- Please pray right now for our team of investigators as they work to solidify plans for intervention – pray for wisdom and insight as well as endurance. 
- Please pray for great collaboration with local authorities - pray that these men and women would be eager to protect the vulnerable and secure justice. 
- Ask God to protect and comfort the many girls who are not yet free, to remind them He is there with them, and to speed their rescue and restoration.

We are very, very grateful for your prayers.  Please feel free to share your them or any words of encouragement for the team in the comments below.  We will provide updates just as soon as we can. 

Even though their first day (a 75-mile ride!) started with rainy weather and hilly terrain, the team is more exited for the road ahead than ever — 5 weeks and 1800 miles of sharing about the reality of modern-day slavery and empowering people to act on behalf of victims of violent oppression.

Take the journey with us! You can:

» Follow the tour on our live tracking page and keep up with the riders through our daily instant access updates.

» Meet us when we come to your city! Find out where we’re headed next.

» Help us spread the word about 5 Weeks for Freedom with online tools.

» Help us reach our fundraising goal of $1 million! We’re asking 100,000 people to text FREEDOM to 20222* to give $10 to IJM’s work. Will you help us spread the word? Other great giving options are available here.

* A $10 donation will be added to your mobile bill. Messaging & Data Rates May Apply. Get details here »

Human trafficking is always an issue, but grows even more prevalent at worldwide events like soccer’s biggest stage.

“...as we turn to this year’s Cup, there is a far more serious form of illegal movement than a footballer’s (or soccer player’s) cunning play that demands our attention: human trafficking, a global phenomenon powered by coercion and deception, which may increase around major sporting events and other times of increased transnational movement.”

... “South Africa, home of the 2010 World Cup, has been documented as a source, transit and destination country for trafficking in men, women and children, according to the U.S. State Department’s 2009 Trafficking in Persons Report. That means people are trafficked from, through and into South Africa, some for labor, while others are forced into South Africa’s many brothels. While South Africa has taken steps to pass a comprehensive anti-trafficking law, that legislation is caught up in a Parliamentary committee, where many believe it will languish for months—long after the World Cup leaves town.”

..."With the huge flow of international visitors pouring in through South Africa’s borders for the World Cup, it is possible—some say probable—that a new stream of human trafficking victims could slip past the notice of officials. Of course, when an activity is hidden and illicit, reliable statistics are very hard to come by. Still, reports are emerging of new foreign nationals—including Mozambican, Zambian, Zimbabwean, Chinese and Southeast Asian nationals—working in brothels in residential Cape Town neighborhoods. City Councillor J.P. Smith, an official responsible for safety and security during the World Cup, recently claimed in an ESPN “Outside the Lines” investigative report that “they were not here a year ago. These girls didn’t come here by themselves. ... They’re being brought here through syndicates, who have the means to manipulate immigration processes, to bribe border patrol, border guards, to bribe immigration officials.””

... “Stronger law enforcement has been proven to help. International Justice Mission views it as indispensable. In Cebu, Philippines, after two years of collaborative casework led by IJM, we saw a 70 percent reduction in the victimization of children in the commercial sex trade. This required vigilance by competent local authorities. In IJM’s experience, such partners can be identified and equipped all around the world.”

“The vision for IJM Student Ministries is to engage students in a personal and corporate journey toward greater discipleship in God’s heart for justice. We want to paint a picture of what can be. Today’s students are passionate about justice and they long for deeper engagement that leads to a lifestyle of righteousness and justice.

As president of the IJM Campus Chapter at the College of William and Mary, Nik Belanger learned the meaning of justice. His passion was increasingly grounded in his understanding, ultimately leading to additional leadership as co-facilitator of the campus chapter of the Virginia Organizing Project, a nonpartisan grassroots organization that seeks to battle injustice by giving people the means with which they can improve their quality of life. Together with his involvement with Circle K International, Safe Zone and tutoring individuals in his community, Nik’s life is reflective of his understanding that justice is all about human flourishing.

“International Justice Mission helped me realize that leadership is not about being the one in the limelight—true leadership seeks to build everyone up,” he said. “As an individual acting on my own, I can only accomplish so much, but real, meaningful change is made through people joining together as one.”

Nik has grasped the heart of IJM, to build bridges across society in order to accomplish together what can seldom be accomplished alone. In so doing, we realize that though the movement to fight against violent oppression throughout the world is often sparked by small cadres of like-minded visionaries, the battle will only be won when we galvanize entire communities to stand and to act with one voice.

“I’ve never wavered on my belief that people deserve justice and equality,” Belanger said. “It’s just a question of striving to live that out in my daily life.””

- Safety for the clients and staff
- Cooperation from the government authorities
- Swift and wise decisions to be made
- Freedom, safety, and a place of healing to be given to these girls

Thank you so much for your prayers…

There’s a constant buzz of conversation happening over on the GPG Online page - http://www.ijm.org/gpgonline—I hope you’ve been able to join. If you’ve missed any sessions, note that most of this weekend’s content was recorded and is available for download on-demand.

One of our staff members has been writing reflections on her experience at the GPG and we’d like to share those with you as well over the next few days. Alyson Quinn serves on our Donor Relations team, and here are her thoughts from the last night’s experience:

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For me, a four-year IJM staff member, the Global Prayer Gathering starts here: 5 o’clock on Friday night, shivering in the stiff breeze outside of the Sheraton Premiere. IJM staff from across North America, Europe and the developing world congregate in the sunken garden for a brief meeting. Dressed all alike in immaculate black suits, the IJM uniform, we are also united in some degree of exhaustion. Long, exacting hours of preparation for the GPG have brought us to this point: cold, tired, and standing on the brink of a weekend of yet more work.

But in defiance of the sobriety of our dress and the numbing tiredness of our bodies, the meeting is charged, surprisingly, with joy. Laughter ripples through the throng of us. We cheer, clap and smile at the leaders who lead us in the litany of final details. Why should such gladness infuse us today, when the hours of preparation have led only to this: a Friday, Saturday and Sunday on the job?

For one thing, the GPG is our family reunion. The staff, many of whom labor in distant countries or in lone-ranger outposts, come together again. Our community rejoices in the fulness of its numbers.

But there is another reason behind the lightness of our spirits.

The reason lies in the nature of the work that we undertake this weekend. Our work will be the labor of prayer.

Make no mistake. Prayer is work of the hardest kind. 

Starting tomorrow morning, during the prayer room rotations, we will expose ourselves to the depth and breadth of depravity worked against the poor, and in prayer we will saturate our own hearts with God’s sorrow over injustice. This work will bend our bodies to the floor with the weight of sin and our own incapacity to circumvent suffering. This work will wring the tears from our eyes and sap our strength and sleep.

But it is also true that this weekend, we will remember the extent of our Father’s power, the brightness of His glory and the prodigality of His love. In return for our tears, we will have His smiles, as we believe that He exists and rewards those who earnestly pursue him. In return for our exhaustion, we will unleash His omnipotence on behalf of the widow and the orphan. Though lowered to the floor, we will glimpse His exaltation amidst the pain and oppression we decry.

So why do we laugh on the eve of our hearts’ breaking? We laugh in anticipation of this work, this scandalously unequal exchange of poverty for riches. For to us this weekend falls the work of remembrance, the work of joy - the unrivalled and holy work of prayer.

http://www.ijm.org/GPGOnline

See the video piece here:
http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/video/sex-trade-cambodian-children-10164798

Additionally, a written piece that mentions IJM directly appears on ABC’s Web site.
http://abcnews.go.com/WN/cambodia-children-sold-slavery/story?id=10163645

Grateful to be in this work with you,
Amy

IJM Field Office Directors from 17 cities world-wide are eagerly preparing to fly to DC next month for this time of prayer and worship with you. We are also grateful to be led this year by IJM friends Sara Groves, Lamont Hiebert (of Ten Shekel Shirt and Love146), and Andy Crouch alongside Gary Haugen, Sharon Cohn Wu, and other IJM staff.

Hope to see you April 9-11 for this indescribable experience of meeting with our God.

Planning to be there? Would love to hear from you in the comments below. Been before? What are you most looking forward to about coming again?

NY Times - With Haitian Schools in Ruins, Children in Limbo

“Children staying in the camps face trials beyond laboring in the streets. Health workers in the camps are reporting a rising number of young rape victims, including girls as young as 12. Alison Thompson, an Australian nurse and documentary director who volunteers at a tent clinic on the grounds of the Pétionville Club, said she had cared for a 14-year-old girl who was raped recently in the camp.”

“‘The entire structure of the lives of these children has been upended, and now they’re dealing with the predators living next to them,’ Ms. Thompson said.”

“The government here has recognized the urgency of reopening schools to provide some structure to those picking up the pieces of their lives. But its efforts to do so have faltered. Officials declared schools open in unaffected areas as of Feb. 1; some students have trickled into those schools, but many have not, say education specialists.”