The first time I stepped foot into the house, it hit me. The walls were painted in pastels and artwork was pinned against the walls with words of encouragement. Faces of all the emotions where sprinkled across the room and the carpet in the large room was a pale pink.
There are ten girls. Ten beautiful and innocent faces, the youngest being eight and the oldest just turned seventeen. They all had colorful and patterned leggings and sparkly scarfs and hats. They were eager and timid to meet us yet met us with the most precious giggles and smiles that lit up the room immediately. And it hit me.
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We just arrived at our new ministry for the next couple weeks: the Dunamis Foundation. A little, hidden tomato farm in the mountains of Ecuador, the Dunamis Foundation is a refuge for young girls that have been rescued from sex trafficking and sexual abuse. They use a tomato farm as a source of income to support the girls.
In the house, the girls learn and heal and love. They do many things from learning skills to help them assimilate into society like jewelry making and sewing clothes. They learn English and math and other education that they most likely did not get. They learn to live in community and how to process their emotions and start to understand the things that were done to them.
There are ten girls. Now go back and read the introduction with the understanding of where these children came from.
There are ten girls, two of them have babies, one is about a year old and the other was born a mere 12 days ago. The first time I met the girls, I walked into the room with giggling little girls and crayons all around and it felt just like a daycare.
Then, you remember it’s not a daycare, it’s a refuge for victims of sex trafficking. It’s a safe place for little girls that have come out of unspeakable abuse. Children that have been sold and used for unconsental sex and many times sexually abused by their family members or traffickers.
The psychologist that works with them, Shay, was telling us about a fraction of the difficulty of caring for the girls. Many of them deal with unspeakable trauma that manifests in several ways, we always have to keep an eye on them and never let them get in contact with sharp objects because they will try and cut and hurt themselves. One of them has a lot of negative emotion and trauma with her baby so will try and suffocate it when she holds it. Someone has to stay up all the hours of the night to make sure they are safe and nobody has a manic or depressive episode.
When we met them, I didn’t see victims, I saw children. Children that just want to giggle and dance and run around and play.
As we walked back to our house that night, we didn’t say a word and the only noise heard was the scuffing of our shoes and the drizzle of mist in our faces. My eyes where locked on my feet as my heart started to beat faster and the lump in my throat grew into my eyes blurring with tears.
Unfair is simply an understatement. My words will inevitably fail in expressing the emotion and gravity of the realty at hand.
1 John 3:1 says, “See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are!”. The Lord is clear about how much he loves His children.
If my heart shatters this much for these girls, I cannot imagine how much the Father’s heart is breaking for His beloved children.
One thing I’ve been learning, struggling and growing with is the duality of how unsettling and unfair the world can be, with how His nature and His sovereignty never changes.
In a world that seems to be drowning in wickedness, His kindness and love is constant, and He always wins. However tragic it may be, the girls are free now. The path is difficult but the light at the end of the tunnel is undeniable.
Last night we went over to the girls house after dinner, we taught them games and danced. By the end of the night I was sweating and my cheeks were soar from smiling so much. There was a moment where we were doing the Macarena and we were all being silly and embarrassing ourselves. I looked over to one of the girls who is mute and has sat out and starred into the distance with a look of numbness since we met her. She was watching us with the tiniest twinkle in her eye and the corners of her mouth creeping up into a slight smile. My heart melted. That was the best thing I’ve ever seen. Truly.
I am learning new depths of how God heals and restores and man, is it life changing. Joy is found in the middle of unspeakable pain, and that is a glimpse of the kingdom.
