2008 Human Trafficking Report (US) out.

The annual report can be seen here Trafficking in Persons Report 2008.

I am no expert on Human trafficking – this is a truly heart-wrenching reality.

Did you know that 12.3 million people are in forced labor, forced child labor and sexual servitude. 800,000 people are trafficked across national borders a year, 70-80% women and 50% minors.  Enslavement within the borders of one’s own country is a gargantuan problem.

It is a $5 Billion to $9 Billion a year (Wikipedia) business.

From the Report:

The TVPA defines “severe forms of trafficking” as:

a. sex trafficking in which a commercial sex act is induced by force, fraud, or coercion, or in which the person induced to perform such an act has not attained 18 years of age; or b. the recruitment, harboring, transportation, provision, or obtaining of a person for labor or services, through the use of force, fraud, or coercion for the purpose of subjection to involuntary servitude, peonage, debt bondage, or slavery.

A victim need not be physically transported from one location to another in order for the crime to fall within these definitions.

An incredibly complicated problem, not to be helped by UN Peacekeepers (anybody surprised?) whose presence increases sex-trafficking prostitution (Refugees International). As you might expect UN is initiating a “series of reforms” to address the problem among its 100,000 people in the field. Bleh.

Find something to do about. Not For Sale. Stop the Traffic. If you know of effective/trustworthy org’s, (especially from Christian perspective) that are involved in helping please leave a comment.

A little message of comfort to the great Christian voting block of the USA

The other day I heard a couple Christian people talking about ‘people of faith’ and the 08 election. One of them made this stunning comment, “You know we could lose again.”

We could lose again?

If I could be facetious for just a moment: Surely you realize that Barak loves you, so does John, not to mention Mike, Ron and Hill, and probably Ralph and Cindy.

80’s retro Billy Squire (From the days of Ron R and Jimmy C)

Newworldson

Salvation Station.

The father of Christian Rock

Larry Norman: God Part III

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Why don’t You Look into Jesus

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Goodbye Larry.

Larry Norman died on Feb 24, his brother Charles posted this message LarryNorman.com the following day from Larry:

“Our friend and my wonderful brother Larry passed away at 2:45 Sunday morning. Kristin and I were with him, holding his hands and sitting in bed with him when his heart finally slowed to a stop. We spent this past week laughing, singing, and praying with him, and all the while he had us taking notes on new song ideas and instructions on how to continue his ministry and art.

“Yesterday afternoon he knew he was going to go home to God very soon and he dictated the following message to you while his friend Allen Fleming typed these words into Larry’s computer:

I feel like a prize in a box of cracker jacks with God’s hand reaching down to pick me up. I have been under medical care for months. My wounds are getting bigger. I have trouble breathing. I am ready to fly home.

My brother Charles is right, I won’t be here much longer. I can’t do anything about it. My heart is too weak. I want to say goodbye to everyone. In the past you have generously supported me with prayer and finance and we will probably still need financial help.

My plan is to be buried in a simple pine box with some flowers inside. But still it will be costly because of funeral arrangement, transportation to the gravesite, entombment, coordination, legal papers etc. However money is not really what I need, I want to say I love you.

I’d like to push back the darkness with my bravest effort. There will be a funeral posted here on the website, in case some of you want to attend. We are not sure of the date when I will die. Goodbye, farewell, we will meet again.

Goodbye, farewell, we’ll meet again
Somewhere beyond the sky.
I pray that you will stay with God
Goodbye, my friends, goodbye.
—Larry

Jesus Culture

Kim Walker – How He Loves Us

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Mostthemovie.

It’s because you lied.

Or whatever – maybe you lied or stole or maybe lust (same as adultery per Jesus) or hate (same as murder) …. Truth about you and me is that we are guilty of breaking laws that God said would never change. We’re not guilty because we’re bad or worthless, shoot…Jesus thinks your so worthwhile He died for you. We are guilty because we broke the laws. It’s kinda weird that we get this “there is no Law” thing going on – like God changed the rules for us cause we’re different, when the truth is that the one thing that changed is that our fines are being paid by someone who loves us.
This is love, this is Jesus being glorious. He took the punishment for us and if we’re walking in faith in Him were guiltless because of His actions.
Isn’t it also kinda weird that we translate “Jesus does it all” (true) into we pretend it’s not there (insane). Or is it like saying we believe He died for something that’s not all that important, at least not us?
When it becomes important to us we are very close to that thing called repentance. And repentance is the first step to the most mind-blowing life-fixing experience in the universe.

Jesus Culture – Kim Walker

We Cry Out

From: What would Jesus Blog

The following are not my words – they are pasted right outa What Would Jesus Blog? at Blogspot:

“Every so often, somebody likes to yell at Me in My blog comments. Rarely do I respond via this blog. However, I would like to respond a recent comment, which I have copied and pasted below. The comment was as follows:

IF GOD REALLY DOES EXSIT WHY IS IT THAT HE MAKES UP SUFFER AND IF HE IS REAL WHY DOES HE GIVE US EMOTIONS WHEN SOME OF THEM WILL HURT US OR THE PEOPLE WE CARE ABOUT. WHY IS IT THAT HE GIVES US LIFE AND LITTLE HAPPINESS BUT TAKES AWAY LIFE AND OUR HAPPINESS WHEN WE ARE GLAD TO HAVE WHAT WE HAVE AND HE TAKES IT AWAY. I SAY THAT IF GOD REALLY LOVED US HE WOULDN’T MAKE US SUFFER AND WOULDN’T TAKE AWAY THE THINGS OR THE PEOPLE WE CARE ABOUT THE MOST.

And now, My response…

Dear Anonymous,
I have created your world and your life. I have loved you ever since I made you in a special place. While creating you, I placed in your heart a set of morals. I remember the morals which I gave you, and I remember specifically placing in those morals the rules of when and when not to excessively use your caps lock key. You clearly went against your own heart which I made for you when you went against your better judgment and typed your whole comment in capitol letters. You know this is wrong, and yet you do it anyway.

Unfortunately, Anonymous, you live in a world surrounded by people that go against the seeds of righteousness I have planted in their hearts. When the world turned against Me, the world fell apart. Why the suffering? Why the Hurt? Why the excessive use of the caps lock key? The answer is only three letters long… S.I.N.

I’m sorry that you have to wrestle about Me in a world so screwed up. The good news is I did something about it. I’ve created a place better than where you’re stuck, a place where suffering doesn’t even exist. I also made a way for you to get up here. If you want in, and believe in Me you do, then calm down on your caps lock key and keep searching for the truth. At the end of your journey, you’ll find Me with My arms spread wide open. That’s a cross reference, get it?

I died for you. I died for your excessive caps lock key use. I died for your anger. I’m sorry you are hurting. You won’t be much longer. I love you. Read My biography and we’ll chat.

Jesus Christ

Anybody else got anything they want to vent My way? Drop Me a line and maybe I’ll respond back in blog format. posted by wwjblog @ Monday, January 07, 2008″

A code of conduct for missions and evangelism? Sheesh.

Effective evangelism by Evangelicals and Pentecostals has created quite a stir among Christendom, so it would seem. Time to bring some intelligent ecumenism to this! The good old World Council of Churches, along with the Vatican and a whole bunch of Evangelicals have decided it’s time to bring some uniformity to the problem of Christians who are just a little too successful at winning people, especially from otherwise well governed mainstream (sic) flocks and our already irritable Muslim and Hindu neighbors. (What does this remind me of, like maybe the book of Acts). A code of conduct should do the trick. The problems of enforcement will have to be worked out later.

What’s the problem again?

“Evangelization also has caused concern among the branches of Christianity because of the vigor with which Pentecostal and evangelical congregations have led the drive for conversions around the world, outstripping the growth of older churches. Pope Benedict XVI’s visit to Brazil in May was partly a response to the exodus of millions of Catholics to Protestant evangelical churches.” see “Evangelicals Support Conversion Code” By BRADLEY S. KLAPPER, Associated Press, Wed, Aug 15, 2007 Washington Post

And of course:

” The code aims to ease tensions with Muslims, Hindus and other religious groups that fear losing adherents and resort to punishments as extreme as imprisonment and even death for converts from their faith and foreign missionaries.”

See also at EthicsDaily.com “Christians Report Progress on Proselytizing Code“

What Changed?

A little Gen X, a little B Boom. It may be one the least represented realities in the country. Too early to be Gen X, too late to be Baby Boomers. Not really stockholders in the counter cultural Hippy movement,which was already starting to fizzle when they came along. Oh sure, they looked like them, talked like them, enjoyed their liberation from the “old morality”, but they really just followed on the coattails of the movement to an increasingly suspicious destination. Equally self absorbed, a little less optimistic. The old guys who started the movement found a renewed purpose for life, themselves. Us late Boomers , well we never really trusted anybody any way. Gen X has grown up, much less wide-eyed, a little more cynical, but at least recognized as an official generation. Oddly, their achievers and heroes are hard to distinguish from the former generations, wow, maybe things haven’t changed after all. We, well we are here in the middle, watching most of the once-hippies age into their health-care world view, and the following gen getting what they can.

There is another part of this whole thing that maintained continuity between the past and the future. Remember the Jesus movement? The movement that came out of that so strange American era is really better suited to change the world than before. Oh sure, it’s bruised by miscreants like everything else, but the passion to be part of the eternal is as hot as ever. The difficulty of rising above the same-old same-old: educational achievement, employment, retirement planning, and healthcare benefits – is daunting but not overwhelming. God Wanters have been represented in every generation since Jesus, usually known by the record of their opposition. These Jesus Freaks have never really minded being ridiculed, Ted Turner and Howard Stern notwithstanding. This movement has been present in every age from the beginning. Deeper than church or religion, facing reality better than the Hippies, it hasn’t really changed either. The drive to understand and re-capture the Jesus experience of century one is still very much alive.

Pew Research Retro! Generation Gap is back.

Actually there is a great divide regarding what’s-good-and-what’s-bad-for-society questions, but it has as much to do with ideology and religion as age.  Still the generation gap is making a comeback.  For example nearly half of the adults between age 30 and 40 have lived together unmarried, quite unlike their elders.  I wonder if this isn’t the fastest growing demog. group in America.   44% of cohabitators have no intention of marrying, 41% of same group are unsure.  67% (whites) feel that the purpose of marriage is for mutual happiness.    The top three happiness getters are faithfulness, sex, and sharing household chores.  In 2000 children ranked in the top three, they now have fallen to second from last in a list of 9 things that “make marriage work”.  Still, we love our children, those relationships in two of the top three spots as things that bring “personal happiness and fulfillment”.  58% feel it’s better to divorce than to be unhappily married, and that it’s best for the children (76% of those who have been through a divorce 57% f those who haven’t).  63% feel that unmarried people having children is bad for society.  37% of births (2005) were to unweds, half of those cohabitators.  Among all age groups ideology and religion are the big tells.

Read the article here http://pewresearch.org/pubs/526/marriage-parenthood.

VRUK

Click here http://www.lovedivineonline.com/to see all of the Love Divine videos like the ones below – and lots of other ministry stuff. Thank you all at Vineyard Records UK!