IJM Cambodia is in need of urgent prayer for a trial just scheduled for tomorrow.  In January 2009, a Russian pedophile was convicted of sexual abuse against 19 young women and sentenced to eight years in prison, as well as required to compensate each victim monetarily.  However, the case was appealed and will be re-tried tomorrow.  Pray that the court will not overturn the just verdict and the sentences will not be reduced.  Please ask God for strength and clarity for the parents of the victims, who have been called upon to testify against the perpetrator. 

At this moment, the IJM team in Southeast Asia is working on a series of complex operations and they have encountered a number of very significant roadblocks.  We are absolutely desperate for your prayer.  The lives of many girls are at stake. 

- 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. 

IJM’s Stop Injustice: 5 Weeks for Freedom campaign has hit the road! After kicking off the tour in Mobile, AL, this weekend, the 15 members of the 5 Weeks for Freedom team began their 1800-mile cycle on the historic route of the Underground Railroad Monday morning.

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.

Read more...

Jamie McIntosh, Executive Director for International Justice Mission Canada wrote an article for Relevant Magazine about the potential increase in human trafficking that surrounds events such as the World Cup.  Below are a couple of excerpts.  Read the full article here. 

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My colleague, Wayne Barnard, IJM Director of Student Ministries, shares a little bit about IJM Student Ministries and one of the students with whom he’s been working over the last couple of years…
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Friends, one of our South Asia teams is in the middle of a rescue operation right in these moments. Please pray:

- 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…

It’s late Saturday night and we’re in the production booth wrapping Day #2 of GPG 2010, prepping for our final morning of worship and prayer. It has been an incredible weekend of gathering with prayer partners and IJM field staff from nearly every continent - the privilege of having these days together is simply beyond words…

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. 

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Friends, just an encouragement to join-in on IJM’s Global Prayer Gathering this weekend from wherever you are. If you are not one of the nearly 1,000 people joining in person here in the DC Area, you can connect through our live-stream and live-blog presence all throughout the weekend. Hope you’ll join!

http://www.ijm.org/GPGOnline

A note from our Director of Media Relations, Amy Roth - a 3 min video clip you will not want to miss:
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For those of you who didn’t see it, ABC World News aired a piece last night featuring Don Brewster and Clayton Butler of AGAPE, our aftercare partners in Cambodia; our client Bella, who has thrived in AGAPE’s loving care; and some powerful IJM undercover footage of Bella, shot by one of our investigators when he first encountered her in the very dark and dangerous Anarchy building.

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

We have just about hit max-capacity for this year’s IJM Global Prayer Gathering - if you are still thinking about attending and have questions, please quickly send an email to . We will soon be closing registration and moving to a wait-list.

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?

As we commemorate International Women’s Day today, I invite you to take a moment to consider the heightened vulnerability of women and children in Haiti right now. Please continue to pray and keep Haiti at the forefront of conversation with those in your sphere of influence:

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.”

Friends, we want to share with you this casework victory in Rwanda from today. Please keep little 2 year old Kissa,* as well as the man who committed this rape against her, and the IJM staff team in your prayers as they move forward to bring the full circle of justice. Pray also that this case would send a strong message to others in this community that rape will not go unpunished. It has been treated with impunity for far too long, turning rape into a pandemic in this nation, and one that not only strips life and dignity, but also fuels the spread of AIDs.

From the IJM Rwanda Team:
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We have a praise report from an ongoing case involving the rape of 2-year old Kissa*. In September of 2009, Kissa was raped in her relative’s home by an older male cousin while she was left unattended. The same day, Kissa told her mother and the mother immediately reported it to the police. Kissa was also examined at a hospital by medical professionals to document the incident. Shortly thereafter, IJM became involved in the case.

Last week, one of our investigators was able to secure an arrest warrant from the Prosecutor’s Office based on medical evidence and witness testimony in the case. Yesterday, this investigator assisted an officer from the Rwandan National Police to track down and arrest the cousin who raped Kissa. The arrest was done in a small village outside Kigali.  A couple of children helped to identify the young man when he denied his identity.  IJM’s investigator and the police spoke briefly to the cousin, and he stated that he had raped the 2-year old girl.  The young man is now in jail and IJM Rwanda will continue to work with the police and prosecutor’s office through the next stages of the case.

*Kissa is a pseudonym

Thank you for your prayers over these past few days for our team in South Asia, the local authorities, the traffickers and brothel keepers, and most especially, the girls who have been enduring such immense suffering. You joined us in fervent prayer for an operation about which we could give you very few details - not the continent, not the timing. But we can now tell you that one of the IJM South Asia teams, in their largest operation to date, secured a landmark victory this weekend.

Early Saturday morning, IJM and the local police in one particular South Asian city conducted simultaneous operations at two brothels, freeing approximately 30 trafficking victims, among them girls as young as 13.  The rescued girls and women are now receiving care from IJM social workers.

Seven suspected perpetrators have been taken into police custody, and police have locked the brothels to prevent their re-opening.

Please continue to pray for each of the girls, as well as for the perpetrators.
We are so grateful, beyond what we can even express. Thank you for joining us in this work!

“These men lie in wait for their own blood;
they set an ambush for their own lives.
Such are the ways of everyone who is greedy for unjust gain;
it takes away the life of its possessors.” -Proverbs 1:18-19

“Unjust gain… takes away the life of its possessors.” Join with me in praying for those who seek unjust gain through the purchase, sale, and pillage of women and girls.

Begin with me tonight in praying for a particular group of brothel owners and traffickers who are harboring, under violence and for the purpose of profitable rape, a large number of women and young girls who desperately desire freedom. Pray that these brothel owners and traffickers would be unaware, despite any covert efforts on anyone’s part, of an impending rescue. Pray that these women and girls would all be securely removed from the brothel and their abusers - all of them - arrested and justly detained. Pray that these women and girls would have courage to tell the truth of what they have endured, and would know the hope of new life and freedom that waits for them.

Because of the particular sensitivity and size of this operation, I will wait to let you know the location and any further details.
But please do pray. We hope to have an update for you next week… but please do not delay in praying, nor back-down from persevering in prayer.

Pray for the women and girls who are suffering greatly this night. Pray for courage and knowledge of God’s presence.
Pray for our staff in this city - they are worn but refusing to relent. Pray for strength and knowledge of God’s presence.
Pray for the local authorities who will execute this operation. Pray for integrity, conviction, and unity.
Pray for those who, by the hand of God, will be brought to justice. Pray that God would turn their heart through this facing of judgment.

Next Friday, February 19 IJM will partner with Pepperdine Law School’s Nootbar Institute in hosting a one-day event entitled “The Role of the Church in Doing Justice.”

Featuring:
• Rich Stearns, President, World Vision U.S.
• Kay Warren, Saddleback Church Joseph D’Souza, International President, Dalit Freedom Network
• Mark Labberton, Director of the Lloyd John Ogilvie Institute for Preaching at Fuller Theological Seminary and Senior Fellow of the IJM Institute
• Joseph D’Souza, International President, Dalit Freedom Network
• Sean Litton, VP Field Operations, International Justice Mission
• Jim Martin, VP Church Mobilization, International Justice Mission
• Larry Martin, SVP Education, International Justice Mission

“The Role of the Church in Doing Justice” will explore how Christians can answer the call to seek justice through churches, NGOs, and individual actions. Event registration is $120.

Panels and presentations will discuss:
• The Biblical Foundations for Justice
• Mobilizing the Church to Seek Justice
• Seeking Justice Domestically
• Seeking Justice Globally

We’d love to know if you plan to attend - just leave a note in the comments, and the IJM team will look forward to meeting you at the event.