How Much Would You Sell Your Daughter For?

All girls are princesses. Little girls should grow up hearing how beautiful and loved they are. They should feel special no matter what they look like or how smart they are. They should know their true worth.

Unfortunately for many, what should be true simply isn’t a reality. Girls all over the world grow up believing that they worthless. They have parents who abandon them or abuse them, and the media tells the girls that their worth is in how much they weigh or what they get on their SATs.

One of the first evenings here in Chaing Mai, Thailand my squad got together to watch a movie called Nefarious. It is a documentary about the sex trade all over the world.

As I watched it I became exceedingly heartbroken for the young girls of Thailand. Here in south east Asia many village girls as young as 12 are sold by their parents to brokers to go work in bars or restaurants and the girls end up stuck in prostitution.

Many of the girls feel like they owe their parents for giving them life and there is such a high value on honor in this culture that the girls won’t leave the industry unless their parents are ok with it. And sadly, usually the parents aren’t ok with them leaving  

The daughters who work at the “restaurant” send home the little money they make to support their family while their fathers drink and gamble their days away. 

The ministry my squad is part of this month is called lighthouse ministries. Lighthouse gets to reach out to these women in bars, to raise awareness with the families in the villages, and to disciple the women who come out of the bars.

This country is in so much bondage. It breaks my heart that the worth of a woman is so little, that she has so little value that having a daughter is seen as an insurance policy if the family falls on hard times. They can always sell her.

 

Join me in praying for this ministry and the girls we get to encounter this month.