Whitestone Motion Pictures has put out The Candy Shop, a film initiative to help fight against child sex trafficking. See the trailer below; but you can also view the thirty minute movie here. I plan on watching the movie tonight. I must admit, however, that the trailer alone made my stomach turn. There is a grossness and darkness to it that makes you want to be glad that its just a movie. And then the message bends you back towards reality. Its not just a movie. As a matter of fact, it is far worse.
This is a nightmare that no dream can depict and that no movie can capture. Right now, millions of girls are being sold and handled in ways that we can't, and wouldn't dare imagine. When they cry "Stop!" no one listens. When they cry for help, no one is there. The last line of the trailer is also terribly sobering.
While we, as a culture, may attempt progress with decent intentions, we are mostly both ignorant and paralyzed when it comes to actively fighting against such evil in our midst. The trailer captures this as well. After watching and considering what you have just seen, you may sit there and ask, "What can I possibly do to help abolish the sex trafficking industry?"
Well, I am unsure of all vehicles of aid that are presently offered; but I do know one. The Gospel. Sex trafficking exists because people are rebelliously empty. They must be filled with God in order to forsake feasting on small children. We may think it is no big thing that we have allowed a few days/weeks/months or even years go by without sharing our faith with other individuals. But I would propose that our neglectful laziness and disobedience is deadly. We may restrain rebels with bars; but the gospel has the power to make slaves of righteousness.
John Newton, the writer of perhaps the most famous hymn, Amazing Grace, is a case in point. Newton was a slave trader (human trafficker) himself, who would commonly rape and abuse women slaves. He confessed this sort of behavior saying, "I was sunk into complacency with the vilest of wretches." So when he wrote "wretch like me" in Amazing Grace, he meant it. A changed wretch has produced fruit to feed millions.
And likewise, when we sing "wretch like me" this is the magnitude of crime that should come to our minds.
Pursuing and seeking immediate judicial consequence for those practicing and promoting the sex trafficking of women and children is absolutely necessary. However, we, at the same time, must be making disciples of all nations. Yes, Jesus can save a human sex-trafficker. As difficult as it was for me to type that sentence, I must believe it...else, I would not belief that He saved a wretch like me.
The Candy Shop Trailer from Whitestone Motion Pictures on Vimeo.
(HT: Z)
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