must watch video- ending slavery

A must see for anyone who is a Christian & especially any of you who know about God's heart for justice and compassion.  

Ending Slavery 

Work Program photo

The beautiful women the Lord has given us to bring out of darkness, to pour into, to bring hope, and to show Jesus. Our work program photo (with our team in the picture).

transformed lives

I am sitting in the car listening to 2 guys talking in the back seat... I listen in amazement and shock. Are these really the same 2 guys that I met a year ago who? One who was a transvestite and the other who was too broken and ashamed to even open up... who started sweating everytime we even mentioned the Lord.  Now I sit and listen to them talk about God... about 'Christianity". We spent the night having dinner at our apartment with them, then watching a movie, and now while driving to the airport to drop off a short term mission team, I see the fruit.

It is so incredible and such a privilege when God allows us to experience the fruit of our labor- something that we are neither entitled not promised to always see. But when we do see it, it's incredible.

I know I have blogged about "Izzy" before- how he left the streets after being a transvestite for 5 years (he's only 20). How his childhood was filled with abuse, betrayal, rape, and finally abandonment & being sold. We became friends a year ago on the street corner- he loved me instantly but would not even look in Carlos's direction out of shame. In just one short year- he is now off the streets, loves the Lord, is finding his identity in Jesus, talks with Carlos every day, comes to our house for bible studies throughout the week, and is planning to do a Discipleship Training School this year.

I feel that I have to share this story with you- because of the way it has impacted my heart and my faith in the Lord:

On our wedding day, Izzy called us to tell us that he would not be able to come to the wedding- he was being admitted into the hospital. As you may know, he was diagnosed with HIV 3 months after he left the streets. As soon as we got off the phone with him that morning- our phone did some crazy iphone thing where it erased all of our contacts, everything was gone. Because Izzy had recently changed his phone number so that people from the streets would stop calling him (the obviously want to pull him back), no one else on our team had his new number. There we are- right after we get married- knowing he is sick in the hospital- and not knowing how to find him. My heart was so heavy. Carlos couldn't sleep for nights. We poured out our hearts to God.... we wanted to be with him. We made a promise to him when he first found out that he was sick that we would walk with him EVERY step of the way- that we would be at doctor's appointments, buy him food each week, go with him to psychologists, be his spiritual partners, etc. And we can't even find him. We don't even know how to begin to look. So we look to God.

A few days later on a street corner, one of the male prostitutes told us that he heard from 3 different people that Izzy had died.

We couldn't take it. We could not accept that. We prayed.

The next day, an unknown number called us and on the other end is Izzy's sweet voice. He came over to the house where he told us what happened:
"You guys have always walked with me in my walk with God. But this week, I had to experience God directly. I went into the hospital and they admitted me. The doctor did a procedure looking for spinal fluid... the stuck a huge needle in my back at least 30 times... I thought I was going to die from the pain. Afterwards the doctor told me that he didn't find the fluid, and they would have to repeat the procedure the following day. I broke down- I planned how I could escape- there was NO WAY I was going to do that again. NO WAY. I began to pray...... and I prayed, and prayed. The next day, I lay down on the table for them to repeat this painful procedure.... I ask God to take away the pain, and I begin to declare the things we've been learning about who God is in my life aloud. The doctor stuck me 30 times again.... but I never felt one thing. Not one thing. God did it! He was there for me! No one else was there, but He was there. And He talked to me, and He was there with ME!"

He continued to tell me how he now understands more why he is passing through this difficult time. He knows and believes that God has a huge calling on his life- that he will rescues thousands from the streets- that God will use his horrible past which has now become his testimony to bring God glory and fame- that Izzy is willing to lay down his life to rescue others.

I cried and cried as I listened. This is our goal- to have people come to know Jesus personally. I believe that God wasn't allowing us to find him for a reason- God wanted to find him on his own now.

Please continue to pray for Izzy- His body is going through a lot as he gets used to the powerful medication that is helping to fight his HIV.

3 huge little letters

Carlos and I got a phone call from a Izzy in the mid morning saying that he finally went to the doctor. We have been trying to convince him to let us take him for over a week. He finally went- and apparently went alone. He called us as soon as he walked out of the appointment.... he didn't want to tell us on the phone and asked if he could come over. We hung up the phone, and hoped that our worst fear was not a reality. We dreaded every minute as we waited for him to get to my apartment.

He sat with me on the couch. He couldn't speak.... Carlos finally asked him what the doctor said.... I felt like he delayed for half an hour before he finally burst into tears as he said that dreadful word, HIV.

I hugged him, and he fell into my arms like a terrified child. He sobbed. For hours he sobbed and sobbed. We all cried. That seemed like the only appropriate response.

Carlos prayed for him. I prayed for him. And then I asked him to pray. His prayer broke my heart into pieces. He uncandidly shared how terrified he was...how desperate he was for help... he begged God to help him understand because he had no idea what to think.

After he prayed, I began to help him process through his immediate emotions and reactions to the news- you can only imagine what those can be.

      This boy became a transvestite prostitute at the age of 15 after years of living on the streets. He got on the streets through circumstances that seem unreal, foreign. His step-father was abusive and a raging alcohol/drug addict. He would beat him severely. One day when the boy was 5, the step father decided that he didn't want him in the house anymore- "he wasn't his child anyways". He kicked him out onto the streets. He was 5.....5 years old.... wow. He went to his only family members- an aunt and uncle. The situation was the same if not worse there- he was beaten, raped by men, starving..... a few years later he finally ran. He was alone, he was a child, he was desperate... he was on the streets.
The only person who finally helped him, who took care of him, who watched out for him was a transvestite. Like all children, Izzy was easily manipulated and tricked. He found himself on the streets.... and later as a transvestite prostitute...
           Often times when people first see a transvestite, their immediate reaction is disgust. How horrible, what terrible people, that's so nasty; among other things. Thanks to Izzy, I now see a scared little child. I now see a life full of injustice. I now see the missed opportunity of someone to have made a difference. I see God crying hysterically over this victim.


    I still remember when I first met Izzy. He was a dressed as a woman. But I immediately wanted to be his friend. I was blessed to work with God in taking Izzy off of the streets. I was able to witness the LORD moving in his life. God allowed us to walk with him in this incredible transformation.... in his search for his identity.... in his search for God. I will never forget the first time he came to a missionary event and cried his eyes out because it was the first time he had the opportunity to be in the presence of God- and it was overwhelming. God has spoken so much into this boys life in the past year. It's incredible. There is absolutely no way we could ever take credit for this.... it is undeniably God. It has grown my faith to watch God move in Izzy's life. God has spoken to him in such radical and undeniable ways. God has helped him leave the life of a transvestite and find TRUE freedom.... He still has a LONG way to go. But he has come so far. Izzy is SO confident of how God has been speaking to him. He was ready to do an intensive Christian training school that our ministry was going to pay for him to do this coming year.... he had dreams to work in missions and one day serve alongside us as we go to the streets. He wanted to bring hope to others and help them get off of the streets as well.
Wow.

Now, you can imagine how hard the news of HIV was for all of us. You can imagine how the enemy used this to plant lies (so typical of him when we pass through traumatic situations). Lies: "obviously God had no plan for your life, because you're now going to lose it. everything you thought was real was fake. Why doesn't God help you now if he is real?" lies upon lies.
But this is where God is the hero again! He fought back on behalf of Izzy. God began to speak to people and give them words for this young man. Izzy clung to God.

Carlos and I were at lunch with him the day after the news. We had just left the hospital where we went with him to his appointment. Over lunch, Carlos was pouring into Izzy about God and God's heart; God's voice, His will, His nature, missions, dreams... the list goes on and on. Izzy stopped and said, "you know, I want to use this for God. I want to help other people. I still want God to use me. I still want to be in missions. I want to reach others".

Speechless.

He gets it. He gets what so many of us don't get for years. He has profound understand that God calls us ALL to take part in missions in some way, shape, or form. Not the "most holy people"- in fact God's  power is made perfect in our weakness. I see that in Izzy. God is making His power perfect in this boy's weakness.... Praise the Lord.
Praise the Lord.





       

Work program photos

At the house preparing all of the jewelry for the work program! 

Some volunteers with our ministry who are working with the children of the women we minister to. 

The women that we have been blessed to work with- they are all part of the work program which allows them to get off of the street- giving them the option of freedom from exploitation and to find freedom in Jesus. 

Carlos leading worship with a small group of women who are in the work program. 

One of the girls in our program just had her baby. We are so excited about what God has done in her heart and her life as she has walked through this difficult and complicated situation. 

street kids & broken hearts

Divine appointments

As I walked around the corner, a little boy yelled out to me that he wanted a cup of coffee. I turned around to see a familiar face. The child said, “hey you look like another American girl that I know that helps women.” Then it clicked. This 8 year old little boy standing by another child of maybe 12 was the same child we had been trying to help for months. And I found found him. God led us to him. We had been working with the Costa Rican child protective services trying to help his entire family. When I first met his family, his mother was lying on a mat in their tiny, dirty house deathly sick. The little boy was actually in “foster care” because he had been taken away. The purpose of my visit was to help a 13 year old little girl who had been being sold as a prostitute. Little did I know God had even larger plans. 

The crazy thing about seeing this child this particular night was that we had literally just left the hospital where we had met the mother to pay her bus fair as she left the emergency room. That morning we had seen the daughter at our work program for rescued girls. What a sad and dark reality. 

As Carlos took this child aside to talk to him, the other boy (who was in the streets with him) who is around 12 years old caught my attention. I sat beside him on the curb and made small talk. I then felt that I had to ask him if he felt alone.... if he felt abandoned.... both of which he told me were true. As he began to pour out his story, my heart broke. His father died when he was small. His mother can not recognize him because she was so severely beaten by the step-father that she has serious brain damage. If the step-father beat the mom, I hate to imagine what he did to this little boy- his stepson. Often times when we see these “bad guys” on the streets we quickly turn our eyes. We are either filled with fear or we don’t want to let the reality of what we are seeing affect us, or we are too busy to care about the ‘bad guy’ on the street corner.... any number of things. However, to see that “street guy” as a little boy, right at the beginning of his life on the streets... it truly changes how you look at ‘street people’. This poor child.... abandoned, abused, neglected, alone. Alone in one of the most dangerous places. A place where literally no one cares about you. I could feel God’s heart break. Just feeling my own heart break was heart enough... but to think that I was only listening to his tragic story, while God had to sit and watch his little boy live through these things. Indescribable. 

                                                     Paths to brokenness

A woman at the work program on Saturday morning sat down across from me and looked me in the eyes. I’m not sure how she started but what she said kept me thinking. She began to tell me how drastically her life had changed since she came to know Jesus. Last week, we talked with the women in the program about how lies come into our lives and how those lies affect our lives. We asked them to think of which lies they believed about themselves and when those lies entered their lives. At the age of 9, this woman was raped. Her mother never believed her. This is when the lies began.... ‘you are worthless’, ‘no one believes you’.....the lies go on and on. 

From that day on, she began to grow more and more bitter. She was angry, didn’t understand, closed off, defensive, and isolated. As an adult this bitterness because her identity. The father of her children was terrible with her. She could not relate to her kids; she was so afraid that the same things that happened throughout her life would happen to them that she didn’t even let them have a life. Her bitterness was all consuming. She was completely isolated and harder than stone. Because she felt she had no value, and because her rights to her body were always just something that was taken from her; prostitution was an easy option. She continued to grow harder and fall farther. 

However, she told me that now her life has been completely transformed... that through the work program & discipleship, she has come to know the Lord personally. Her life is radically different in every aspect. She has hope, she smiles, she actually comes out of her house. She said that every day of her life, she used to wake up and think “ugh, I hate life..it’s going to be a terrible day...and I have nothing worth getting up for”. She said that one day a friend called her saying, “it’s so cold and rainy outside. It’s such an ugly day”. She in turn replied, “no, this is a beautiful day because the Lord made it just for me. And you can always put on a coat”. 

Seeing people like this is one of the things that keeps us going. Hearing someone just say out of the blue that God’s work through our ministry has radically changed everything about their lives makes it worth it. 

Sing along

I'm home in GA for a few weeks visiting family and raising support for the ministry!

Carlos was left alone as the only leader of Freedom Street for a few weeks! Please keep him in your prayers as he balances the MANY, MANY things that God is doing in and through Freedom Street!

I have loved reconnecting with old friends...and can not get over how gorgeous Georgia is. Wow. I have no words other than God is beautiful...and He surprises me every day.

As I sit here, I can almost understand how easy it is to be in this beautiful country of ours and never want to leave. It's easy to forget about the dying world on the outside.

But today I heard a song that totally touched my heart. It's written by Christy Nockels.... she wrote it after hearing about human trafficking... the thing is, it's asking God to spread His arms around the world which is a cry of my heart as well. However, I believe that God calls us to join with Him in that. To spread our arms around the broken world; to answer His command to go into the world and to bring  hope to the prisoners and free the oppressed. To go into the nations and make God known through our works.