In the Trenches with Lantern Rescue

This is Robbie Dilmore from The Christian Car Guy and Kingdom Pursuit, where we hear how God takes your passion and uses it to build a kingdom. Your chosen Truth Network Podcast is starting in just a few seconds.

Enjoy it and share it. But most of all, thank you for listening and for choosing the Truth Podcast Network. I'm with my friends at Land and Rescue and I've got Mark with me, who's the head of the ministry. I've got our Truth Warrior interns.

It's a little bit loud. We have your director of communications. I'll let you introduce her. Mark, give us an update on what God's doing in Land and Rescue and then take us over to Ukraine. You have a lot of folks over there. You're trying to help.

I appreciate it. Let me get on your show again because, you know, it's just like we get so heavily involved in tragedy and conflict in the world inside of our counter human trafficking efforts like Afghanistan, right? And then the world forgets about Afghanistan. Well, guess what? We're still in Afghanistan.

We're still taking risks, rescuing people all the time, doing extractions, doing everything we have to, right? You introduced me to a guy. We can't mention his name or anything. Who's involved in that? I mean, just give an update on Afghanistan before we jump to Ukraine.

He's our task force leader and he's doing incredible work. Right now, while I'm doing this show, we're moving a mom and baby who are in hiding. They've been hiding since August of last year. But then the whole world and media forgets about that, right? But we keep working. And then Ukraine.

I feel like that's the same thing. Like we are employing an enormous amount of people running warehouses, being the first point of contact, feeding 500, 600 people a day, plus advising them on routes, safety, how not to get traffic, where to go in different countries. Like we're doing all this work.

And it's like the world's already, they've already forgot about Ukraine too. You know, they just move on to the next thing and we just stay in the trenches. And I appreciate my team and my people and especially my foreign employees who are task force members doing incredible work. Just this week, one of our warehouses was pretty close to some really hard shelling, mortar shelling and attacks. And fortunately, nobody died and people are safe. But Stu, I'm telling you, your audience needs to know the people defending our points of interest are pastors. I've had to put body armor, helmets, guns in their hands, get them training, build bunkers, do everything we can to defend that. And these are all pastors and every pastor I meet in America, I go, do you think this could be you one day to check this out?

And they're just blown away. But it's Christian pastors and ministry leaders who have stayed in the fight in Ukraine. And I know there's a lot of hot topics to talk about the funding and money and all that. Look, I'm not talking about that. I'm just talking about the Christian moms, dads and children who are suffering. That's who we're helping. That's who we're rescuing. That's who we're feeding.

That's who we're giving care over and watching over. And it's going to come a day where this is hopefully is going to end and we're going to have to rebuild some churches. And we're going to have distribute Bibles. We're going to have to help people in that way.

So Christian audience, be ready for that. I'll introduce real quick to you. This is our director of public engagement who works for us as well and does an incredible job. And she's been very deep in the Ukraine conflict and effort as well.

And we need to introduce. Tell us a little bit about that, because one of the big casualties of war are children and human trafficking, young men, young boys, young ladies that are trafficked as a result of war. That's the war underneath the war that we found.

Talk about that a little bit, Whitney. Absolutely. So honestly, that was one of the key points and motivators for us to get to Ukraine as we started to see things unravel. We wanted people in place at those border points and places where you see these women and children that are coming across the border seeking refuge from what's going on. But here's the hard part is their sons, their husbands, their fathers, they're all in Ukraine fighting. They're standing for their ground there and they're fighting for their country.

But what that does is that leaves a vulnerable population coming across the border. And people know that the wrong people know that the right people are there, but the wrong people are, too. And so anywhere you have an opportunity for evil to to arise, we see it, we know it and it happens. So what we did is we we got a group of people together and we got material together.

And really, we just tried to become that voice of, hey, this is what you need to look for. This is what you need to watch out for. These people are OK.

These people are not. Right. So picking out those signs, because when you're in that situation, I know we can hardly imagine what is really going on there. We are so blessed in the country that we live in. And Ukraine serves as a wonderful reminder to us here. But it is also a call to us here to stand up and do something. But if you could fathom for a moment being a mom with a young child and you've had to put your child on a bus with you under gunfire and mortars.

I mean, all of these things. Right. And you get to this this rally point. You've made it to your beginning of your destination out of Ukraine. But you don't know where to go. You don't know who to talk to.

You don't know the right person, the wrong person. And now you see someone maybe holding a sign or maybe saying, hey, come with me, I'll bring you to safety. And in that moment, you're vulnerable.

Your mind is a thousand different places. You've got a screaming child on your hip and you're just thankful to be alive. And so you fall vulnerable to that person, to that place. And now you're not just vulnerable. You're a victim. And so we're trying to break that before it continues before it happens. So that's next thing you know, you're with your baby in another transport going into another country and you're trafficked like an animal. They tag you and you could never see your baby again.

You could be killed. It's awful what's happening. We have our Truth Warrior interns here. Do you guys have a question for Mr. Mark or Mrs. Whitney? With Lantern Rescue lighting the way to freedom, they need your support by way of lanternrescue.org.

Is that right, Mark? Yeah, lanternrescue.org. You know, we have right now we have an open case in the Caribbean that involves Ukrainian women. They've already been trafficked that far. They're already in the Caribbean, south of the U.S. They're being held in brothels and they're for sale and their passports and documents have been taken and they cannot leave. And they are only given according to our undercover agents.

They're given food and water. It's barely, barely existing. Question. OK, Colby, our Truth Warrior intern.

Quick question for these guys. Yeah, I was going to say, give us a little bit of background about how this all started and when it started. Because I think it's important for everyone to know and it's unique. Yeah, I mean, we have multiple shows about our beginning and that people can tap into on our podcast and research that. I would encourage them to do that because I probably can't do it justice of all that God's done to bring us to where we are today.

But I would encourage people to check out the Lantern Rescue podcast and look back at the beginning podcast and you'll get all that. And I will say, if we're keeping it simple on a simple note, there is no doubt in any of our minds that that work with Lantern Rescue and volunteer with them, that God has definitely intricately designed each person he's brought to the table in this organization to be the hands and feet. And we work and operate as the body of Christ. So each of us brings a little bit something different. But he's ordained every bit of it and we watch it, we watch his faithfulness unfold in our organization.

It's been amazing. Pray for these guys. They're a whole team. They've got a whole lot of folks working with them, pastors, leaders. And pray for the frontline people. And real quick, Mark, tell us, a lot of folks are wondering, honestly, what's going on in Ukraine? Like, is this war over? It's kind of like been this long, drawn-out affair that no one really knows. What do you see as the next thing to happen there and how can we be praying for the Ukrainian people?

What's really happening? If you just follow the facts and if you want to understand war without understanding the political reasons and all that's happening, if you just want to look at a straight war, Google the crisis maps showing where every missile is landing. And just watch that play out over the last few months, how much attack has occurred in Ukraine the size of Texas. And those are real cities, real towns, real houses that are being decimated.

That's the real fact. People are getting shot. People are being shot at. There are missiles that are landing. There's, you know, fights in the air, fights on the ground. That's occurring right now.

There is no conspiracy about that. Anybody who thinks otherwise is completely and utterly wrong and needs to buy a plane ticket to Warsaw and go see. So the other fact of that is, you know, obviously, politically, what is Putin going to do? What is the international community going to continue to do?

All of those things. That's for other minds and other podcasts, not this one. And we just need to pray for those in harm's way. An update from the team at Lantern Rescue. We're with our interns. We're in a wonderful establishment here.

One of our Truth Network partners here in North Carolina, Dario. You'll enjoy their hot dog, too. We knocked a couple of hot dogs back, didn't we, Brother Mark? Yeah, man, it's the best in the U.S. One of our Truth Network interns had a big scoop of something. What was that, Colby, you brought over here?

Big scoop of ice cream, chocolate ice cream. Right in front of us, too. Can you believe that in this sweltering heat? Pray for Lantern Rescue. Pray for the pastors. Pray for Ukraine.

But this will give you, share this podcast to other people. They can know what's going on. These folks are embattled. Some dear saints there. Some great Christian schools. Some great seminaries. Some great churches that are being bombed. And there's a lot of people trafficking.

Some 8 million people are staying and not leaving. So we'll keep them in our prayers. And the website one more time for Lantern Rescue.

Yep, lanternrescue.org. And you can also find us on your normal social media outlets, Instagram, Facebook. We'd love for you guys to give us a follow and keep updated on what we've got going on. People can get involved, right? Yes, absolutely. Look, if God's prompting your heart, we've got a volunteer form on our website. Fill it out. Let us know what your desire is and where you feel led to help.

We'd love to have you. You know, Whitney, it's like we're all in this massive dark room. Let's say this dark room is like this massive arena that seats, you know, 100,000 people and it's pitch black. Someone turns on a little flashlight. Someone like Lantern Rescue turns on a big light. But what if a bunch of other people, thousands of people listening right now to my voice, they decide to shine the light of Christ themselves and start praying and start giving and supporting and going and helping you.

What would happen? Look, we want to be the city on the hill, right? And that's what we are called to be as believers and as Christians. And I encourage you, if you have the ability, absolutely donate your funds. You know, it's going to a good place. And like I said, follow up, you know, fact check it, check us out, because I think it's important for everyone to see that there is a capability to do so much more in this world than what we do is currently right. And so if God's calling your heart, listen, because any time he has ever called me and I've been obedient, he has blessed me beyond belief. Well, I'm praying someone's heart was tugged away at by this interview, listening to all of our awesome affiliates of the Truth Network, AFR, our friends all over the place, Wilkins Radio, Truth Network, all the stations of Carious, Jacksonville 91.9, down in St. Augustine, 91.3 Brunswick, 91.7 Jacksonville. Listening to this, go do something about it.

Go to lanternrescue.org. You know what? Don't ask us. Ask God what he wants you to do. You know, God, he's the God of the helpless, he's the God of the homeless, he's the God of the widow and the orphan, and there's a bunch of them out there. They need your help, and by helping these folks, you can help them and be the hands and feet of Jesus, and you can shine that light and light up our world with the good news of Jesus. Thank you, guys. God bless you.