The kids are home on spring break, and we are one of the few families in the neighborhood who stayed home. Thankfully, we got our share of warm weather, unusual for Chicago in March, but perfect for kids (and me) who are anxious to get outside and play! Running around in shorts, riding bikes, just eating lunch on the back deck—we felt so free after being cooped up all winter.
One day when rain threatened we went to see the movie Amazing Grace. I realize it’s been out a few weeks, but I’m typically one who waits until the video, so it was a treat to see it in a theater.
I highly recommend the movie, which tells the true story of William Wilberforce. Especially if you like history, you’ll enjoy it. Even if you’re not a history buff, I think it’s an important movie to see.
Wilberforce, a member of the English Parliament in the late 1700’s, spent his life fighting to abolish the slave trade. In one dramatic scene, he carries in a parchment scroll filled with signatures of citizens who support his cause (his fellow Parliament members did not) and with a flourish, unrolls the scroll on the floor of the House of Lords.
And you think, I would have signed that scroll. Slavery, treating people as property, is wrong. If we are concerned with moral government, we ought to be concerned with slavery. Human beings ought to have the right to walk in the sun, free.
You may assume slavery ended in the 1800’s, with the Emancipation Proclamation. But there are more people trapped in slavery around the globe today than there were in Wilberforce’s day, including millions of children.
These people are often hidden, and it will take more than laws to change things. They are already being held and forced to work in violation of U.S. and international law.
A 2003 U.S. State Department “Trafficking in Persons Report” said: “As unimaginable as it seems, slavery and bondage still persist in the early 21st century. Millions of people around the world still suffer in silence in slave-like situations of forced labor and commercial sexual exploitation from which they cannot free themselves. Trafficking in persons is one of the greatest human rights challenges of our time.”
Things have not improved in the four years since that report was issued. An ABC news story this month showed that human trafficking is still a major world problem.
Christian relief organizations, like World Vision, are working hard to fight this problem, but they need our help.
Modern day William Wilberforce types are circulating petitions. Click here to sign one. I urge you to do it.
A movement called “the Amazing Change” is using the movie to raise awareness of this issue. Small things, like being a smart shopper and not buying products produced by the slave trade, can make a difference.
If we can make a difference, why wouldn’t we? We are free for a reason–to set others free as well.
I once was lost, but now am found
T’was blind, but now I see.
4 Comments
Keri, One of the most powerful movies I have watched lately is a documentary titled, “Born In A Brothel”. This is a different type of slavery, that of a child whose life (especially that of a girl child) is dictated by abuse, sex, and the realities of prostitution. One woman–ONE WOMAN–went in and changed the lives of a few children, forever. But not only those children, but their children, and their children after them–whole generations impacted by one woman’s actions.
Suz,
Thanks! I’m sometimes hesitant to write about this stuff. It probably feels overwhelming, like there is not much we can do. But as you point out, doing something small can make a difference. Change begins with awareness.
Do you know what breaks my heart? Women who are slaves to the opinions of others - women who live under a cloud of emotional and psychological abuse. It is easy for us to speak about their extricating themselves from this type of bondage. But the history behind that kind of slavery can be so complex that it way out seems like a mace.
I feel for these women and they are the ones I see when I write. I write for them, that God will use my words to take hold of their wounded hearts, hold their spirits in His hands and help them to see their worth in His eyes, life them up and out of the emotional and psychological slavery.
Thank you Cheryl! Way to go. There are so many ways that even people who appear to be free can be in bondage! I love your heart for women. thank you for using your gifts to help women to see that they are deeply loved daughters of the King!!