Ep. 276: Advice for Donors Giving To Anti-Sex Trafficking Organizations

Give locally. Before you send money off to a national organization that is taking in tens of millions of dollars, see if there’s a ministry in your community. My experience is that there likely is. Investigate that ministry first. Big ministries can afford slick marketing. Don’t be seduced.

Do your research. MinistryWatch tracks the 1000 largest ministries in the nation here. Many of the largest trafficking organizations are there. But, as I said above, most of the local ministries are too small to make it onto our list. To learn about these ministries, use the ProPublica website, here.

Volunteer. Local ministries usually need volunteers to work with the people they serve. Many of them offer volunteer training that will help you understand how to be more effective in your work for them, but which also educate you about the human trafficking problem in your area.

Give to Christian organizations. Many of the organizations involved in sex trafficking are not Christian groups. For example, neither OUR or IJM are explicitly Christian organizations, though IJM does have many Christians (including its founder, Gary Haugen) on staff.

Some of them do good work, but without bringing Scripture and a biblical worldview to this problem, we are likely not providing lasting help. I make no apologies for recommending that you give to and advocate for explicitly Christian organizations.

Pray and Give. Don’t let negative headlines freeze or frustrate you into inaction. View the negative headlines as a gift, steering you away from the bad actors and toward the good actors.

Human trafficking is a scourge, a horrible scourge in this beautiful but broken world. But it is the job of Christians to be restorers, reconcilers, repairers of the breach. Local human trafficking ministries are a great place to start.

The producers for today’s program are Jeff McIntosh and Rich Roszel. We get database, technical, and editorial support from Stephen Dubarry, Christina Darnell, and Casey Sudduth.

Until next time, may God bless you.

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