April Newsletter

Easter is coming quickly – a time when many of us spend extra time with family. Having Easter Egg Hunts or putting on new Spring clothes for church on Easter Sunday… followed by a feast with family around the table. I do hope that’s what you have to look forward to, all while celebrating the life, death and resurrection of Jesus. What a precious gift: we can have forgiveness of sins (all we’ve done to put barriers between us and God) and direct access to God through Jesus. Easter is truly a time to celebrate!

Before Easter, though, is National Crime Victims’ Rights Week, April 6-12. The theme this year is: Kinship, Connecting and Healing.

Kinship: the quality of being kin, related.

Most of the survivors we walk with have not experienced healthy kinship.

The majority of those trafficked in the US have been trafficked by their own families, or their significant others. The very people they should have been able to trust. The ones they are most connected to.

So how do you build trust when those closest to you have taken advantage of you? How do you change what “family” means to you? How do you move forward? How do you find new connections?

The speaker at our 2023 dinner, Jenny Footle (founder of Beautiful Feet Wellness), recently shared this in her March newsletter (used with permission; emphasis added). She addresses justice, deliverance and relationships from the perspective of a survivor of sex trafficking, which is very insightful:

I see people celebrating when traffickers are taken down, but do you see the survivors celebrating? No, they look concerned, a little somber or sick. We don’t feel joy when someone has to receive punishment. We wish they never did it in the first place, we wish our fathers, relatives, boyfriends, peers, employers, etc., were better people. We wish they would have turned around.

We are also struck with the gravity of the situation, it is like the lobster in the pot that slowly gets boiled, but then you’re ripped out and get cold water thrown on you and realize, wow, it was really that bad, this is real, my life isn’t just a nightmare, it was real.

It’s a little bewildering, “Okay God, so I’m free, where to now? Are there others out there? I thought they were safe and I was wrong. Who can I trust, can I trust myself, how do I do this?” Freedom might start once you get across the Red Sea, but people forget you have a long way to go to the promised land (God please not 40 years!).

So just know, if you’re praying for deliverance, you’re in for a shock, loss, and a long road of drought and desperation from there before you land in the place God has for you.

Please pray for survivors who are on this journey, and also who are surrounded by people telling them they should be happy their oppressors are dead, in prison, gone, etc. We should be celebrating their (survivors’) freedom, and revere God for the justice he’d rather not, but will deliver.

Healing from the trauma of trafficking is a long road. It doesn’t happen overnight. It can be a bumpy road, a roller coaster.

It’s not easy or natural for a survivor to trust anyone: strangers or friends. It’s so important for those walking with them to practice trauma-informed care. They have triggers to overcome. They have been told to think one way; they want/need to learn a different way. They’ve not been allowed to control many aspects of their own lives (if any), and suddenly they’re expected to be completely in control of their own lives.

Spring is a time of rebirth; a beautiful symbol of the kind of healing that survivors seek. Will you pray for survivors as they navigate their healing process?

We’re privileged to walk with many survivors. Several have recently needed practical help to keep their hope alive – help moving, staying in safe locations, staying fed, and obtaining their own transportation (we were able to help a single mom get into her own car!). Unfortunately, we’ve not been able to respond to all the needs; we rely on our donors to enable us to respond. Will you consider helping by donating the funds we need to keep helping? Every gift makes a difference, small or big.

At the same time, we’ve been filling requests for Hope Bags –about 100 each month (more below).

We’re honored and humbled when you choose to support our work. We can’t do this work without you. Thank you for giving when and as you can. Your support is a beacon of hope which lights the way to a new future for survivors.

Blessings,
Sues Hess, Exec. Dir., and the RHope Team