Project Rescue Praise Report!

Plenty to Celebrate

By Jennifer Barratt

In this Easter season, we rejoice in the wonder of new life!

There is so much to celebrate. We are seeing lives touched and transformed around the world by God’s grace. Survivors of trafficking and sexual slavery are experiencing miracles of His love, set in motion through your generous support of Project Rescue.

And as you read these words, there’s something new to celebrate: Our team is overseas, attending our first-ever Project Rescue Summit. It’s a time for all the leaders from our entire Project Rescue network to gather for training and connection. We’re excited about this premiere event, believing that great things will come out of our time together.

Thank you so much for your role in this vitally important worldwide work. You might say it’s the reality of Easter in powerful, personal, practical form. God is clearly using your generosity to rescue and restore the lives of more and more women and children targeted by traffickers … offering new life in new places.

May the Lord bless you for your response of compassion to the needs of so many in faraway places!

Greater Love: Five New Partners in our Project Rescue Network

We thank God for new opportunities to offer physical, emotional, and spiritual intervention, prevention, and restoration for women and children in sexual slavery.

Partners in five key regions of the world have recently joined our network: two in Latin America, and one each in Asia Pacific, West Africa, and the Middle East.

Here are snapshots of just a couple of our new partners: 

  • Middle East — In a distinctly Muslim country, friends of Project Rescue are establishing an outreach building providing emergency shelter, medical care, counseling, legal aid, vocational services, and more for survivors of exploitation.

Women and children in this region, many of them survivors of war and violence as well, suffer with no means of rescue, no support system, and no opportunities to break free from enslavement. But a local church is now partnering with us to rescue and restore enslaved women and children.

Your generous giving to Project Rescue will help them escape the abuse and slavery — the despair — bringing them safely into a network of care and support and HOPE.

  • Honduras — For the first time ever, God is opening doors to us in Latin America!

    Women and children in Honduras are deeply impoverished — they need education and employment. Traffickers have capitalized on their vulnerability.

A place of safety is urgently needed — a shelter where meals are provided, counseling is offered, hope for the future is given … and the love of God can restore lives.

We’re grateful that friends have stepped forward to support a new safe house for vulnerable women and children in Latin America.

We’re looking forward to seeing further growth in our outreach in 2024 — new partnerships as well as expansion in our work with existing partners.

Thank you for being part of it all through your faithful prayers and giving!

Rescue: Up Close and Personal

Ashanti and her brother Monte had never attended school.

The money their parents earned from the kiosk was just enough to cover the rent and feed the family. School fees were out of the question.

So when Project Rescue launched an after-school tutoring program in their South Asian community — with the promise of new shoes and a hot daily meal — Mama made sure her children could attend.

“I wish I could live at the school all the time!” Ashanti told her brother.

But this wasn’t just about loving school. At home, Ashanti’s uncle was abusing her — more and more frequently.

Her parents, unable or unwilling to stand up to him, seemed to “look the other way.”

Ashanti felt increasingly helpless and alone.

But one day at the Project Rescue center, when it was time to go home, Ashanti pleaded with Latika, the caregiver, to stay longer. Then she blurted out the truth: “My uncle is waiting for me, and I hate him … because he puts his hand over my mouth and touches me — he hurts me.”

“Do your parents know?” Latika asked.

“There’s nothing they can do,” Ashanti whimpered, weeping into Latika’s blouse.

Soon Latika was greeting the parents as they arrived to pick up their children. She privately confronted them with the report that Ashanti’s uncle had been abusing her. Both parents denied it.

“This cannot be allowed to continue,” Latika insisted. “If it does, I will report him to the authorities.... I have a duty under the law, and a duty to your daughter.”

“Our children will not return to this place!” Papa shouted.

“They will,” Latika replied, “or you and Ashanti’s uncle will be visited by the police. But there is another way. Let us work with you to protect your children. When you’re at work and not at home, let your children stay here at Project Rescue.”

The parents looked at one another cautiously. Finally, without admitting the truth about Uncle, they nodded their approval.

“The school has been good for our children,” the father said quietly.

“We will let them stay,” Mama added.

“Thank you — you won’t be sorry,” Latika replied with a smile. “We promise to take good care of Ashanti and Monte.”

Ashanti and her brother are now safe from abuse — and Ashanti is still loving school! 

                                                                     

As you stand with us generously today, you will help express God’s life-changing hope, healing, and love through Project Rescue’s outreaches and initiatives to more women and children devastated by sexual slavery. Thank you for your faithfulness!