i still felt like i wasn’t doing enough.

so i started praying about it. i didn’t really know what i should change. i knew that i wasn’t “called” to go to indosilibinisia and do missionary work. i knew that wasn’t it. i searched out what i should be doing. then one night it finally clicked and made sense.

freedom 424.

my church started a program a while back called freedom 424. it’s mission is to buy a girl in thailand out of sexual slavery for 24 hours. they take the girl to a safe house. they do her hair and do her nails, give her a nice bed to sleep in, give her medicine if she needs it, and they share the gospel with her. they treat her like a girl and like a human for 24 hours. at the end of that period, they give them the chance to stay there for as long as they need and try to help them get out of the hell that they’ve been in.

it costs $24 for one girl.

and i’m broke.

i don’t say i’m broke just to say it. i haven’t gotten a pay check in four weeks and won’t get one for another two. my money is tighter than it ever has been.

how am i going to support freedom 424 when i’m having trouble supporting myself?

i wrestled with this for a little while before finally coming up with an idea. six bucks a week, for four weeks, would buy one girl out of sexual slavery. that would be 13 girls in a year for less than it costs to get a baconator from wendy’s. i can do that.

so that’s what i’ve done. for the past four weeks, with no income coming in, i’ve written a check for six dollars and put it in the offering plate. today was the day where it finally added up to $24. today was the day that i bought my first girl.

i spent a lot of time praying over that last six dollars today. pastor jon had already finished the offering prayer and the buckets were two rows in front of me before i finished my prayer. i just asked that god did something special in the girl’s life that was freed because of the money i donated. i’ll never know who she was or what happened with her, but i’ll know that those 24 hours that she was out of that bar were something special. i know that god will answer that prayer.

i can’t do a lot.

i’m not the person to jump on a plane and fly across the world to help build a church in a village. that’s just not me. i’m not good at that.

i’m not the person that can cut a check for multiple hundreds of dollars to help support an organization. that’s just not me. i’m not at that point in my life.

i’m not the person that starts an organization to help people across the world. that’s just not me. i’m not that person.

i can’t do a lot.

but i can do something.

i can give a little bit to help that person jumping in the plane.

i can write a check for six dollars a week.

i can pray for the people who run those organizations.

my outlook on missions was wrong. yes, we have a ton of problems here at home and that’s where my heart is. that’s what i’m good at and what i’m passionate about. but just cause we have problems here doesn’t mean that i should forget the problems that we have around the world.

i can’t do a lot.

but i can do something.

say your prayers and take your vitamins.

have a nice day.

-jonathan