Dinner with a Missionary Report

Last night Carole and I hosted a dinner as part of our Fall Missions Explosion. Our guest works with Project Rescue in India. She is very involved in the whole arena of human trafficking, including sexual abuse and slavery. This is a huge issue not only in southern Asia; it is a big problem here in Oklahoma City as well. Statistics show that 1 in 4 of our children are being abused and abuse begins early in their lives. The discussion we had with the families who were there got heavy at times, but we left with a sense of determination to do what we can do to help.

Here are the conclusions we reached:
1. There is no reason to believe that our church children are any less likely than others to become victims of sexual abuse. We must assume that children we know today have already been victimized.

2. The Church has been unwilling to talk openly about this topic in the past, but there is now a greater openness to discuss difficult issues such as this, and a greater desire for the Church to be involved.

3. There is no better place for this discussion to take place than in the safety of the church family, so we must be diligent to create environments where those who have been vicitimized can come forward without fear of being ostracized.

I am confident that as we keep this issue as a matter of prayer, we will begin to see how we can become involved in sharing the unconditional love of Christ into this type of situation, and how we can become involved to break this horrible stronghold of sexual abuse.