Human Trafficking & Teenage Rape

I've just been watching a movie on Human Trafficking, the largest growing crime in the world and it just makes so much anger burn up inside me. Last week just over 600 young people from around Australia and New Zealand gathered together in Melbourne for a huge youth event called 'Insane'.

A part of Insane was a huge silent protest in Federation Square against this vile crime where around the number of around a jumbo jet full of mostly of women and children go 'missing' everyday and are sold into sexual slavery. There are way too many stories I've heard from individuals that have been involved in this and it really breaks my heart.

We keep telling ourselves that this only happens in far away lands and that it's doesn't really effect us so why do anything?! I want to change the focus slightly to right here on our shores of Australia, slightly different from sexual trafficking, but still sexual victims.

I've been having a few girls coming to me regularly now for months with stories and experiences of young teenage girls mostly getting drugged and raped here in Australia from every corner of the continent and they really develop a sense of self hate and depression. As these girls talk to me, it makes my heart break and I just wish I could really do something to stop this. The part that makes me the most angry is that nearly 100% of these go unnoticed and unpunished. One example I know of is a 26 year old raping a 15 year old girl who was drunk!!! How can we allow this to happen!

I've been told I'm too protective of our young girls, but I want to be a father one day, and this scares the hell out of me when my daughter will become a teenager. Is it culture we need to change or teachings that our children get from tv shows and songs.

We need to start doing something now, something needs to change now!

One life at a time

Break my heart for what breaks Yours God! I promise to do all I can in my power God so just give me access and Your anointing

"He [the wicked man] lies in wait like a lion in cover;

he lies in wait to catch the helpless;

he catches the helpless and drags them off in his net. "

Psalm 10:9

Abortion or 'choice'

For you created my inmost being;

You knit me together in my mother's womb.
I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;

Your works are wonderful,

I know that full well.
My frame was not hidden from You

when I was made in the secret place.

When I was woven together in the depths of the earth,
Your eyes saw my unformed body.

All the days ordained for me

were written in Your book

before one of them came to be.

Psalm 139:13-16

Extremists - again

After my previous post, my brother told me that he had just been reading some speeches for his studies on Martin Luther King Jr and how they had been along similar lines to what I blogged and have been thinking about.

I thought I'd just add a few of his quotes in, firstly because they are along similar lines to my previous blog, and also because they are inspirational.

"Was not Jesus an extremist in love - 'Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, pray for them that despitefully use you.' Was not Amos an extremist for justice - 'Let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like an mighty stream.' Was not Paul an extremist for the gospel of Jesus Christ - 'I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus.' Was not Martin Luther an extremist - 'Here I stand; I can do none other so help me God.' Was not John Bunyan an extremist - 'I will stay in jail to the end of my days before I make a butchery of my conscience.' Was not Abraham Lincoln an extremist - 'This nation cannot survive half slave and half free'. Was not Thomas Jefferson and extremist - 'We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.' So the question is not whether we will be extremist but what kind of extremist will we be . Will be extremist for the preservation for hate or will be extremists for love? Will we be extremists for the preservation of injustice - or will we be extremists for the cause of justice?"

What a spokes person! There are so many other brilliant quotes here from Martin Luther King Jr, but I may break it up into smaller, bite size blogs.

I'm about to go into a technological blackout until late Monday. This weekend a few of us are involved in the International Weekend of Prayer and Fasting for Victims of Sexual Trafficking so one of the things I will be fasting is technology. You may also like to join us in prayer and fasting as a starting point to fight against this evil so please do this weekend.

"The Spirit of the Sovereign LORD is on me, because the LORD has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners"
Isaiah 61:1

Role models, are you proud of yourself?

You reap what you sow




Do what you say. Integrity, speaks louder than words

"Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows."

Galatians 6:7

Chocolate companies break promise

On July 1st, people all across our town will be going out of their way to buy more chocolate—a chocoholic’s dream, but it will be fairly-traded chocolate. This is the best way and the only way to eat your chocolate slave free.

July 1st is a very important day around the world.

It’s the day when the chocolate industry promised to make sure that no children were being used as slaves on cocoa farms.

It’s the day when we could eat a bar of our favourite chocolate such as a Mars, Kit Kat or Dairy Milk knowing that no child has been used in the harvesting of the cocoa beans that went to make the chocolate we love to eat.

Sadly there will be no celebrations on July 1st.

Industry has failed to keep its original promises.

Today, children as young as 12 are still being used as slaves on cocoa plantations. Here are the words of one child after being rescued from a farm. “I will tell you how I lost my arm. I tried to escape, but I could not. They caught me and tied me to a papaya tree and they beat me and broke my arm. I used to dream horrible dreams that they were beating me and about many other things: the hard work, my family …I still have these dreams today”.

Although the majority of farmers would not treat children in this way, there are some who do, and there are an estimated 12,000 children trafficked onto cocoa farms in the Ivory Coast into a life of slavery.

In our community, thousands of people are buying chocolate without knowing that these children are suffering for our sweet tooth to make fat profits for an industry that hasn’t delivered on its promises.

In 2001 they said they would certify that farms were slave free. Now they are saying that they are gathering data on some of the areas where cocoa is harvested.

This is not what they promised.

This is not good enough after 7 years of waiting for the freedom, safety and protection of these children.

We have to choose which chocolate bar to buy, at little cost to us when our chocolate is costing some children their lives.

We have to choose which chocolate bar to buy, little cost to us when our chocolate is costing some children their lives.

What are we doing?

There is quite a lot of discussion happening on the Salvo blogs lately. There was one comment on Marney Turners blog by an 'anon' which said;

"Do you see church as something passive, that you go to observe? or something in which you participate?

Is Christianity something you do or are?

Where is "the church" Mon thru Sat?

If baptism is by water can it not be by the Living Water and by the Holy Spirit?

Can a uniform not be a statement of commitment?

Can items of clothing be a constant reminder to the person wearing them of meeting a certain standard of behaviour?

As a friend of mine once said "I wont put a "fish" on my car because then I'd have to drive like a Christian" "

Some good questions to think about. Sure the 'church' has deviated from it's purpose many times, and still in many ways today, but is it really the church or people within the church? Yes, the people within the church are the church, but then I suppose then it can go into questioning whether the 'denomination' if it is correct or not, but that's another topic all together.

There are way too many people that call themselves 'Christians' but don't even know what God requires of them. Who would become a part of, or assosiate themselves with something they have no idea about, like becoming a lion tamer or a Free Mason for example without knowing what they actually do or what it actually means.

Christianity has much to answer for, or is it really people in the church that have much to answer for!? Back before the reformation of the church, the Catholic church became an entity that was all about controlling people in the name of 'God' which really was nothing like what God requires from His people - my God is a God of justice - that means people are liberated spiritually and even physically, not so you can do what you want sinfully, but so you are free from oppression and any form of slavery, etc.

I like the part of the above statement about a uniform being a statement of commitment. Many 'Soldiers' of the Salvation Army these days don't do more than observe 'church' and it just is a passive thing - uniform to them is something they just wear to just be a part of the 'club' and not for anything outside of the four walls of the church where it's true purpose lies; its funny that these people are slowly just wearing casual civilian clothes to worship, even footy club clothing I've noticed rather than their uniform.

Why did Salvationists wear uniform in the first place - because they wanted to show they were apart of the fight, were committed and wanted to be associated with this Army God had raised up, not just for it's Soldiers to club meetings to make themselves feel good and pat each other on the back saying 'you're doing a good job' but actually get out there save the dying and clothe the naked and snatch people out of the clutches of damnation on many levels.

What happened to that?? We lost the vision of eternal damnation. I'm sure forgot to study the Word and therefore the requirements of Salvation, became comfortable thinking that sitting in 'church' occasionally would give them a free pass into 'heaven'. I've had a few small envisions of hell and that 'encourages' me strongly to actually partake in our calling to save the lost! If you've lost your passion or your enthusiasm, read the Word more, pray more, ask God for a renewed passion for the lost, and even a vision of hell yourself - but as a warning - be ready for what you ask!!!

Arise Soldiers - enough is enough! - are you giving reason for God's enemies to blaspheme His Holy Name?? If so, stop calling yourself a Christian and associating yourself with God - you are doing the most damage to the Kingdom of God.

"I can't stand your religious meetings.

I'm fed up with your conferences and conventions.

I want nothing to do with your religion projects,

your pretentious slogans and goals.

I'm sick of your fund-raising schemes,

your public relations and image making.

I've had all I can take of your noisy ego-music.

When was the last time you sang to me?

Do you know what I want?

I want justice—oceans of it.

I want fairness—rivers of it.

That's what I want. That's all I want. "

Amos 5:21-24

Focus determines your reality

I had a good conversation a couple of days ago now with a good friend about how leprosy colonies still exist today and it changed my view on the verse where Jesus says to "Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse those who have leprosy, drive out demons". Previously I wasn't aware of many people still in the world that had leprosy, so I wasn't sure how relevant that part of the verse was, but God keeps reminding me His word is eternal.

We got onto the healing topic that seems to keep coming up around the Salvationist circles a lot lately. I'm guilty of focusing on God's healing power more than His saving power and my good friend, a respected leader of the Army, was saying to us that the best healing God gives is the healing of hearts! How good is that! I love it. He also went onto say that if we could hear God on the healing topic is that He might say, you wouldn't worry so much about my signs and wonders if you really knew what was coming!

My Spiritual giftings are in healing, discernment etc, more the 'supernatural' gifts - everyone seems to focus on whats around them the most.

So it got me thinking about what's our primary focus as Salvationist in the Salvation Army - well we know we're not a metaphor, so I guess it's salvation!! We focus primarily on peoples souls! We want them to see, as we see, the love of God.

Then what? Secondly, then is it the physical, which to me, it looks like in the past few decades the Army has put into first place. (This covers both the feeding and clothing etc and also the healing topic). Even today I heard some Officers were unhappy with a good friend of mine, who is a leading Officer of the Army, because he is "too focused on social justice and evangelism" and here I'd like to state IS the basis of the Salvation Army - how ironic!!!

So, in my personal opinion, the Army in the past few decades, started loosing it's vision, started taking it's eyes off 'the ball', and now we're trying to get back on the of the purpose of the movement, why God raised us specifically - there will be much opposition, especially from within, from the 'not-so-right' teachings of the mediocre army, and we're seeing this opposition already! (God have your way with Your Army in Jesus Name)

Here comes some healing again I think - many people have been badly hurt from this 'army' when we started diverting from our 'mission'. Since we 'represent' God, we may have to have some healing first so these hurt by the 'organisation' can see God clearly again, not the blurred vision they see of God through the Army.

So I suppose what I'm saying in summary is, put God's saving power first - He ultimately wants us to spend eternity in His Kingdom, then worry about their physical self as a close second(!?) What's your thoughts?

If focus determines your reality - what is the reality of the Salvation Army at present? Thanks to Commissioner Knaggs for his vision - its very timely!!

Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell.
Matthew 10:28

Rainforest Alliance Certified Coffee

I picked up a pamphlet tonight about McDonald's new coffee they're promoting.

On these pamphlets it says

"Rainforest Alliance Certified coffee is produced within a sustainable system developed to protect the environment, wildlife an improve coffee farmers' quality of life."

Buying this Rainforest Alliance coffee makes me feel like I want to go and chain myself to a tree to stop it getting mistreated. Knowing about it's 'competition' Fairtrade coffee, it seems a bit weak really.

If I had a tree and a human in front of me, and had to choose which one to save, I think I value human life much higher in the scheme of things, so I'd choose the human. I'd rather completely support a product that totally guaranteed to stop slavery and also supports the farmers that were struggling than a product that contained only around 30% mixture that is friendly to the environment and its frogs. They also mention that they support improving coffee farmers quality of life, but it seems just a bit of a tag on at the end and not as the main focus of the product.

I know I need to lighten up but it's not enough to talk up how good you are if you're not going to be totally committed to really making a difference on what is really important. My work has just started up a community benefit program also which also contains a 'caring for the environment' component, which I feel is just to win brownie points with the community. Does it really care? Does McDonald's really care, or do they just want to be known as 'good people' that are doing a 'good deed'? If something is worth doing, it's worth doing completely and with commitment - do you agree?

Ok, off my soap box now... Human life and the opportunity of having a quality life is much more of a concern to me, and I'm sure God for that matter, than a forest and it's wildlife. Yes we need to be caring for them, but if they become a priority over human life, then there is something a bit wrong.

'But he's already made it plain how to live, what to do,

what God is looking for in men and women.It's quite simple:

Do what is fair and just to your neighbor,

be compassionate and loyal in your love,

And don't take yourself too seriously—

take God seriously.'

Micah 6:8 (The Message)