Kidnap & Rescue

Recently I heard about a show on the Discovery Channel that left me covered w/ chills. It's a show about the recovery of people that have been kidnapped. This particular episode was about a team that specifically recovers stolen children. Most of these helpless children are sold into a world of sexual slavery and child pornography. Very heart breaking to say the least. This man and his team go in where governments cannot venture. They're not business suited, political ambassadors, they are hard-core, seasoned and extensively trained veterans. They also do this for NO personal pay.They have tried simply buying the children back, lower risk, right? But the children are much more 'valuable' to their kidnappers to keep than ransom, these days. There is no other way but to go in using great force.

This particular episode reenacted two different rescue operations. One little girl was rescued and reunited w/ her family 18 months after she had been abducted. The operation involved traveling to a foreign country, obtaining black market weapons, a child sized bullet proof vest and a custom made, bullet proof, tube that was worn as a back pack, that the child was placed into and carried out of captivity, into freedom. Can you imagine?

Besides the heart break of such a situation, what especially moved me was that these men, who have nothing to gain & their very lives to lose, would risk everything for one little child. An entire team, of big brawny men, for one helpless little child. They recognize the value of even one small child, one small life, barely lived. When they arrived @ the compound, the child put her hands up toward them, to carry her. Somewhere in her heart, she just knew they were there to save her. They gave her a teddy bear and began to outfit her in a small child-sized bullet proof vest and eventually placed her in the safety of the tube, that one of them personally carried on his back.

Imagine you are that one child. You have lost all hope when suddenly not just one but a team of big men rush in just for you. I thought it was such a graphic picture of the value Christ sees in us. We are as helpless as these little children, unable to save ourselves. But God sees the value in each of us, to come out guns blazing, to risk *everything*, the life of his very son, to save us. He will persist to the very end to rescue us. For even *one*, to be saved from perishing, he risked it all. 

Jesus experienced betrayal (Judas), rejection (Peter) and persecution. These men have faced these issues themselves. One time they went in for a rescue, only to discover they had been set up and the children had already been moved before they got there. They have even lost comrades during these rescues. And yet....they continue in their mission of recovery. Another time they had one rescue target but upon arrival found many other children being held captive, they rescued them all, how could they not? 

I am amazed by these heroes. Such bravery, fueled not only by compassion but a sense of justice for what is good and right. One man on the show stated: he 'wished someone would have rescued him and done this for him when he was a child'. That's right! Many times we are mistreated and then tend to turn into the very thing we hate. This man made a choice to be a rescuer, rather than an abuser. We can all choose that. Truly honorable men!

Do you want to be rescued? Because there is one who has come to save, risking everything for YOU!

Romans 3:23-24 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.    

John 3:16 For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.