be Lydia

In March 2016, I had a dream where I heard a voice say “be Lydia, be Lydia, be Lydia” over and over and over. I sat up and literally said aloud, “Lord, put it in my head so I can sleep.” I never remember my dreams but the next morning I woke up and had what I call a “download from the Holy Spirit” and took six pages of detailed notes in my journal.

“Be Lydia” meant to be “like” Lydia, a worshipper of God in the Book of Acts who heard Paul preach the Gospel and responded by showing her faithfulness through hospitality. I was supposed to show my faithfulness by fighting sex trafficking.

At that time in my life, I had no idea what sex trafficking really was although I had heard the term before. I knew it existed in Cambodia, Thailand and far away countries. I had even donated to an anti-trafficking organization only knowing that children were being “abused.”

I had absolutely no idea it was going on in the United States much less my own neighborhood!

I prayed about this crazy dream until a few months later when I went to see the movie The Abolitionists which is the story of the Operation Underground Railroad organization (the organization that I had donated to without knowing what they did). I was completely wrecked. I knew without a doubt that God was breaking my heart over what breaks His. I woke up the next morning and did something I had never done before which is to say to the Lord, “Your will, not mine.”

I knew from my dream that I was supposed to have a non-profit so I moved forward on that.

I also knew that I was supposed to hold an event so I worked on bringing anti-trafficking speakers together and I also wanted a marketplace of women vendors because Lydia was an entrepreneur. Below are my thoughts right after this first event.

While a lot has happened since my dream in March 2016, I am still depending on the Lord daily to reveal where He wants us to go. We know we are supposed to work on prevention and pouring into young women so they won’t be tricked into sex slavery. We also know we are supposed to incorporate hosting to create awareness. Powered by the direction of the Holy Spirit, we do both of those things and would love for you to join us.

In the meantime, you can read about my first event when it was just me trying to figure this all out (thankfully I have a team of warriors helping me now!).

I had hoped that I would wake up the day after our first beLydia Gathering with a game plan, but I’m still trying to process what happened and what God is doing in my life.

Honestly, I planned on scrapbooking and organizing my office this summer.

I have no agenda but if I did, it would be more aligned with doing nothing rather than doing something.

When I was passing out postcards at church the week before (hated it!), I first began telling people about the beLydia Gathering, how we’re helping anti-sex trafficking ministries and we will have some wonderful vendors, blah, blah, blah. And as soon as I said “sex” they would quickly grab the card and walk away half-smiling, half-appalled. Then I started to just say we were having a big event, come and help survivors and oh, we have wonderful vendors. By the beginning of the second service, I was just saying “We have an event with jewelry!”

All of that to say, I know we need more awareness about sex-trafficking, but why me?

My son and I came home yesterday afternoon, unpacked his car, left my car in the garage filled to capacity with bags, boxes, bird cages and labeled soap; he went upstairs to rest while I did the most random thing (for me): I put on my bathing suit.

I stepped down into our pool, all alone and just floated, sitting on a pool noodle, bobbing up and down, all by myself and thought about what had just happened.

“What was that?!”

To hear the speakers, all so selfless and inspirational, was such a blessing….I have no words. It’s so obvious it’s the Holy Spirit working in them. Leading them. Carrying them.

I’m pretty sure that there are secular anti-trafficking organizations and God will use them for His purpose but I don’t know anyone in their right mind that would actually choose to work against this kind of evil unless they were led by God.

I’m actually worn out from being in awe of God. To put all of this together in such a short amount of time…I’m just speechless.

I could not walk across the room yesterday without someone stopping me to share how they were so moved by the ministries, or praying about how to get involved or wondering how they can use gifts that God has blessed them with to help the survivors of sex trafficking.

This has been the most humbling experience of my entire life (and that’s saying something because I’ve made a lot of bad choices that have humbled me in not a good way). I had to repent for being angry/annoyed and forgive people who didn’t return my emails. It hurt my feelings and I felt desperate to have people sign up, because I felt like this was so important and it annoyed me that they didn’t respond to what I was calling them to, but that really shows how prideful I was and how I didn’t completely trust God.  Once I finally let go of what I thought it should be, He provided the peace. Lesson learned (I hope).

If this is what happens when you totally trust God, then I want to totally trust God. Always. Without hesitation.

The future of beLydia: I’m going to pray and listen, take notes and then respond. I know He has given us a green light to move forward, I feel that with every ounce of my soul, but I just don’t know how to make it happen yet.

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