Go Beyond

Kolkata, India

Early this morning, the boys on our team headed back to the slum school in the village of Udayan Pally where they continued their work with the children of Bengali Hindus. The path to New Hope School is still coated with a film of slick and slippery mud that makes walking a challenge. But it’s worth taking every step to the school just to see the smiles on the faces of the children who are finding new hope there. Our boys are fully engaged with their assignment and are taking advantage of every opportunity to chat with curious onlookers about why we have come. One thing is certain, the villagers are as excited about our presence here as the children. For the majority of these poor families, their children will be the first to learn how to read and write in both Bangla and English. And, their children will be the first in their families to hear the story of Jesus and His love. Pastor Rudra’s curriculum includes teaching the story of Jesus in a way that children can reproduce it at home — through stories and songs.

Later in the morning, the girls on our team boarded a bus that took them to the aftercare home that we fund for girls rescued from forced commercial sex. Most of these young sex trafficking victims are younger than the girls on our team and have already lived through a lifetime’s worth of hell and abuse at the hands of filthy men seeking to satisfy their sexual appetites at any cost. When we arrived and entered the secure campus, the young girls there greeted our team with beautiful smiles and waves. Within minutes, the girls in aftercare and our team members introduced themselves to one another. As I stood there watching all of this happen, one of the young aftercare residents approached me with a smile and said to me in very broken English, “I go home today. My father is coming.” Her broad smile advertised an immense joy in her heart that she had not only been rescued, but would soon be reunited with the family who had lost a daughter through the deception of a sex trafficker.

“My father is coming” are the sweetest words I have ever heard on any of my visits to the aftercare home. Some of the girls in aftercare can never return home because they were sold to traffickers by their own family members. For these girls, the words “my father is coming” would have an entirely different meaning. But for a girl who fell into the trap of an unscrupulous sex trafficker, the words “my father is coming” represent new hope and the opportunity to heal among a family that thought they would never see their daughter again. The young lady who joyfully uttered those words told me that she wanted to continue her education and aspired to become a beautician — a dream she never thought she would fulfill when her life was abruptly interrupted by the evil intentions of a sex trafficker. And, to make things even sweeter, she clutched a small cross dangling from a string around her neck, lifted it to her lips, and kissed it. “”I am a Christian,” she said, “and I am going home today. My father is coming.”