Concerned Citizens

This is Rodney from the Masculine Journey Podcast, where we explored manhood within Jesus Christ. Your chosen Truth Network Podcast is starting in just a few seconds.

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Previously on Lantern Rescue. Sometimes we're catching a trafficker at the border that this might be his first or second time trafficking someone, but he's working for this enormous ring. Now if you're convincing him within a day, he has no incentive to flip on his car. If you drag out the investigation a little bit longer and you're putting pressure on them, you're more likely to be able to get them to cooperate with you. If you're not willing to communicate with them or have a longer investigation, there's no opportunity for them to cooperate.

So you're not able to get to these higher level guys because there's no incentive for them to rot on them. Welcome to Lantern Rescue, a ministry program dedicated to bringing light into the darkness of human trafficking. It's time to light the way to freedom. This is Lantern Rescue. We tell the stories, we talk about rescues, and we empower you to do something about it.

William Wilberforce once said, Let it not be said I was silent when they needed me. This is Lantern Rescue. Welcome to another amazing episode of Lantern Rescue. We've got a big update coming, but also a real lesson to be learned, I think for all of us in the midst of that. So Mark, can you kind of start us off with what's going on?

Sure, Ren's going to kind of share this case before she does share about this particular case. I wanted to update our listeners. We are unfortunately not able to always record every week, and I know there are some weeks that pass, but I've recently bumped into multiple listeners who have said they've listened to every show, they're devoted to praying for us, and they can't wait to pick up the next show.

And so I really want to thank people for that, and I really appreciate, Robbie, all that you do, too. So, you know, we've been extremely busy in the regions of the world that we work in. Without disclosing too much, we have a really large takedown by our task force, something that we've developed this case quite a bit. And in parts of the world, prosecuting or arresting someone or getting a warrant for them based on human trafficking, believe it or not, that's a work in progress.

That's not always a viable option. But gun trafficking and drug trafficking is, and so sometimes we pursue doing undercover work of known human traffickers by also bringing to light what they're smuggling as far as guns and drugs. And we've got some really big cases that I would appreciate our listeners pray for, because when this airs this weekend, it'll actually still be active and something occurring, so I appreciate prayers for that. We've got a lot of training next week in one country of some commandos, as well as just some meetings about aftercare that we would appreciate thoughts and prayers on there. When it comes to aftercare in some countries, it's not always minors that need help. It's foreigners that are in that country that get completely pushed aside.

It's also the 18, 19, 20-year-old who has been trafficked since she was 12, but now she's, you know, out of the system and there is no social services for her. So, you know, pray that those were mobbing in the aftercare process of that region that they really get a way forward to help out. Then I would also say continue to pray for the folks in the Middle East. We still have a list, a short list that we're working through to rescue people and move them. And as I've mentioned recently, it's become much harder because of the condition of the people. The children are starving, they're too weak to even move, so we have to take the time. And that's risky time in order to feed them, get them some medical assistance just so we can make the extraction.

So keep praying for those needs and those people. I'm excited to really talk about this today. I don't know if excited is the word.

That's definitely not the word. I just think it's so- Motivated. Yeah, motivated. Thank you, Rick, because tomorrow we are going to be posting about this case that Ren's about to talk about. And we prayerfully talked about it, considered should we even do this because it is extreme. And when people who follow us on Instagram and social media see that post tomorrow, they'll understand we can hardly block out the graphic of what really happened. But Ren, you can kind of share about the case and what happened and then we'll go from there. Yeah, sure. And before we get started talking about this particular case, I found that like a trigger warning is extremely graphic and it does involve death and mutilation. So if that's not something that you can listen to today, I would encourage that you turn out.

If it is, then hang in there with us and we'll get through this together. So giving people time to log off if they want to. So this case is really graphic, just to be honest. Basically what happened is a woman was sold across the border. She was tricked into some form of probably they said she wouldn't be working somewhere.

We'll never know because we didn't get to interview her. And she was sold, without her knowledge, into another country. And once she was entered into that country, she was using a voodoo ritual and her body was, um, her limbs were chopped off and she was killed during this ritual. So I guess the best category we could put this in for human trafficking would be organ trafficking. The use of human bodies and their death and the non-consensual use of human bodies and their death in voodoo rituals is something that's been happening for a very, very long time, all across the world, not just in this country. And it's something that trafficking needs to acknowledge as happening. So again, I think that organ trafficking is probably the best category to put this in, but we'll explore that avenue later.

So that's kind of what happened in this case. She did not survive. She did die. However, the traffickers and the people that killed her have been arrested and they will face prosecution.

Wren, if I could ask you a couple of questions, of course it's kind of like, but I think probably a lot of listeners are wondering the same thing. Do you know how old she was? Yes, she was 18.

Yeah, she was very, yes, yes. She was barely of legal age. She was 18. So her crossing the border wasn't as suspicious as other cases.

And I think that was done intentionally. You know, her parents weren't looking for her right away because she got a job. She's 18, she can leave the house. And there's no way that she knew this was going to happen to her. Again, we'll never get to interview her, but this was through what we've gathered, questioning the traffickers and people involved in this vigil. She was unaware that this could happen.

This is not consensual. She did not voluntarily get sacrificed. She was sold for a profit to someone that wanted to use her body and included rituals. And so as graphically horrible as it all sounds, as I was trying to, in my mind, get a better idea, you're saying that they cut her limbs off as a part of this voodoo ritual? And so like her arms or legs, that kind of stuff, like this is what they were doing? Yes. And if anyone does get onto social media this weekend, it will be a somewhat sanitized picture.

It will be blurred out, but you'll be able to kind of tell what's going on. So again, trigger warning if you log on. Yes, her legs were removed. They were chopped off and they were on the side of her body when our team got there. She was already deceased at that point and really in that region of the world, even if she was still alive, she wasn't going to survive.

Not that kind of attack. There's no way medical services could have rendered aid quickly enough and efficiently enough to help her. So yes, her legs were completely removed at the hip joint. Unbelievable.

In the final stages, I'm not sure which image we're showing, but unfortunately they removed her head. And you know, I don't know, Ren Rabi, you know, we talked a couple of weeks ago about in West Africa that we were asked by the government to take our counter-trafficking task force and focus in on the kidnappings and children who were being taken for voodoo rituals because it's a season of religion there that they practice this. And so, you know, we've intercepted a lot. We've rescued a lot of girls whose end result would have been the same thing. This case, we got late, you know, and we weren't able to make the interception at the time until it was too late. But, you know, I will say the good news is we arrested both the men responsible and they were toted off, handcuffed, and we've actually recommended prosecution.

We've made the recommendation of a death penalty as soon as possible. So I think it's important to talk about how this case, how we even got a little into this case, because that's what we'd like to talk about a little more in the show today. When she was getting her legs removed, onlookers, people saw and heard this going on. She was alive when that happened. And they went and they found our team and told them what was going on because they know our team and the work that it does.

So by the time our team returned, she was, her head was removed and she was deceased. But it's really important that people just in the community that have grown up in the community of Voodoo, that their families, their parents may be practicing, maybe they even practiced it at some point, recognize this as wrong. And they did try to get her help.

Unfortunately, we were too late for this particular victim, but I think it's really important to notice that it is a societal shift that's starting to happen as part of the world where they're starting to recognize like, oh, this isn't, this isn't right. We should do something about this. Right. Which, you know, really even relates back to our own country, right Ryan?

Oh, absolutely. If you think back to the slave trade in America, that ended and they were going to abolish because a group of concerned citizens spoke up about it. And it started the events happening that led to the association's amendments and, you know, the abolition of slavery here in America. So it takes that group of concerned citizens to kind of speak up against their way of life, their culture, their government, to have these changes happen. Right. As the, as the, really the culture sometimes doesn't have an idea there because I guess it was like the frog in the water.

They, they, they become numb to, I mean, unbelievably horrible stuff. And fortunately, right, they, God provided a way out and, and as you guys have this opportunity that God's opened this door for, for, for people to recognize that there is an answer. Yeah, absolutely. And you got to think, I know at least a lot of cases in history that I talked about and I've talked about in the past when stuff comes up, particularly with studying the law, you'll look at a court decision. You have to remember the year that it was decided and, and this goes, kind of works for anything. You have to remember the years that things happen because you're like, what? Women couldn't have credit cards until when?

Like, women couldn't have their own bank job? It seems so crazy nowadays, but you've got to think of the world and the society that they're living in and how radical it was when people changed certain things. So it's happening all over the world. So this is, this is a ritual and something that's been happening in this part of the world, in this country, for hundreds of years. The citizens are starting to speak up against it and looking for ways to punish their own citizens and change their own laws and change their own way of life. That's huge.

You know, that's a societal shift that it's really hard to do. And Mark, I was thinking that, wow, this is where prayer really, really like praying for that nation that the, that the citizens themselves will wake up and because the actual citizens are aware of it, making things available is, is, is a huge advantage, isn't it? Yeah, it is. And it's something that it's good to see the community and the region of that world realize there is help, there is assistance. As harsh as this crime is of organ harvesting and dismemberment of this child's body, this is an issue that's been going on for thousands of years. You know, if we go back even to the Israelites in the Bible. As shocking as that image was for me, because I live in a culture and society that recognizes that's wrong, you know, and we have a foundation of even our foundation of faith that says, man, that's murder. I can't imagine growing up in a place like Africa where this is acceptable.

And yet it has been for a long time. And we're making a, it's interesting to see this cultural shift that is occurring. I remember one time we were in a, um, a village where people were trafficked all the time prior to us arriving there. And then I don't want to be too descriptive here on faith talk radio, but they had, in order to eliminate that, and they had began to transition from that's not right anymore.

They actually drew images of men and their genitals with big X's across them on their buildings. And they were basically saying later, a few months later, when I came back and I saw that I asked one of my task force and I said, what's going on? They said, well, that means trafficking. They can't, they can't do that here anymore. True, you know, selling of girls and, uh, abusing them and having sex.

And that's, that's not allowed anymore. And so, you know, we help with our task force and team, we help make that change in that area. And, uh, and now we're, we're finding ourselves, you know, tackling something that's obviously been around all the way back to the Israelites, the Canaan gods, Molech and then Baal and the sacrifice that occurred then. Well, I got to go to a break mark, but yeah, well, we're going to get to that prayer. And when we get down the other side of the break, we certainly would, you know, we're just so grateful that you guys are making us aware of this so that we can see how we can pray for the world. So we've got so much more coming up.

Stay tuned. Lantern Rescue is a USA based organization that conducts international rescue operations for people suffering from human trafficking. Lantern specializes in sending former U.S. special operation law enforcement and intelligence personnel to partner with host nations and assist them in creating specialized units to combat ongoing security problems, such as genocide, terrorism, and human trafficking.

As a nonprofit charity, they offer services free of charge to their host nations. Human trafficking has grown into the second largest criminal activity in the world, reaching an estimated $150 billion in annual activity. Lantern Rescue has developed rapidly to combat trafficking. Lantern operates through a trained international network in order to rescue women and children from sex and labor slavery, and facilitates holistic aftercare services.

They're gearing up for operations right now, and you can go to lanternrescue.org to see how you can support them financially. The following program contains sensitive content, including accounts of sexual abuse. Listener discretion is advised. Welcome back to Lantern Rescue.

Today's episode, kind of tough to listen to a lot of graphic stuff, but doesn't catch God unaware. And we're so grateful to know that this has great application for all of us right here in America, doesn't it, Wren? Yeah, it absolutely does. So, you know, the societal shift and all that stuff that we're talking about, that's something that's happening in America and all over the world today involving human trafficking. You know, people are still in denial that it's happening, that slavery is still around in 2022. And it's taking people speaking up about it, doing something about it, and recognizing that it's a problem for it to change like anything else in the world. So I think it has a lot of application to what's going on today, whether it's, you know, this country that is standing up against voodoo rituals for the first time in thousands of years, or people in the world that are recognizing human trafficking and not backing down when someone tries to tell them that, oh, that's not happening, like you're mistaken. So I think it's very applicable to today.

Yeah. And Mark, you had a thought along those lines? Yeah, I think I wanted to just be transparent real quick and personal to our listeners who are hearing this conversation, maybe looking, now going to Instagram and looking and they're like, oh my goodness. And it is right that they should be shocked and they should take a moment. I mean, in this podcast, I've seen this image of this child, and I've also personally picked up children with body parts missing.

And, you know, I unholstered my gun because I'm just, I want to shoot somebody. But you process it as you see it, listener, as they see that image, take a moment, realize that's a real girl, a real person. She was 18. She had a family.

And then she's not here anymore. And in such a harsh way, as well as our team who is dealing with that, you know, and that has its effects on just not on the US team, but also on the foreign team who had to pick up the body parts and had, there's not a CSI in West Africa that shows up and cleans up. That's our people, you know, that have to do that as they're making the arrest of the criminals. So it's okay to process that. It's okay to also know that God is in control and He's still fighting this same fight and He's just using people today, whether it's human trafficking today in these forms, or as it's been in the past, slavery and other topics.

And I'm so glad that we're able to bring people to a realization today that this is occurring, and then tie it into what Ren has done, tied it into, look, there are people who don't quite get it. They live in the comforts of America. They live in such a closed, sheltered situation. They don't understand how many girls are being perpetrated and exploited around them in this country and in other countries. And really, it gets me because I have daughters and I have, you know, five daughters, and how easily they can be deceived in the States, and they can be convinced to participate in something that could result in their death. And then to take that overseas and see this poor child who didn't have that same system of protection, or even she did, they didn't have the same knowledge of evil.

And so, you know, she was tricked and deceived, including her family. And really, for me, the take-home message from this disturbing case is that we've got to cherish our children and our responsibility toward them as a society. And we cannot get away from the fact in America that young children are dependent upon adults, and it is the adults' obligation to take that task seriously, and that we should never abuse, just deny the word, the simpleness of their minds, and take their trust and abuse it. Like, we can't do that. And there seems to be, a little bit in this country, a move to legalize certain activities and to reduce the age of certain things.

And that's why we can't do that. It's our responsibility to watch and protect God's magnificent children, you know. And that was just something that was pressed upon me when I saw this whole case, and been involved with our task force, and figuring out next moves, and then having this radio show.

So, Wren, give us an update on the social media situation. Yeah, so we have an amazing team that works our social media page. They've been doing fantastic things. Awareness is definitely getting raised by them.

They're an amazing group of people that help us out so much. And it's a way better way to stay connected with us. Like Mark said earlier in the episode, we don't get to record every week. But stuff is posted on social media every week. So definitely connect with us on there.

It's at Lantern Rescue on Facebook and Instagram. And if you ever enjoy something about the podcast, we had one of our volunteers that we love dearly. She's been binge listening to every episode of the podcast in order. So if anyone out there that listens wants to give us, you know, a comment, a question, a topic that they would like to hear us discuss, we'd be more than happy to hear that. So just give that to us on social media.

Our girls will get it to us real quickly, and we can address some questions that listeners might have, or topics they might want to hear us talk about. So Mark, God's not caught by surprise. You know, in Deuteronomy 25, there's this, you know, Moses predicted that the people would literally eat their children in those sieges. And as a result of, you know, turning their back on the sin of all that stuff with Mullach and, you know, offering their own children. And so there's unbelievable, like, things we can't even fathom. But God has got solutions for those.

And I'm so glad for your heart for how we can pray about these situations. Yes. You know, when I asked the Minister of Defense of one of the surrounding countries, how often this happened, he said, a lot. I said, like, wait, like, do you deal with 10, 20 cases? 100? He said, thousands. Thousands, right? Oh, my goodness.

So we're in a real life, in this particular, you know, show today, and discussion, we're in a real life situation of people who are following after Baal or Molech, you know, either one, with the ritual of sacrificing children and using their organs. You know, and the disturbing thing is when you study Scripture, and look at it, okay, yes, those were foreign gods, but at some point, they were embraced by Solomon. Solomon allowed a temple to be built to Molech, right?

Right. Because of his relationships and marriages. And, you know, he allowed that to happen. Obviously, Ahaz was, you know, such an evil king.

He reigned all those years in Jerusalem and, you know, did all of these things, including passing his own son through the fire. So, I think that when we pray, we not only pray for our team and pray for those in resistance to that there, but when we think of America and the listeners here that are from the States, that we pray that we don't slide down this slope, that we don't find ourselves. I know that sounds bizarre.

I know people think there's no way we as Americans could ever do this. When I look at the sacrifice of abortion, when I look at the sacrifice of children's purity, because we have no verification of age or identity when we hand them a phone, and they can look at any type of extreme harp, horn, right? Oh, yeah. When I look at the sacrifice that we are making of our children by making them susceptible to lifestyles that they don't understand, that they don't understand, that they don't know what to do, lifestyles that aren't acceptable, and yet we want to shove it down their throats and try to teach them at a young age, we're already sliding down this slope.

You know, Robbie, are you following me? Like, we're already going there. And so every listener that's here in this show, I tell you what, just take a moment and pray. I tell you what, I can pray and ask our listeners to pray for our country and pray for this situation, pray for our children, pray for the protection of our children.

Right, we can do that right now, Mark. Jesus, thank you for hearts, for righteousness. And I pray that we would stand in the gap, whatever that looks like, and that literally your presence would come forth, the image of your son that would help people see this isn't right, and that their lives involved and people are being hurt. And I pray that you would come to their rescue, that you would put people in their path, that you would put people in their path, that you would bring righteous people into these situations, and that you would continue to minister to their hearts, to the team of land and rescue, so that they can process all that they actually see and are experiencing and can stay strong in you. I pray for our culture, that you would help us to wake up and see you and see that the real solution to all this is a need for you and a hunger for you.

And I ask this in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen.

Thank you, Robby. And then, Mark, we've got some good news, really, to share that we, by all means, want to pass that along. Yeah, let's end this show on a good note.

And the good note is that we have got final success on some cases. As we kind of mentioned at the beginning of the show, they're going to resolve themselves in the next two weeks, and I'll be out of the country again and some of the team to see those things through. And so those are really good things we're excited about. I'm also excited about some of the shows we have upcoming, Robby.

We don't always talk about, because we don't always know what we're going to do on the show next. But we've got a couple of folks that we want to introduce our listeners to. One is a counter-human trafficking agent that we work with and have in the States. One is the founder of a task force that I serve on the board with, and he is doing tremendous works in the Stateside arena, and we're in partnership with him, and I look forward to having that show. And then, last thing, too, I challenge everybody, please go to, because it fits this topic today, please go to our social media, the Earn It Act. You're going to see all about it in our Instagram story and our post. We need you to sign that.

That's a bill that's up before Congress right now, and it needs to be pushed through for the protection of our children in the States. – And so, your social media is all lanternrescue at Instagram, lanternrescue at Facebook, that kind of thing? – Yes. Yes, it is. – All right.

Well, and we know it's lanternrescue.org that's the hub for all that stuff. And thank you, Mark and Wren, for what God's doing through Lantern Rescue. – Thank you, Robby. Have a great day. – You, too.