i didn’t know…

^{Proverbs 31:8} Open your mouth for the speechless,
      In the cause of all who are appointed to die.
       ⁹ Open your mouth, judge righteously,
      And plead the cause of the poor and needy.

I’m taking a missions class at church as it relates to poverty, slavery, HIV/AIDS, and persecution. I am pretty up to date on poverty, HIV/AIDS, and persecution, but it turns out I didn’t know much of anything about slavery. Or, to be more accurate, I wasn’t really seeing the slavery that takes place all around me. Why?

I think a lot of it has to do with the fact of just not knowing what to do about it. Last week, the topic was human trafficking. We learned what to look for. I am happy to be more vigilant in my observation. I have always been the kind of person to get involved, not turn my back on a cry for help. If I hear screaming, I am investigating and calling the police. It’s in my nature. I will not ignore a cry for help.

When I saw the movie ‘Blood Diamond’, it broke my heart. I never knew the slavery involved in mining diamonds, forcing children to become soldiers, to do unspeakable things NO person should have to do, regardless of age. That movie changed me. I swore I would never buy a diamond again (not that I’m a diamond kind of person) if there wasn’t a guarantee that is was not a conflict diamond. I have never looked at diamonds the same way since.

Well last night, I learned about children forced into slavery to harvest cocoa beans. Seventy percent of all chocolate is produced using cocoa beans harvested by slaves! Coffee beans, harvested by slaves. Produce, harvested by slaves. Sugar, harvested by slaves. How can this be? I thought slavery was abolished? This takes poverty to a whole level I never thought about. These are the people living on $0 a day. Almost everything I buy in the grocery store is off the back of slaves! I am horrified! The solution won’t fix things over night, but it means I can do something about slavery. I can buy fair trade certified items as much as possible. Fair trade items come from sources that have been investigated. They are farms and companies that don’t use slave labor.

I cried over this. I cried in my car as I drove home. I cried to God, Forgive me God! I’ve been so wrong! I’ve been blind on purpose!  Why would you save someone like me? I have a good life. I have a home. I have food to eat. I have more than a huge percentage of people all over the world! Why would you save me when children are dying to pick cocoa beans so the rich can have chocolate!?! Chocolate!!! We don’t even need chocolate! They need to be saved more than I ever needed to be saved! Then a whisper in my right ear, Who will go for us? (Isaiah 6:8) And just like that, the call to missions is affirmed again. The date was 8/4/2011. I write it down because I want to remember each time God speaks to me. He is faithful to speak to me when I am most heart broken.

And I am heart broken for these people. I am heart broken over my ignorance. How could I have been so blind? I confess I have lived a lot of my life with my head in the sand. The problems people face all over the world were just too big, too numerous, too outrageous to deal with, it was easier to just willfully refuse to look at them. I was like a child who covers his eyes and ears and screams ‘lalalalala’. But then I became a Christian. I was blind. Now I see. I pray God lets me see the world through His eyes. He is answering my prayer. I can’t stay the same. If I go back to pretending everything is okay, what kind of person does that make me?

What can you do?

• research slavery and learn as much as you can about this ongoing modern outrageous problem
• google fair trade to learn how to find items that come from slave free companies
• pray!

I know I can’t fix the world. I can’t do everything. But I can do something. These are God’s people. He loves them. They need to know He loves them. THIS is an emergency!

His… Michelle