Cause the Salsa Needs Canning

    I have had the title of this post in my mind for a long time.  I have been very lazy with writing lately, and there is no excuse for my laziness.  Writing is a very powerful tool in my life, and to deny the Holy Spirit's gift because of laziness is a shame.  As many of you know, at least those of you in blog world that take your sweet time to read my updates (which by the way, thank you so much for taking time out of your busy day to read the words God has given me), my husband and I have began a journey into a world of ministry.  We are very dedicated to proclaiming freedom around the world starting in our own community.  These past few years have brought many life changing events ending with me on a plane to San Fransisco to become trained in investigation and reporting for cases of slavery in my own community.  I was trained, and after being home for only a few days, I was asked to be involved with a Human Trafficking Awareness Summit held at the state capital. 

   Amazed by the new updates in the law, I was excited to be asked to be involved with such a wonderful adventure, so I embarked on what I now kindly refer to as "little black dress" ministry.  This type of ministry includes putting on your best clothes and playing "important" with big name law officials.  Sorta like when we were children and played house.  You knew inside that you did not belong in this type of world (at least not yet), but you welcomed the chance to play. 

   It didn't take long for me to realize, though, that I did not belong in this world (at least not yet).  I left at the morning break because I had a house to clean, people to visit, and salsa to can. 

    Time is precious.  It is the most precious gift you can give someone, and it is a fleeting part of our lives.  Our time is different than a store bought gift because once you have given your time, it can never be returned.  I must never be selfish with my time, or deny time to a person that God has told me to give because it doesn't fit into my schedule.  Sometimes the people that God tells us to spend time with isn't logical.  My home and family must be a major part of my time (the most important), but home and family can also consume every second of my time becoming more of a distraction.  My time is too precious to be spent on chasing ideas and dreams that I cannot see God's hand holding together, and like I trust my money, love, and life to God, my time also, must be daily given to Him.  Time spent must be intentional, for spending time can quickly become meaningless or wasted.  Sadly, there are occasions where time spent doing "ministry" is just wasted time.  Time could be spent better elsewhere such as canning salsa.     

I have learned these lessons the hard way.  Naturally, I am a shy person when I am in a crowd that I am not known.  It takes me quite awhile to warm up to people, and even then it is easy for me to move on from relationships.  It is a piece of my personality that makes me incredibly sad.  I like to fill my days with checklists and management, but this doesn't allow the Holy Spirit to move.  We must be intentional with our time because reality is, there are many things to get done in a day.  Every house wife knows that from the moment she wakes up to the moment she lies down, she is in movement.

    So I left the meeting because that season of my life hasn't came as of yet, and honestly, I have done very little with the training I came home with from San Fransisco.  I hope to change this, but it is all about waiting on the Holy Spirit to move.  I will squeeze in here though, it is about movement as well.  More on that later.  It takes waking up every morning and asking God, "Okay, what do I do today?"  It takes obeying His leading when He tells you to go or to stay.  What season of life are we in as of now?  Well, I am building a photography business, and it is going very well (thanks be to God and the creative insights the Holy Spirit has given me).  I am trying to find a place at the kickboxing gym that I am now attending (since I am officially past all hurts and aches), and I am attempting to get healthy enough to carry a baby to term.  I am seeing a natural herbalist doctor guy that has suggested some medicine that will raise my body temp high enough to keep a baby (since my normal body temp is below 96 degrees), and I am starting to feed my body organic food.  My prayer is that by the end of the year, we will be pregnant again, and the baby will be carried to term.  I am also in a season of leaving full time work and going to part time work and trusting God with money.  Finally, I am in a season of building a ministry.  God just hasn't given me or my husband the picture of what that is going to look like yet. 

So what season of life do you find yourself in at the moment, and are you spending your time intentionally in that season?

The High Demand for Slavery Starts with Us

Why Human Trafficking and Modern Day Slavery is a World Wide Problem and a World Wide Concern

This is my thank you to all who helped raise money and who gave money for me to go to the Not for Sale Academy June of 2012. I pray that during my time there I brought honor and glory to God above and brought honor to the friends and family that sent me. I pray that my time there was not wasted, and I have information that all may benefit from my attending. Thank you again.

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, for the Lord God has anointed me to bring the good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the broken hearted, proclaim FREEDOM for the captives, and the opening of the prison doors to those who are bound. To proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor and the day of vengeance of our God. To comfort all who mourn.” Isaiah 62:1-2

Information:
         Walk into your closet, pantry, or living room for that matter and take a good look around. Stop thinking about how messy your living room may be, how you have too many clothes, or even that you need to go grocery shopping and think for a moment from where these products actually came. Forget about the label or the store, I am talking about the cotton that made the t-shirt that says made in America or the minerals inside your computer or television. Go a step further and think about the chocolate chips in your cupboard. Have you ever stopped and wondered, “Where did the things that I use every day actually come from?” Here is a little dose of reality that hit me way too hard during my training at the Not for Sale Academy. The high demand for slavery does not come from some scary looking mafia men; it comes from people like you and me. Isn’t that a scary idea?! There are children being kidnapped and forced to work in the jungles of Africa picking Cocoa from the trees because we like Hershey’s chocolate bars. This is not something that we can justify nor distance ourselves from any longer. There are companies all over the world trying to expose the truth that since we do not ask businesses where our items come from, they are finding the cheapest labor possible and getting away with using slavery to create things common in our society.

         We fuel this demand by wanting cheap material in high quantities. We do not want to spend a large amount of money on a toy for our child. We would rather spend a small amount of money and get a wide range of variety. Companies are not ignorant, and they track our spending habits. Hasbro, Mattel, etc. see that we do not want to spend a lot of money, so they vouch for sweat shop laborers to create things so that the company can sell the item at a cheaper rate. The reality is that though sex trafficking is a horrendous act that should be stopped immediately; they actually serve a small percentage of the 27 million enslaved. Most of the people enslaved today make the clothing you are probably wearing at this moment. That sound daunting? Good! We need this to sound daunting because the only we are going to see an end to modern day slavery is decrease the demand. Here are a few more facts for you:

o Labor Trafficking is the most prevalent source of slavery.

o There are five types of trafficking: Labor, Child, Sex, Organ, and Domestic Servitude.

 o Type of Work Traffickers Traffic Victims for: Sex, Domestic (nannies or servants), Marriage, factory work, agriculture, restaurant, manufacturing, home care, servile marriage, criminal activity (drug transporting), construction, hotel or motel work, housekeeping, daycare teachers, cleaning business, and domestic services for Embassy Employees: Diplomats.

o The victims are usually recruited in the following ways: a personal relationship, newpaper ads, internet, or the promise of work.

o Victims are not just women. Many come from rural villages, but that doesn’t mean that they are poor or uneducated. Many men and women who have graduated from college with Master’s degrees have ended up being trafficked. Traffickers are not just men either, and they are not just big crime involvement type people. They can be someone as simple as a man or wife.

o Victims have difficulty seeking help because of language barriers, restricted movement, fear of authority, fear of deportation, lack of accurate knowledge of rights and resources, shame or scorn from family, trauma, or attachment to trafficker.

  o Many of the women getting stuck in Sex Slavery are from poor villages where there is not work to sustain themselves or their family. These women take loans to come to America or other westernized countries because they believe lies that once they get into those countries they will find work. They hear these lies from other women who work to recruit women for business. These women are beaten into submission and eventually learn to be “good” at their job in hopes of returning to their land or making enough money to send home to their families. Most of the women, even after “rescue” or paying off their debts return to prostitution. It is the only thing they know how to do, and when people find out what they are doing, even if they were trapped into the industry, they are looked at as a prostitute. The Price of Sex Documentary

o Many of the girls from the small villages mentioned above know that many of the girls that leave the village end up in horrific situations, but with no view of any type of future, they continue to trusts the men and women promising futures in other countries. I thought that this was an impossible idea until I met a girl on the bus in San Francisco. She was from Ukraine and took out a huge loan from the bank in order to come to America. She was going to college and working side jobs such as cleaning houses and teaching private dance lessons to pay back the loan. The Price of Sex

o The TVPA (Trafficking Victims Protection Act) of 2000 defines trafficking the recruitment, transportation, transfer, harboring or receipt of persons, by means of the threat or use of force or other forms of coercion, of abduction, of fraud, of deception, of the abuse of power or of a position of vulnerability. Any child being used for prostitution under the age of consent is automatically trafficking. The age of consent in Arkansas is 16.

o Made in the USA is not a safe answer to this problem. Only a small percentage of the item has to be assembled in America for it to have the Made in the USA tag.

Purpose:
        I bet you are saying right now to yourselves, “Okay, great Paula. I have heard a lot of this before, and even if I hadn’t you are telling me I can’t get away from using stuff made by slaves. Thanks for the uplifting words…now what?” I will respond with please do not get discouraged. Discouragement is another tool used by the traffickers. This problem is big, but it is not too big. Nothing is too big for God right, and we are His people. The perfect question is “Now what?”

 What Not for Sale is doing: NFS has discovered that slavery is a business, and the best way to fight it is business. They are building a corporation and a force of people to fight for the justice of people. They have discovered a way of doing this that is like no other. They are also trying to get out of the category of non-profit so that they do not have to wait on government grants to continue doing work. They are focused on finding ways to be self-sustaining. They are going into areas with high probability of trafficking and building business creating jobs. The jobs are being given to not just survivors but common people of the villages. By doing this, they are creating chains of fair trade products and creating job so that people will not be tempted to go into bigger cities looking for jobs. They showed up some new things coming out on their product line, and though I cannot give you details, I can say that there are exciting things coming out of NFS. While you wait for their new products, check out their Rebbl tea. http://www.causes.com/causes/597-not-for-sale/actions/1661196 In addition to creating a system to stop trafficking before it happens, they are training a force of people (like me) to be a part of the abolitionist movement.

What will I be doing now that I am trained: I am responsible for the research of cases of trafficking that have already been exposed. I research these cases and report them to slaverymap.org. This web-site is a tool for everyday people to see where and when trafficking is taking place in their own communities and around the world. In addition to this, I am responsible for bringing awareness to the community about trafficking. I now have a wide range of knowledge too in-depth for this letter, but I would love to sit down with any of you and talk logistics. I have also been trained to recognize trafficking in my everyday life. If I am in the opinion that trafficking is happening then I am trained to approach victims of trafficking so that they may reach out for help. Michael and I will be taking the knowledge that I now have to help with organizations in Arkansas. I am also trained to investigate cases of sex slavery online. This is a skill that I am thankful to have, but I ask for prayers as my husband and I figure out the best method for me to use this skill considering the obvious issues with the material I will have to be researching.

What you can do:

• Accept the reality that slavery does exist and it affects us in every area of our life at the current moment.

• Accept the reality that you are an abolitionist and your role as a believer and consumer can either contribute or fight modern day slavery.

  • Pray for your community, for America, and for the world. Pray that the voices of those in bondage be heard. Pray that more organizations step up with a desire to love people the way Christ loves us.

• Reshape your view of people (especially immigrants and prostitutes). Contribute to the breaking down of stereotypes because stereotypes contribute to human trafficking. Most immigrants are too afraid of asking for help for fear of hatred or deportation. When we refuse to look at people with the eyes of God, we dehumanize them. It is easy for people to take advantage of people who people quit seeing as human.

• Become a smart consumer. Download the Free2work app (www.free2work.org). This app allows you to scan the barcode of a product you are about to purchase. Once the barcode is scanned, the app will tell you the rating of the company. High grades determine if the company is working towards a no tolerance mindset. A lower grade determines if the company is doing nothing to fight slavery. We may have to pay more for things that are made in no tolerant shops, but do we really want to get gratification from someone’s deprivation? Remember that we the consumer run the show! If begin to speak out against companies that use slave labor in their production then we speak volumes about where we want to put our money. The reality is, as well, that a lot of clothing is not made in “no tolerant factories”. As we pray for transformation, think of some ways to purchase clothing at a no profit to the company (such as buying from second hand stores).

• Open your eyes to the world around you. You go to a Chinese restaurant to eat after church on Sunday. Your waitress seems happy enough, but she doesn’t really talk to you and she looks sad or nervous. All of a sudden you realize that you live in a community where there is slim to no Chinese population. You may ask where she came from, what she is doing in town, or if she likes her job. These are basic questions that can lead you to some pretty important information. If you have a concern that human trafficking is occurring call the Polaris Project hotline number 1-800-373-7888. Memorize this number. It would be easy to write this name on a napkin. If you have any more questions about what to do in these situations, feel free to contact me.

  • Be a realist but an optimistic realist. Faith the size of a mustard seed can move mountains. Welcome to the mountain. Sometimes, I feel like we got in statistics like 27 million people entrapped in slavery today. However, those are humans we are talking about. Each human desperate for freedom. Each human being beaten, abused, exploited, raped, etc. Each human that has an individual story. We have to feel like these people will be freed. We have to pray with faith that God will move mountains in this area.

• Let us, the church, end the issue with sex. We need to have freedom to discuss sex in the church so that people who are struggling with addictions to pornography or people who have reached the point they are buying sex can reach out for help knowing that they will not be shunned. God offered sex as a gift, and he meant it for good. It is the world that turned it into something perverted, and then the church decided that sex was bad. I read a portion of a book while I was in San Francisco that stated sex is a big deal. God intended it for married couples as a gift and a way to reproduce. However, sex is not as big as a deal as we think. The idea that sex sells needs to be destroyed and we need to start opening our hearts to the idea that struggling with some sort of sexual issue is fairly normal. We also need to speak out against pornography and teaching our sons and daughters about purity. This is so important because in my work, I have to research cases of sex slavery online. There are so many men that treat buying sex like they were going to see a new movie.

  • Get involved with your community. I would love if you joined a group such as P.A.T.H or Not for Sale, but that isn’t what I am talking about. I am talking about your neighbors, the people in the grocery store, the people at the park, etc. This goes back to opening our eyes. We, as the church, need to be opening our arms, hearts, and eyes. Thank you.