You are holding a candle. It is a symbol of hope -- of the light you are in the darkness. In a moment, the choir will be singing an anthem called The Prayer of the Children. It was written as a lament for those children who suffered in the Bosnia-Serbia conflict from several years back, suffering that continues today around the world. Still children are crying out for hope, crying out for God to move in their situation -- as we heard in the story of the woman who had grown up during the Bosnian conflict seeking God. This song remembers the cries of suffering children.

But unfortunately there are many other children similarly suffering.

Although not often on the public media, there are many, many children enslaved yearly as domestic or sexual slaves. Conservative estimates are that more than a million people, of all ages, are sold into slavery across international borders every year. One author, Benjamin Skinner who has been researching the plight of today's slave trade, wrote in his book A Crime so Monstrous, that when recently in Haiti, just an hour's plane flight from Florida, he was offered a 10-year-old girl for sexual and domestic slavery for $50. This was in broad daylight.

We hear statistics like this and shake our heads and think "that's horrible" but we also often imagine, "well, that's Haiti" or whatever country.

However, the bondage of children in the states is equally horrific.

One such child was Tanya.

Tanya was 12 years old when she was approached by an older boy who complimented her, offered to give her rides places, but when they became a couple everything changed. Power plays, manipulation and physical abuse began, and Tanya was too young to resist and too emotionally attached to leave. Her boyfriend was a pimp and she began to see customers -- more than 100 men a month. She was a sex slave.

According to Shared Hope International, a Vancouver, WA based nonprofit whose goal is to rescue young girls from the sex trade, Tanya's story is far from rare. Between 100,000 and 300,000 U.S. children are enslaved in sex trafficking each year.* The US government reports that the average age for entering the sex industry is between 12 and 14 years old. (*According to Ernie Allen, president of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children)

At truck stops in the US these young girls are called lot lizards and are passed from truck to truck by order of CB radio. During a 2005 sting on a series of truck stops above Harrisburg, PA more than 2 dozen child sex workers were found.

Unfortunately it is often the children who get arrested, charged and jailed. The pimps and johns, those men who use them, go free. Linda Smith, former Washington state senator says after two years of research she has not found anyplace where the men responsible are arrested for the crime of the rape of a child. And there are lots of men involved. When you have 100,000 children being used around 10 times a night, seven days a week, you are dealing with somewhere above 7 million men. Linda Smith says, "We need to mourn the selling of innocents. And we need to, as believers, ask God to forgive us for our apathy and go out there and fight for these kids" (Linda Smith, World, Feb 26, 09, p 55, ubp).

There is a lot of darkness. And you are holding a candle.

The hardest thing with statistics or songs that remind us of the plight of those around us is this -- we don't know what to do. We can feel overwhelmed with the horror that is out there and we would rather pretend it does not exist than be a light in the darkness.

Today I want you to recognize just what God has given you.

Indeed our passage of scripture reminds us of what all we have been given and the candle Paul described there is called "The Promise".

It is the promise, the word spoke to Abraham more than 4000 years ago now which Paul said applied to the Galatians 2000 years ago and applies to us yet today. Can you imagine that something that old has any power to affect us today? Yet indeed it does.

What God did in Abraham's life is remarkable -- his story begins in the 12th chapter of the Bible -- where we are told how God spoke to Abram, which is what his name was before God changed it.

Realize that this Abram was no slouch -- he was a man surrounded by idolatry in his country (modern day Iraq) and a man of wealth who heard the voice of God telling him to abandon the life he knew, and the security of his guaranteed income and follow God. God said, "Leave your country, your people and your father's household and go to the land I will show you." That alone is quite a call, but the next thing we read is simply this: "So Abram left." (Gen 12: 1-3).

That alone was remarkable to me -- is it any wonder he is called the father of faith since he demonstrated such faith in God, faith that sustained him. To him God promised that all nations would be blessed through him. This is the promise -- it was spoken to him and to his seed, Paul points out in this passage, meaning to the ultimate seed from Abraham, Jesus Christ. It is Jesus who received the blessing and distributes it to us.

This is the promise -- the promise of life by faith, the promise of relationship with the living God by faith, the promise of hope in that God as well. It is a promise pictured in this candle in your hand.

A candle is of value in a dark room only when lit, without the flame it is as dark as the darkness around it. Paul says in this passage that the promise did not depend upon us doing something, like us keeping the law, but upon us believing someone! The law which was given 430 years after the promise to Abraham did not negate what God spoke to Abraham. Life and hope still come via the promise.

The law was to keep us aware of sin, like a guardian of young children, until the promise could come so we might be justified by faith -- so that our candles -- the flame of our lives might be lit.

Through faith Paul ends this passage saying, we are "sons of God" -- notice that we "all" are sons of God. Male and female are all sons, alike before God, we are all equal before God, all given the same authority in the family. We have been made sons for we are clothed with Christ by baptism, we are one in Christ Jesus and therefore, we are Abraham's seed, God's heirs.

Imagine -- earlier Paul wrote that Abraham's seed was Christ and here in v. 29 that we are that seed. We become God's righteousness we are told in 2 Corinthians 5:21 -- and who is God's righteousness? Jesus is God's righteousness. We become "jesus" on this earth -- as is said always, we are the body of Christ.

You are holding a candle because you are made the light of the world by Jesus. You are holding a candle for hope lives in you and comes through you. You are holding a candle for your light, the light that is in you through faith in Jesus Christ, the light of the Promise made to Abraham and to you, Abraham's seed.

1. Make certain that you are not a part of the problem -- for guys here who frequent internet porn sites, stop now. It is a crime against every woman in your life and a sin before God.

2. Open your eyes to the plight of those around you and begin to pray regularly for them. Pray for organizations such as Shared Hope International who are seeking to rescue young children and bring men face to face with their crime.

3. Never, never give up. When God places before you an opportunity to act, take it. Keep your light shining. Live this life God has given you, be the "son of God", the one clothed with Christ, the heir of God in how you live this life.

4. I think about the children we have around us -- some children come without their parents and need us to be their moms and dads, their grandmas and grandpas. Some of these children could one day become a statistic and your role now, your actions now, your acceptance now, your love for them now could make all the difference.

One little girl who visited another congregation in the area told her mom, "and mom after church all the people shook my hand and all those old people had soft and warm hands". For that child those hands became a good symbol of what it meant to be the church.

During Lent use the 40 day prayer guide to boost your prayer times.

And as we light the candles this morning and listen to the anthem, and pray following it, remember this: there are children suffering all around us and we have a calling to make a difference one child at a time.

We are heirs according to the promise given to Abraham -- we have light to share.

(stats: July 12/19, 2008, World, "Modern Bondage" pp 24 ff, ubp; February 28, 2009, World, "Shame of the Cities", pp 54ff, ubp.; Voice of the Martyrs, February 2009, pp 3-5, ubp).