Pastor Brian and Jacque Lother, Nick and Jo Lembo
Brian: Thank you guys. That's wonderful. Don't go too far. I'll have you play again at the end of the service, Adrian. Okay.
Jacque: Oh, wow. I just have to breathe for a moment.
Brian: Is it okay to be jealous every once in a while?
Jacque: That's just amazing. That's amazing. What a team you are. Don't you love seeing husband and wife teams?
Brian: Yes.
Jacque: In just a few minutes, we have another great husband and wife team coming. It's so great. Just a couple family. This is family time, a little family time. Denise and Brian Walker are here.
Brian: Good to see you guys.
Jacque: Oh my Lord. Oh, that's so wonderful. Okay. Okay. I’ve got to get focused again now.
Brian: Squirrel.
Jacque: Okay. It's just how God made
Brian: I know. It's alright. And I love you how you are.
Jacque: Oh, okay. okay. Is it next Sunday we are having an all-church luncheon again? Don't you love the al- church luncheons?
Brian: Yes.
Jacque: Because we just get time to sit and talk together and enjoy good food and it's great. So remember that, and please plan your menu accordingly, ladies, so you don't have to cook next Sunday. Also afterwards, remember the apple outreach we did last fall? We are going to do that again. We are picking out the neighborhoods close by and we are going to bring them a bag of apples and tell 'em about the church and just bless our neighbors. So maybe you can be a part of that too. That'd be great. Then, the next Saturday, the 7th and 8th of October, we are having a women's encounter. Ladies, please clear your calendar to come.
Brian: Who are you encountering?
Jacque: We are encountering the Lord, our Father, God. That was a good question. Yeah. We are encountering our father, God, Jesus through the Holy Spirit. It's going to be a special time. TaQuaris is going to share. Carrie Christie is going to share. Cheryl Orvak is going to share. You are going to leave richer and fuller. I promise. I promise. So please go to the back and sign up today. There is also a postcard with all the details. And take a couple postcards because maybe you have a friend that you want to invite to bring with you. That would be awesome. Awesome. Did you want something Pastor Robert? I got your hint.
Robert: Thank you. Praise the Lord. Men, I didn't forget about you. Well, I did. I'm Pastor Robert and Pat today. Pat Is out fishing and I'm doing his work. But that's okay. He gets it. I’ll get a bag of fish, so I'm good. Saturday, October 15th, 7:00 AM right here, we will have our men's breakfast. We are going to start doing our monthly men's breakfasts again. So we are going to meet in October, we are going to meet in November. In December, too much is going on. So after November, we'll see you in January. But we want to see you here October 15th, 7:00 AM We are going to have good food, good fellowship, a time of prayer and reflection and just to get to love on the guys. We love the Men of Hope and we are better together. So we look forward to seeing you. But please, right now, I believe Rachael has a sign up online. if not, she is trusted to do that. We'll probably try to have you guys come see us after service starting next week.
Brian: Who's cooking?
Robert: Probably me and Pat.
Brian: Ooh, then I'll be there.
Robert: We have some other cooks in, in the men's group, so we may baptize them too. I'm looking over to my left over here. There is a certain guy that provided the ribs for us. I don't want to mention any names like Ken, you know, who's also doing the lunch next Sunday. Make sure you come and bless the Joy group that's sponsoring it and bless Ken because it's his birthday and he's still going to come and cook. Praise the Lord. So men, sign up. We look forward to seeing you on the 15th.
Jacque: Just one more thing. What I love about our family here of faith is that we have deep spiritual times together and then we downright just have fun too. The spiritual times are fun too. A bunch of us are going to go to the Chanhassen Dinner Theater at the end of October, the 25th, Pastor Jeff. But today is the last day you can sign up. So if you want to join us, go talk to Rachael at the table. It's
Brian: It's a matinee too.
Jacque: It's a matinee on a Saturday afternoon.
Brian: You can dismiss the children.
Jacque: Okay, kids, go. Thanks Charlie. He was right up and ready to go.
Brian: Yes. And the youth are going with them.
Jacque: The youth are going.
Brian: Daniel. Yep. Yep.
Jacque: Aw, thank you Cindy. Thank you, Cindy, for all your work for our children and all the people who help. And we can use a few more.
Brian: We have a special day today. We have some longtime friends. When we first started Hope 25 years ago, we were meeting in a school, and we hadn't been meeting there for very long. One Sunday morning, this guy just walked in and he had been watching our cable TV program. How many know that it's everyone's constitutional right to have a cable TV program? We had a dear friend, Dan Grooters, who is still part of this church, who 25 years ago got his video camera out and would video tape and then he would make duplicates and take it down. He did all the work. There was this guy from out of town, I think New York or out east somewhere. He ended up showing up at our church service. Well, we've ended up forging a 25 year friendship and he and his wife Jo, were part of our church for many years. I'd like to introduce Nick and Jo Lambo. Why don't you please come? They are going to share with us this morning.
God has just brought them on a really, really cool journey. But before we get into that, I have a couple other things I just want to share really quickly with everybody. Our dear friend Adrian has a CD that he has produced of his piano plane called New Beginnings. He will have this available for anybody who would like to buy this after the service for $10. And so he'll be in the back, Adrian. Please get yourself some real inspiration. I've been listening to this and have my own worship times and it's just really a wonderful CD to listen to. And then I wanted to just share an interesting, really cool story before we get into the nuts and bolts of today.
Adam Kik and Nadine have been part of our church. We've been praying for Nadine and her thyroid cancer, and she still has another surgery coming up here shortly in a few weeks and we were still praying for her. But God really touched Adam in the last few weeks. He wanted to do something to demonstrate what God had done in his life. How many know that it's good to bring forth works, meet for repentance, as Jesus said? When Jesus touches you, it's good to show that. They live out in the out town and he wanted to erect the cross in their yard. How tall is this cross, like 13 feet? Yeah, 13 and a half feet tall. It's big. It's made out of 8x8 timbers. It's not one of these little things you see by the side of the road. It's a real demonstration of his faith. He gets this thing built, he thinks, but nobody can see it at night, and we want to put a light on this thing.
So, to power it, they had to dig a trench about 120 feet long and about maybe eight to 12 inches wide on this large piece of property. You'll never guess when they were digging that trench, what they found. There was this coin or medallion that they found in this trench. What are the probabilities of it? Zero. On this coin were these words, "believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou will be saved." Someone from the Union Gospel Mission had made this many years ago. Wow. And of course, our good friend Shelly works at the Union Gospel Mission. What do you think Adam felt when he found this coin in this trench that they were digging? Gee, maybe God was in this whole project and encouraging them.
The interesting thing about our Lord is that these kinds of things actually can happen on a regular basis in our lives if we'll just be looking for them. God is always at work. Nobody's ever too far away. And now Adam and the Dean are part of our tech crew here and working really hard. I'm so grateful for how God touches lives. If you are watching by livestream, be encouraged today because God is working on your behalf as well. Don't be discouraged by the wind or the waves, but let your faith rise up. Let your faith rise up.
So Father, I thank you for this great gift, this gift of this little coin, this little medallion that says, "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved." What a wonderful promise that we have from you today, Lord. We just bless your name, Lord. Amen. Well guys, it's great to have you with us.
Nick: Good to be here.
Brian: It's wonderful to have you here. Are your mics on? Let me see here. Yep. Good.
Nick: Good to go.
Brian: Just a quick introduction. Obviously, we as a church have been a part of being, you know, moved in our hearts with the sanctity of life and the pro-life message of the love of Christ. But there is a whole other arena that I believe the church needs to become a part of that. I think in many respects historically, we have simply relegated to law enforcement because it deals partly with that. The topic we are talking about is actually human trafficking. It's a multi-billion-dollar industry just in our country alone. I remember a very prominent restaurant in our neighboring community to the east in Maple Grove. It was a very popular restaurant, and all of a sudden, one day, I came by there and it was shut down; it was closed. I made some inquiries and what ended up happening was the owner of that restaurant was arrested for human trafficking. We, sometimes, think these are things that only Hollywood makes movies of that happens over in Dubai or someplace like that. But in reality, it happens in our backyard. Nick and Jo have been a part of a ministry. Did you ever think 20 years ago when you came to Hope that God was going to raise you up into this?
Nick: I probably would've said no.
Jo; And then be struck by lightning.
Brian: We are just doing an interview this morning with you so that you can really share what God's been doing through your lives and through the ministry that God has raised up through you people. It's a national ministry; you are touching people all across the country. You've been fighting human trafficking actually for a long time now, and I just want to ask you this question, how did you recognize God was leading you into this? Jo, do you want to__
Nick: Actually, if you don't mind, I'm going to just start because we do a lot of presentations across the country and deal with a lot of different issues. I just want to say this, first of all, it's a blessing to be here and a part of Hope. We honor this man tremendously. He has been a father in the faith and blessings. We've got a lot of stories of how we've been blessed by him, but that's why we are here this morning. I want to say this before we start. If this is new or some of the stats we throw out to you, don't let it shock you because it will. But don't let it disturb you. Really, all we are doing is I'm uncovering what is already there, so don't get dismayed. Don't get discouraged and go, "Oh my gosh, what's happening?' It has been happening all around us and has been happening for centuries. That's kind of one little disclaimer we have.
One other thing, if you don't mind me saying this while it's fresh in my mind, Brian said it's so key and that is, it is happening in the United States. We work a lot with the homeland security or FBI or different agencies and the stats they've given us as far as how many United States citizens, children, girls and boys are being trafficked and transgender is really about 95%/98%. There is a misnomer thinking, oh, it's foreign nationals. It's not. It's much cheaper, I hate to say this, for these traffickers to use what's already here then to bring them through ICE and deal with customs. So, really foreign nationals maybe__ We say statistics are interesting. Pimps don't give us W2 forms, so statisticians above my pay grade can do, but maybe 2% are foreign nationals, maybe 3%. So kind of get that off the table and realize we are protecting our children here. We are protecting our citizens. So anyway, how did you get involved, Mrs. Lambo?
Jo: Well, it was God's idea, and I'll just tell you right now, he's sneaky. He'll sneak up on you. I was telling Jackie yesterday, we were here for six years and we were such a part of you. I remember singing the songs, "Wherever you lead, I will follow. I'll say yes, Lord, take me where you want me". Let me tell you, those are covenants. You are making covenants. You are not just singing and he's listening and he takes you up on it. I remember when God called us to Seattle in 2006, I didn't want to go. I remember lying right down there on that floor, snotting on the carpet and saying, "Lord, I don't want to go. We are part of this. And Jackie and Brian are so much a part of our lives." Brian, at the women's encounter, had prophesied over me and over us powerful words that gave me such encouragement, and I hold onto it today.
And so I'm laying on the carpet going, "I don't want to go, I don't want to go, I don't want to go." And the voice of the Lord was just really gentle to my heart, and said, "Will you do it for me?" How do you say no to that? So I said yes, and I also said, "I'll never say no to you." And that began a journey because we sort of fell into this. Brian asked, "How did you recognize God was leading you into this?" That was one of the first steps. And then we moved to Seattle and we were associate pastors in a large church in South Seattle, and I said at the ordination, because I didn't really see the need to be ordained. I'm like, "I'm his wife; let him be ordained. I'll be the woman behind the man. I'm happy to be invisible. This is okay." And they said, "Well, we really want to ordained couples because we believe there is power in that agreement." And so I honestly went into the ordination just a little flippant. It was like, okay, that's fine. I'll not say no.
It was not long after that that God began to show me why I was a card-carrying pastor. I don't have time to tell you the whole story, but it led me to opening the Washington State Legislative Session in Prayer, the only ordained woman ever in history to do that in Washington State because I was an ordained pastor. It led me to be the pastor of Shared Hope International, which is our organization. I'm now the director of Faith initiatives. So I have a business card that says I can pray and talk about Jesus.
We are a Christian organization, but oftentimes we are talking to legislators, we are talking to schools, we are talking to attorneys, and we can't just bring Jesus right to the front of the stage, but my card says I can, so I love that. And the fact that I'm ordained, and God saw that and needed that to happen and made me do it, has led me to where I am today.
I just want to tell you one little story. When we were associate pastors, we went to a training, our church security called me and said, you have come down here. You are over the Christian school, you are over the Sunday school, you are over the young adults and the youth group, and our kids are at risk and we don't know anything about this. And so he had my attention. I cleared my calendar, and I got there just after lunch as they were going into workshops. I remember looking at the agenda and thinking, I'm not an attorney, not a social worker, not law enforcement; I guess I'm an activist. I went into that workshop and stood there for three hours because the room was packed. And I happened to walk in the door at the front of the room. I was like from here to Brian, from the speaker, so I had to just pay attention. No, I was spellbound and listened for three hours, all the misconceptions, all the labels we put on people, all the things we think we don't realize. These young people are being forced. They don't get to keep the money. Many of them are minors. They can't get away if they want to, and all my paradigm shifted on that day. I left and I read the book, Renting Lacey. It was written by our founder.
Nick: And it ruined our lives.
Jo: It did. God was sneaky about that too. I couldn't read it during the day because I was busy, so I'd read at night in bed. That's not bedtime reading because it's the story of America's prostituted children.
Nick: You would read it all the time; you were reading in the office.
Jo: I was.
Nick: It was everywhere.
Jo: And then I was crying.
Nick: And I couldn't get away from it. That was the best thing. Husbands, how many of you love when your wife just starts crying uncontrollably. And then goes, "What are we supposed to do?"
Jo: Honey, we have to do something. This book is tearing me apart. And he said__
Nick: She said, "What do we do? This book__ I keep crying." I said, "Quit reading the book." I got the answer for you. It's really simple because you know, I hate to admit I wasn't really listening either. Anyway__
Jo: But God had a call on a purpose and did not let us deviate. He kept the path straight. And so because I had read the book and because we were associate pastors and because people knew I was talking about it now, anytime anyone came into the church that remotely had anything connected to the commercial human trafficking, sex trafficking industry, they would send them to me. I knew so very little, but I had a heart. One girl, her name was Danielle and I'm going to just tell this really quickly, a real short story for you.
She was sold in Montana on an Indian reservation by her mother who was drug addicted and she was the currency. And so that's where her story started. Her mother had been abused. And so her mother was also needing those drugs to anesthetize the pain in her soul. Danielle was 26; she had had five children, all different fathers. Some were from buyers, and some were from pimps. She had lost three to the system because of her lifestyle and her drug addiction. She wanted desperately to get her last two children back out of CPS before they were adopted into the system. They sent her to me because she had been forced into prostitution and now she was out and she needs someone to help her. And I'm like, all I did was read the book. I don't know what to do, you know.
I became her friend and walked with her and saw God change her life. One time we were invited to our state capital at Olympia, Washington and the young adults were really involved in free trade and don't eat chocolate, don't eat sugar, don't eat coffee because it's slave labor. And I'm like, oh God, this is way more calling than I'm prepared for. I mean, this is big.
Nick: Giving up chocolate, that was the challenge.
Jo: And coffee, I mean that was just a big deal. I went to Olympia with these young adults and we went to talk to our senators. And again, I had a card that said I was an ordained minister, but I didn't really know what these guys were talking about. So I said, "You guys are trained; you talk to the senator and I'll just hang out here by the window and pray." So they are talking to the senator, they are talking about the bills that we need to protect young people from this crime, and I'm looking out the window over the capital of Olympia in Washington, and the Lord speaks to me really quietly, " You need to pray for the Senator." Now, I knew the senator was a dragon lady. She was tough. She was not in the party that I was in. I knew that we probably disagreed on everything and I knew that she probably didn't really want me to pray for her, but I said, "You want me to pray for her?" And the Lord said, "Look at your business card." I looked down at it, which is my pastor's ordination, and it said I'm a pastor. He said, "You have a card that says you can pray. Tell her that."
They got done talking and I turned around and I said, "Senator, can I pray for you?" And it was an election year and we were constituents. She said yes. We all stood up. I went around her desk. I just laid my hand on her. Don't you know there is power and laying your hands on people? I thought, I have a card that says I can do this. And so I laid my hand on her and I just began to pray that God would be with her, that he would anoint her, He would give her the strength and power and courage and wisdom to see things she could not see and that she would know he was with her and she was not doing this alone. And when we said amen, there was a tear running down her cheek. And she said, "Thank you very much." And she exited into the Senate chambers.
Again, I heard the Lord say, "Follow her." And I'm like, okay. I went in and she was standing behind a big huge marble pillar, and she was wiping tears and trying to regain her composure. And I said, "Senator, I just want to say this. You are in a unique place to make a difference, and if you had been here with this bill, we are asking you to back Danielle, the girl who just told you her story, she would've had a different life. You are going to make the difference. And I just want you to know I'm going to pray for you and you can send me an email anytime. And if you want to just say pray, I will pray." It was the oddest relationship for about two years while she was in office and she was speaker of the House. She would send me emails and I knew they were from her because if her aid had sent them, they would've been spelled right with correct punctuation with, but it was just da, da da da da. This is what I need you to do; please pray. And I would return, "I'm praying."
God did something in her heart that I believe was a seed planted that remains today. So that was one of those areas where the Lord said to me when we began to associate pastor in the South Seattle church. And the Lord said, through the pastors, "We want to ordain you." And I'm like, "I don't have to." And God said, "No, this is my plan." And so that's what we did.
Brian: So how about you Nick? How did you get dragged in?
Nick: Drag is a good thing. And she knows this because she kept saying, "Why don't you come to these meetings with me?" And I said, "Who's going to be there?" 99% women, you know? And I'm going, "Who's going to be there?" Well, so and so and so and so. I said, "And how many of you guys want to go to a tea party or a baby shower?" Let's play games. I'm going, "I don't want to go." So finally, she said, "Well the head of security is going to be at this and I'll buy you Starbucks." And so I go, "All right. " It's a Saturday morning. I went in, and again, the only men that were there was myself, this other guy and then two young guys because a lot of younger people were starting to get this social justice thing. But that was it. And then 60 women. A lot of nuns were there too. Catholics have gotten this for a long time. We met nuns that have been fighting trafficking for like 40 or 50 years. It's just amazing. But anyway__
We are sitting there and the speakers, a guy from LexisNexis. It's a think tank organization, deals with a lot of lawyers and HR issues. And he's saying, "We've got to go against the men that are doing this. We've got to deal with the demand on the product. And so we have to get to the men." And I'm sitting there; I have no idea what they are talking about. And they are talking about lawsuits that are coming and how it's the state of Illinois versus John, this and that. After a while I'm__ And every time that they mention these lawsuits, these ladies go, "Yeah, get them, get 'them, get them." And I'm thinking, I honestly didn't know this. I thought, who is John? And whoever he is, if these ladies ever meet him, they are going to open a can of whip butt on this guy. I mean, he is going to be in deep trouble.
Jo: For those who don't know, a John is someone who buys someone.
Nick: I honestly, I'm sitting there, but then the Lord begins to speak to me and say, "Well if they need to deal with men, you know what it's going to take? Men have to deal with men, men's breakfast. You know, that kind of thing. And the ladies that will try to talk to these guys. I hate to admit, but I got this thought in my head like the old peanuts cartoons, you know, when the adults spoke. Guys will do that. And either they'll patronize them or they'll just discount them. They might be pleasant. But when they start talking to them about you can't buy women, you can't do this. Hate to admit it, you know, as a guy, there is just that, there is that disrespect. I hear the Lord going, "You've got to get involved in this." And going, "I don't know anything. I don't know anything about this." And then he said, "Do you know how to deal with men?" And I went, "Well, yeah.' Do you like it? Yes, I do. I mean, that's part of what my DNA is, has been to deal with men.
He said, "You've got to go up and talk to the speaker afterwards." I'm going, "What am I going to say?" I don't know anything. But it was one of those moments where your heart starts beating, and you go, yeah, okay. I go up to him and I say, "Look, I don't know anything that you are talking about, but just dealing with men. I think men need to deal with men." And I'm looking around the room and it's mostly ladies. He goes, "You are absolutely right." He told me about two organizations that were trying to get men involved with it and one was Shared Hope International. I became a part of that. The journey it started 10 years ago, and we would've never chosen it. I had no clue that was in the mix at all.
Brian: Since 2016 and the last 10 years, Jo, you've trained thousands of people across the United States here. Did you always envision yourself as a public speaker?
Jo: Absolutely not.
Brian: So other people here who haven't envisioned themselves as public speakers, maybe the Lord can use them as well.
Jo: I just want to say the word you gave this morning pastor about don't discount your good deeds. You are going to hear us talk about traveling across the nation and speaking to thousands of teenagers and going to speak for senators here. And, you know, testifying and as Washington state hearing, those are all big things. But you know what? Everything, every day giving a tip to the guy who puts the growth, that is part of what you are doing for God. God waters that seed and it will grow, and it will harvest one day. You may not see the harvest of all the things that you are planting. You may be a waterer of somebody else's seed. But someday, that soul is going to feel comfortable with the message of the gospel. Someone actually speaks words to them because they felt comfortable with the spirit that has come towards them when they got a tip. And then when somebody says, "Hey, you look like you are having a bad day, I'll be praying for you," and that becomes comfortable to them. So when someone presents the gospel in words, they can accept it.
Nick: Here is a funny thing: Did she ever envision herself speaking? I don't know if you remember this, Jackie, you asked her to do a women's Bible study or something like that. And she came to me and went, "I can't talk, I cannot talk in front of people. I can't do this."
Jo: You challenged us to do community groups.
Jacque: Yes.
Jo: She said, 'Just gather your neighbors in your home." I think it was once a week, maybe every other week. Invite people that are just in your neighborhood and have them in and do a Bible study. You can choose the book. I was totally terrorized. I said I can't teach. I'm not a teacher. I can't talk in public. And so then we decided, maybe I decided, that it would be a good idea to do a Beth Moore video series. And then all I had to do was talk about what we just saw on the screen. I thought, "I can do this." And one of my neighbors was an engineer. She worked for Simed.
Nick: Simed or Boston.
Jo: So I was all intimidated right there. I mean, she's an engineer, she's way smarter than me and blah, blah, blah. I had so many excuses. Jackie was not giving up anything. It was like, "Have you started your group? Do you have your group? Have you reached out to your ladies?" And I'm like, "Hmm. I said I'd never say no, Lord." So I did this and it started something in me that, you know what? I can talk to these ladies. They are my neighbors. I can do this. And then when I moved to Seattle and we were ordained and I told the Lord, I'd never say no, and our pastor's wife asked me to preach a sermon on a Wednesday night. She said, "Would you preach on a Wednesday night?" Caught me at the copier at two in the afternoon. And I said, "Sure." She said, "How about tonight?" I look at my watch and I'm like, "I'm going home." So I went home, and I sat in a chair with my Bible and I opened it up and I just looked up to the Lord and I said, "Okay. I said I wouldn't say no if you asked me. It's your idea, so you've got to give me something."
The scripture came to me about, let one generation tell the next generation of the wonderful works of God. I'm a storyteller. Y'all know that. My attorneys on our team kind of don't like it. They are just the facts. And I start telling stories and they are like, you know, but they love me. So I go that night and I just tell stories about my family, my grandfather's heritage, leaving Russia coming to America so we could be free, and my parents believing God and being kicked out of their church because they spoke in tongues and having to find another church and all the things that happened in my life and how God was faithful. Afterwards, a young man came up to me and he said, "I've heard sermons all my life. I've heard the scriptures used all my life. I've been told they work all my life tonight. You gave me a whole series of times it actually worked and it has increased my faith."
So I just want to encourage you, whatever you are doing, God has a calling. It may not be this, it may not be this big, it may be right here in your community, but God has a calling and a purpose and he knows how to get you there if you just say yes.
Nick: I want to mention this too that there were two scriptures that came powerfully to us here that we had no clue. That was in 2000. When did we move here? In 2003 or whatever, two scriptures came and one was Isaiah 51 14: The cowering prisoners will soon be set free. They will not die in their dungeons, nor will they lack bread. We were like, okay. We kept praying over that for years. It wasn't until years later when we started dealing with these issues, we realized, you know, get into some stories of__ we've dealt with thousands, hundreds of survivors that have gone through that life. We are not going to go into a lot of the specifics because they are horrific. They are very, very disturbing. But we realized that God was speaking to us about them, the countering prisoners, and they would soon be said free.
We've seen such restitution and redemption. We've mostly dealt with girls that have gone through it. They have all told us the same thing, that the world in which__ they need multilevel counseling restoration with masters of social work, they need that. But they said, you know what? The world just gives us coping skills once we've come out of that life. But only Jesus can get to the root of it. Yeah. That's the thing I think that has spoken to us the most. That's why these scriptures have meant so much to us.
Jacque: Okay, can you teach us? I don't have anybody in my life in my circle that is involved in this, but I have to believe it's going on around us. We care. Everybody matters. Every person matters. Can you help us understand what we should be looking for? How can we help?
Nick: When I go into a city, I know the websites that men go to in order to buy sex because the FBIs told us if there is the internet and there are men. It's going on. I don't care if it's a rural area. I don't care if it's rich, poor. It doesn't matter. There is no demographic that does not participate in one way or another. I go on this website. Somebody ask me, how can they let this happen in America? There were laws that were changed so the websites, the companies cannot be based in the us. Now, these companies that you can look up their websites are in Luxembourg, Amsterdam, Romania. But there is one site I looked at yesterday, because I like to come with the stats, and it was 10 o'clock in the morning. In the Minneapolis area, just Minneapolis, so they are pulling from in the suburbs. At 10 o'clock in the morning, no joke, there were 396 ads. They start posting at midnight. I didn't look at the end of the day. That's an enormous amount of ads. Again, these are, these are not dating sites. These are sites that men go to. Again, I don't want to disturb you, but it is happening in this city.
Brian: How do we keep our children safe? How do we keep our children safe in this atmosphere?
Nick: This is the woman.
Jo: That's what gets me up in the morning. I am in the prevention training. And so we go into schools, we go into churches, civic clubs, wherever we are, and we tell people what it looks like in the US who's vulnerable and why, how pimps trapped their victims and what you can do about it. We now have added internet safety in the last few years because most predators are now online. I have some booklets back there. I could go into a whole three-hour internet safety training for you: how to keep your grandkids, your nieces, your nephews, your kids, your neighbor kids safe. But there is a lot of material back there. It's free. Please pick it up. There is a booklet, how to keep your kids safe online. And then there is a little piece of paper about this big and one of the links on it is for youthonline.sharedhope.org. You'll see it back there. Send your teenagers there, send your young adults there.
We had a group of young adults who created that website. It has their graphics, their language, it looks like them. It's not a 67-year-old lady telling them about trafficking, but it's their peers. And so that's a link you can actually give to a kid. And then the other link is sharedhope.org/internet safety. On there we have tip sheets, we have scripts on how to start the conversation. Yeah. How many of you know it's not a one-time conversation that we have with our kids? We talk to them daily, we open the door, we let them know they can always talk to us.
Here is basically what you need to watch for: significant changes in a child's behavior. Now, we all know that when hormones hit, their behavior changes a lot. But what you can watch with that is their language changes. They start using words you are not familiar with, words that are not your culture. And you wonder what does that mean? They may become very secretive. They may shut their computer. When you walk into their bedroom. They may get desperate to get on their computer because they are being forced to do certain things. If they don't answer, when that predator says, hey, I want you to do this or that, then they get in a lot of trouble. Maybe their family is being threatened, like, you do what I say, or I know where your little sister is. And they'll text them a picture of their little sister at the bus stop. I know where she's at. You do what I say, or I'll go get her. I'll burn your grandma's house down with her in it. These kinds of threats, when you are 13, 14, 15, you believe them and they say, don't tell anybody or__ so they don't tell anybody. And so they are in silence, but they are acting differently because they have to obey this new master who's threatening them.
They may still be going to school. This is the hard part for us to understand in America, but like you said, the restaurant owner was selling. He had a ring; he was participating in this industry. Kids can still be in school, still be living at home, and this is still happening to them. They may tell their parents, “I'm going to youth group,” and then this guy picks 'em up and they have to go do his business for a few hours. He makes sure they are back in time to go home after youth group. That happened to one of the girls.
Let me just say this really quickly. Don't get the Hollywood image of a pimp. It could be a doctor. We know stories in the Seattle area, Mercer Island, a very wealthy area. This guy was running something. Here is a doctor. Teenagers just, you know__ we don't like the word pimp, but yeah, selling girls. So it's all ages, demographics. Get rid of the Hollywood image of it because it really is much more prevalent in every demographic.
Jo: When a child is being threatened in this way, they may lose their appetite. I may stop eating, they may be sleeping more because they are depressed. They are afraid. They are afraid they'll say something wrong. So they just go to their room and shut their door. So they don't have to interact with anybody. They may have new friends, an older girlfriend or an older boyfriend, and you don't know where they came from, but they are all set in their life. And you are like, where is the connection here? What happened to you hanging out with these friends?
There are a lot of those things that you can watch for, but I encourage you to get some of that information back there. Go to our website on online safety and just look at the signs which you can watch for. And then there are numbers for what you can do, who to call. And of course, my card is there. If you need to reach out to me, I'm happy to reach back out. I am the director of national Outreach. So that's my job.
Brian: In an area like this, there is obviously a lot of victimization that happens. In your last 10 to 15 years, what have you discovered about God's heart regarding these victims?
Nick: Psalm 79:11, another scripture that God spoke to us while we were living here: may the groans of the prisoners come before you with your strong arm preserve those condemned to die. I always get this picture of going into a prisoner of war camp. My dad was in World War II, so I kind of always knew a lot of those stories, and just going in and bringing rescues. His heart, he gets so affected because again, if we go into the lives of these individuals__ they are rich girls, poor girls, again, all kinds of demographics, but there is some kind of brokenness, there is some kind of loneliness in their hearts. And God sees that. That's his heart is to reach out to them. He never condemns them. We've understood that 15/20 years ago, they used to just arrest the girl and the guy got off. And then they began to understand, probably in the last 10 years, no, these girls, particularly girls, are victims and they've been coerced and forced. He's the great rescuer, always the downtrodden, always the weak. His heart just explodes with love and mercy and wanting to bear his arm.
Jo: We were living here when I had a dream one night, and I woke up sobbing. Nick remembers this. He said he'd never seen me just ripped apart. The dream was I was walking through a burned-out forest and it was smoldering, so it wasn't still burning. I was walking through and as I was walking through, I heard these faint cries. I looked, and amongst the burned-out logs were these baby lambs and they were badly burned, and I was heartbroken to see them. I picked them up and as I picked them up, they began to kind of heal to where they could walk. I saw a barn in the distance, and it was a lit door. I remember putting them down on the ground and saying, "Go, go. You'll be safe there." I knew that was the church, that was people that would care for them. And it tore me up.
I said to him, "What is this? Who are these lambs? Where are these lambs? How will we find them?" And I feel like through this work, God has shown us these are the lambs, and they are badly hurt, badly, deeply hurt. But you can do something. I want to encourage you, if you want to pray against trafficking, there are a bunch of these little booklets back there on the table, absolutely a free gift to you. And they are newly updated. It's a prayer guide. We issue them usually right before January, because that's anti-trafficking month. It's 30 days of prayer. So we assume maybe you'll get them on the first and you could pray to the 31st. It has scriptures, it has a little bit of education about trafficking and then it has prayer, things to pray for. And then it actually has the words to pray.
I was telling Nadine this morning, because she's one of our ambassadors of Hope. She has the kit. She received it at the 2018 Faith Summit. I told her to be sure you get one of these because you need to update your kit. I was telling her that it used to be that we just told people what to pray for and we kept getting reports back, like, "I don't know how to pray for that." So this has words that, how to pray if you want to follow the words. And it's how to pray for the victims, how to pray for their parents and families, the social workers who rescue them, the law enforcement who rescue them. It's how to pray for pimps, how to pray for predators, how to pray for the buyers who abuse them and use them so miserably. How to pray for organizations like ours. I would encourage you, if you want to fight trafficking on your knees, that is the most important thing that we need you to do.
Brian: We live in a capitalistic society, supply and demand. Obviously, the supply side of this equation has a lot of victims. But what about the demand side, Nick? Because if the demand side isn't addressed mm-hmm. , it seems like we are only dealing after the fact.
Nick: That's absolutely right.
Brian: You work more with men and obviously, that would be the demand side of this equation. Why don't you share a little bit about how you are trying to dare I say bring redemption to the demand side?
Nick: Absolutely. I work on the opposite side of what Joe does, so I deal with the demand, which is we all have a demand for iPhones or Samsung, whatever phone you like, but there is a demand. If there wasn't a demand, if there was no market for it, those companies would go out of business. We talk about the demand, which is the desire for the purchase, which is 99% of the buyers are men and boys and girls and transgenders are traffic, but 99% are men. We are systemic to the problem. And so we've got to be systemic to the answer. What we do and again, how this ever happened, I don't know, but it began as part of an organization. Now I run it with a foundation that helps me do it. We deal with the demand. To put it in nuts and bolts, we post decoy ads on websites that we know men are trying to buy women, then we pretend to be the girl up to a certain point. And we do this with law enforcement, so they know what we are doing. They respect us. In fact, we work with law enforcement quite a bit now.
Jo: And this is all online.
Nick: It's all online; it's safe. We've developed a platform. In fact, we are redeveloping it and making it more affordable for people to get involved in it. We do it in teams. We interact with these buyers. I call it disturbing fun at times. It's very disturbing at times. But these men, it's all text messages for the most part, some phone calls. We try to educate them when we sense they have an intent to buy. We usually, and again, we are led by the Lord in this too. We'll answer them: your information is being recorded. It can be shared with law enforcement. Arrests have been made. I have some things I want you to know. You can imagine we get some nice four-letter words thrown back at us.
But we also get sometimes scared, frightened men. Those are like gold because it's like, then we can swoop in and begin to__ what we do is try to crack humanity because realize we are dealing with__ when I first got involved with this, I was raised in the Christian world, so the word patriarch was awesome. But then we were in this world and I went to the patriarchal society, which is men dominating women, using them for any purpose they feel. And that's what we are dealing with. So we try to educate them and create some humanity. Like, sir, do you have any daughters? Do you have any sisters? Do you have any nieces or nephews? Would you like them to be sold 10 times a night? And then of course if you can get an answer like, "No, I didn't know this was going on,” then we can begin to bring redemption to them. I've got so many stories, some buyers that I've actually met then after doing background checks.
Brian: You have a couple that is now part of your ministry. One was the victim, and one was the buyer who had experienced the love and redemption of God. Yes. Just tell a little bit about their story, because sometimes when we deal with just nuts and bolts and facts, it can get a little depressing. It can, but there is joy at the end of this journey here. Let's talk a little bit about that.
Jo: That's the best part of my job, the faith initiatives, being able to share these stories of how God redeemed and healed. This one, Nadine, you met John Pulley at the conference. He was a buyer. You guys were there. He had been a buyer. He had been deeply involved in pornography. It drove him towards buying online, although he was married. His marriage was failing as you can imagine with those kinds of dynamics. And so he went to prison, and he got out and he began a group for men. It's called Man Alive Expedition. And he challenges men about porn addiction and tells them how to get out and how to find their life again. Well, he started these groups across the nation. In 2018 at Bethel University, when we had the conference here, he was one of our speakers.
It was powerful with tears and weeping. He told us how he didn't know that culture says it's consenting adults. You are helping a girl out, all the lies that the culture believes. He said, "I didn't know until I was arrested and in prison." And then he turned his life around at that conference. You may not have known this. He stood after he spoke and a line of survivors, because after he spoke, we had an older survivor. She was in her sixties, and I call her a war horse. And she had shared her story of how God had redeemed her. Before she spoke, John had just finished telling his story. She said, "Come here." And I had told him, "I don't know what survivors will say to you. I don't know how they respond to you. We've never had a buyer in our conference before."
Nick: Some were saying you let the fox in the hen house. Some were very upset that we brought him there and we get that.
Jo: She asked John to come back on the stage and she put his arm around her. And you may remember this, she said to the audience, "For all the survivors in the house who have wished that a buyer would say he was sorry, he just did." And it was just that moment then.
Nick: And then she took him under her arm and mentored him for a number of years. And it was really awesome. And then they actually team-taught a little bit.
Joe: John got married this last year and he married a survivor. Amanda was trafficked from within the church. She was in the church and a youth leader was selling her and using her and threatening her. She was under that control for three or four years. Amanda is a powerful speaker to talk to churches about what to watch for within the church and safety and security measures. They got married this last spring and God is using them. They now have a presentation, they call it "The Same Root, but Different Leaves." And they talk about how he believed the culture. And so he partook in the commercial sex industry. She talked about how she believed that she had no choice, that now she was soiled, now she was worthless. She was a throwaway. She would never be accepted. Her church kind of underlined that for her. And so they grew up in that same soil and grew up and she became a survivor of trafficking. He became a redeemed buyer. There are inspiring stories. In January they'll have a webinar with me during anti-trafficking month. And you can find all of that on our we sharedhope.org/faith in action. That's where those webinars are.
Brian: Sometimes you might ask the question, where is all of this going to end? How does this all end? And you know, you've heard people say before, what I've read at the end of the book, and there is some really good news in the book of Revelation. If you look to the 18 chapter, the 18th chapter is where God now begins to bring judgment against the unrighteousness and the evil of the world. In verses 11 through 13, in that chapter, we read that the traders will cry and carry on because the bottom has dropped out of business. No more markets for their goods. It finishes by saying this: and their slaves, their terrible traffic in human lives has been ended. This is the heart of God. I believe the end will come because the love of Christ will overcome the evil and the sin of the world.
Jesus said to his disciples that I have overcome the world. But he didn't overcome the world with might and power. He overcame the world with his love and mercy and compassion. We've just scratched the surface here this morning, just a little bit of the tip of the iceberg. But this is a real cultural sin, evil problem that is happening in our culture today. Sometimes we in the church can find ourselves being inoculated from it and isolated from it. But in reality, just like every one of us have friends or family members who have been touched by abortion, we will probably have people not too far down our chain in our lives that will be affected by this. We just need to be wise as the kingdom of God. We need to bring solutions to our world today. We need to get along with each other.
We need to get along with each other. We need to love one another. We need to model what it really means to be a follower Jesus. But then when it comes to these real cultural issues that are undermining the health and wellbeing of our nation and our world, we need to have a solution. The solution really is Jesus. There are coping mechanisms as Nick and Jo mentioned, that are being taught to the victims, but it's only Jesus that can change the evil heart of a buyer. It's only Jesus that can truly get into the heart of someone who has been victimized and bring wholeness to them and let them know that they matter because they have been created and made in the image of God. Yes.
What I'd like to do now, Nick and Joe, if you just come down here. I'd like to have Pastor Jeff, Pastor Robert, and Jim to come forward. I want you to just lay hands on them and we are going to again, bless them. They don't need to be commissioned because they are already doing this. But I do want, kind of officially, because this is something that Nick and Jo became a part of after they were part of Hope Community Church. We want to just bless them and lay hands on them and really put Hope Community Church's blessing of healing and restoration upon them. And for those of you who are in the congregation, those of you are watching online, just extend your hands forward as we parade blessings on them. Jackie, please go down as well.
Father, I thank you that, Lord, you have an answer. You are the answer. And Lord, where sin did abound, your word says Grace did much more bound. Every single one of us here in this room today have experienced your mercy and your grace. Some, Lord, of us have come from a really distant country like the prodigal son found himself. Others of us, we never really left home very much, but we didn't know who you were. We didn't know the identity that we had with you. But Father, I thank you that your grace covers it all. And we pray for Nick and Jo. This is a hard subject. This isn't the typical subject that is talked about on a Sunday morning in church, but this Lord is a problem we have in our culture. And I pray in Jesus’ name that you would help Nick and Jo, and that you would raise up others as well to stand in the gap and to be empowered by your grace and mercy so that Lord, those who are slaves and being trafficked in human lives, that Father, this business will end, that the bottom will drop out of this business. And that, Lord, may the groans of the prisoners today come before you.
And may your strong arm of love and mercy preserve those who right now are condemned to die. And may, Lord, those who are presently as prisoners and they are cowering in fear, may they soon be set free Lord, and that they will not die in that dungeon of fear that they are in and that they will live prosperous lives. They will live lives that you ordained for them to live, that you had predetermined for them to live. This would pray, Jesus, in your name and for your sake. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen.
I'd like to receive an offering for Nick and Jo. Go ahead. You want to say something?
Jo: I just want to say this, something else you can do. The federal government right now is building a bill to completely legalize prostitution. Just like they legalized gay marriage, they want to legalize everything about prostitution. Now, you will hear us as an organization say, we need to stop arresting the victim because basically we are arresting someone who is raped, and someone got paid for it and we are arresting them. So that's not what we are talking about. We don't want the victims to be arrested anymore. But they want to legalize this because there is a powerful movement called sex workers. Some of you are shaking your head; this is not work. This is a debased thing that the devil wants to do to women and children. They want them to believe this is all they can do. If they are not being pimped by a person, they are being pimped by poverty, drug addiction, lack of support, lack of family. They feel like they have no choice. And so this bill is going to sound compassionate towards them. It's going to say it'll make it safer for women to sell themselves. And by not bringing punitive charges against pimps, this will turn into a wild west and our children are not safe. So watch for the federal bill. Do everything you can to fight against it and pray. Pray, because God can stop this thing.
Nick: And Jo, if I could just add this really quickly. The adult sex workers that we have talked to, all of them started when they were teenagers. And so you understand it's not a life they've chosen. It was the only alternative they saw. So even though now they were adult sex workers, and they might not have a trafficker over them, in talking to them, you realize really almost all of them started this when they were young. And then, I hate to say this, when they age out, the pimps are like, "We don't need you anymore. Chris men want younger." But anyway, it's another terrible story. It's not as it seems to be.
Jacque: I just see this as such a cancer, just a cancer that is growing in our, that's a good word in our country, in our world, and just eating away at the fabric eroding at the core, eroding our culture. Yeah,
Brian: That's a very good picture. I'd like to take an offering to bless Nick and Jo in their ministry if the ushers could come. If you want to give online afterwards, just go to the category "special" and we'll make sure that that offering gets to Nick and Jo if you want to give online. If you are watching by livestream, again, just go to "special" and we'll make sure Nick and Jo receive this.
Father, bless this offering. Bless Nick and Jo. Sometimes the work of the gospel is uncomfortable. It's dirty business, taking what Satan has ruined and bringing good out of it. It's a challenge that's hard. Sometimes, it puts a knot in our stomach when we are called to do the work of Jesus, to bring your love and grace to the world. But I pray that you give us wisdom. Give them wisdom. Give us just a determination to bring redemption to the world. Bring the love of Jesus to the world. Bring hope to the world, Lord. Bring hope to the hopeless. Bring love to the unlovely and bring good to those who are evil because that's how you are. That's how you are Lord. And we pray in Jesus' name that you will multiply this offering as you did the loaves in the fish. And that many lives will be touched because of it. And Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Go ahead guys.
Jo: I'm particularly fond of your online ministry because we watch you online. We were able to attend your mother's funeral online. What a beautiful, beautiful lady. I loved Ruby. She never saw me, but she did encourage me. She would pat my hand and say, "You can do this, honey," whatever it was. And so we are part of your audience. We travel a lot this month. We were in four different states on all four weekends, so we haven't been home to be online. but we catch it when we can. I just met Rachael this morning and she's the one who answers me when I make those little comments like, so good to see everyone or It's good to be with you. And she writes back, and thank you for joining us from Arizona. Thank you for that ministry, for those of you who make that happen. And for those of you online, you are part of a family. Just because we are in Arizona doesn't mean we don't still belong here. We still call this home, and you can too.
Brian: For those of you who wouldn't know this, Jacque's dad and Nick's dad and my dad were best buddies. They were the last three World War ii vets in our church and the only World War ii vets in our church. I still remember the three of them would sit together over there and blubber when the American flag came out and stuff like that.
Jacque: Our dads would have little presentations of the flag and they would carry the flag, and they all signed over there on the wall. Their signatures are over there. Yeah, yeah,
Brian: Nick's father was in the Battle of the Bulge. Jackie's dad was a navigator under B17. My father was in the Canadian Navy and was part of the D-Day invasion. But they are all with the Lord today. They are all with the Lord today. We are so grateful to have longtime friendships and to be able to partner with each other through the years in doing a work of healing. Just like Brian and Denise, all the work you've done with post-abortive and people who've lost children, the work you've done is just amazing. I look around and I see people and that song comes to my mind that Ray Bolts recorded many years ago “when we are in heaven”, and people will come up to you and to you guys and say, thank you for giving to the Lord. Mine was a life that was changed. Mine was a life that was changed. Let's raise our hands together, shall we?
Now may the Lord bless you and may the Lord keep you. May the Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you. May the Lord turn his face towards you and give you his peace. And may your heart be touched with the infirmities of those around us so that we will bring the love of Christ to them. This, we pray in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen. Amen.
We will have people at the altar to pray with you if you have a prayer need. Dave and Lou will be over here serving communion after the services. For those of you who want communion. Thank you for being here today. And thank you, Nick and Jo for being here. God bless you. Have a wonderful day, everybody.
Transcript taken from the Sunday morning service 9-25-22. If you would like to watch the full service, click the link below.