16 days!

Are we seriously leaving in 16 days for Cambodia! I can't believe it is almost here. What a journey all four of us have been on over the years to get to this point!

I'm Erin and I'll tell a little bit about my journey and how I got here. You will hear from Jamey, Kelli and Tim later!

At the end of 2008 God took a hold of my heart and gave me a passion to “…proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners…”, Isaiah 61. At the end of the year I watched a movie called, Taken, this movie had a sub story about 2 young girls who were kidnapped and sold into slavery. This movie made me sick and after watching it, I found out that you could actually buy a person here in the states for less that what you might pay for a cup of coffee. This just didn’t sit well with me, so began my journey to learning more about Human Trafficking.

Human Trafficking is the fastest growing criminal industry in the world and is not limited to just underdeveloped countries. This can be seen by the rise of Atlanta becoming recognized as one of the centers of Human Trafficking in the US. There are far more slaves and trafficked women and children (and men) in the world today than there ever were during the entire slavery period of the mid 1800’s. This reflects a continued decline in the perceived value of a human life, as someone loved and created by God to do His will. There are an estimated 27 million slaves in the world today!

In March, my church, North Point Ministries (NPM), - I am going via my campus Buckhead Church is going to shine the light of Christ into this worldwide scourge, starting in a region of Southeast Asia that is well known for its high incidence of child prostitution and abuse. Ours is an assessment team. From March 18 - 28, 2010 we will journey into some of the darker corners of Cambodia to identify national partners who are already at work. We will seek to identify several potential partners who already have successful and effective ministries, determine what NPM can learn from them, and assess if there would be value in NPM coming along side them. Upon return we will make a proposal to globalX regarding future ministry opportunities.

Approaches to battling Human Trafficking are often categorized into one of four categories. Prevention, Rescue, Rehabilitation and Prosecution. Each have a significant role in the fight against Human Trafficking and offer different opportunities for NPM engagement. We will seek to determine where NPM resources and people could best be utilized and begin the process of forming partnership agreements and understandings. Considering the many potential partners, most importantly we will seek to determine with whom God would have us co-labor. In addition, we will seek to determine how people who travel to Cambodia on Human Trafficking missions can also engage in Atlanta after they return home.