Elijah Rising
Elijah Rising
Trafficking In Asia - Tommy Broyles - Ep.81
After adopting a daughter from China, Tom Broyles' life took a transformative turn from practicing law to pursuing mission work driven by faith and purpose. Discover how his legal expertise and faith uniquely prepared him for this impactful mission, blending professional skills with a heartfelt commitment to service. Listen as Tom shares the emotional and logistical steps they took to establish a safe home for minors, emphasizing the challenges and victories along the way.
The psychological toll of working with trauma victims is a stark theme in this episode, as Tom delves into the concept of vicarious trauma and the importance of self-care.
From the harrowing realities of sex trafficking in Houston to the cultural shifts encountered upon returning to the U.S., the resilience required for such mission-driven work is evident.
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Hi, welcome back to the Elijah Rising podcast. Today we have a special treat for you. We're going to be talking about trafficking in Asian countries with none other than Tom Broyles, our assistant, grant writer and all around development associate extraordinaire. We're so grateful to have you on, tom.
Speaker 2:Thank you.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so you know, we are going to be talking a lot about your experiences, especially overseas and how it relates to Houston and kind of what, some of the similarities and some of the differences are, but you had an extraordinary career before you came to us. Do you want to share with our listeners a little bit about your history?
Speaker 2:Sure, just a little background, yeah, so I well, I'll start with. I was raised in Abilene, texas, southern Baptist.
Speaker 1:Amazing.
Speaker 2:And I decided to go off to university went to University of Texas and then went on to law school and got married. My wife is from Dallas and got married. My wife is from Dallas and we kind of settled into the young adult American lifestyle. Maybe I should speak for myself. We were about trying to make a lot of money. It was really what we were about.
Speaker 2:And so we were busy doing that, and about eight years into that, things started to change a little for us. We, I guess, got closer to God and God's will and things did start happening that we didn't expect to happen.
Speaker 1:Do you want to share with us?
Speaker 2:what those things were those things were yeah, well, we, um, we had two children, um, biological children, and then, when we thought we were finished, um, I felt originally it was me and I felt like we had another child in asia and and I was like, oh you gotta be crazy, we were done. You know, we took care of that yeah that's not. And um then one night she was up all night, um, with a picture of a girl with black hair calling her mommy whoa and she woke me up and said we've've got a child, we've got to go.
Speaker 1:Wow. So she had a dream, uh-huh Like the Lord was. Wow, it was a dream. That's amazing.
Speaker 2:And of course I was ready to go. So I don't remember if I had the documents. If I didn't, I had them very quickly for her.
Speaker 1:To sign.
Speaker 2:I didn't want her to change her mind.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And so we did it together and we wound up adopting our daughter, mia, and that was a life changer, and I think it's the more that we relied on God for what we were going to do. Things happened that we didn't anticipate, that we had not seen other people go through, and it became some of the hardest things we had ever done. But also, being in China is where my daughter's from, with my entire family, and having a baby handed to you.
Speaker 2:I mean it is just there's so much wrapped up there with the gospel about the love and adoption, and so it really changed us.
Speaker 1:I imagine Now at the time you were working in kind of the legal sector is that right?
Speaker 2:I heard you say you went to law school.
Speaker 1:So, what was your occupation? What?
Speaker 2:was your skill set.
Speaker 2:Well, when I got out of law school, I started out as a private practice attorney and I was in litigation and hated it and thought, god, I am not happy here. And so I spoke to one of my law professors and she said well, what interests you about law? And I was interested in environmental law, and so I started looking for jobs in that field and we moved from Dallas to Austin then and I worked in that field for many years and then I had the opportunity to be appointed as an administrative law judge for the state of Texas. So I took that at a young age and for the next 20 some odd years 23 years worked as an administrative law judge. And it's interesting how God pieces all this together. I never intended to be a state employee, or a judge or anything like that.
Speaker 2:But God had a plan, because when I was in college I also had worked for the state, and so you'll see this wraps back around when I'm 52 and I can retire from the state because of the work I did in college, buying back that time, and that allowed us to have the time to go serve what we wanted to do.
Speaker 1:That's incredible and you're like, okay, I did not see that coming. We didn't see any of this coming. So you can imagine our surprise when you came to us with this kind of a history. As a small local nonprofit, your resume definitely stood out among the crowd, so to speak. So we're really grateful that you're on the team now.
Speaker 1:Thank you, so to speak so we're really grateful that you're on the team now, but you also have an extraordinary history in some of the, I guess, nonprofit or missions work that you've done. So before we get into that, would you share with our listeners how that transition happened from being a judge into missions?
Speaker 2:It all started in China again with following God's call to adopt and we were looking for some jade crosses for family, and China has lots of jade, and so we were talking to I remember her name, lily, and she asked me why do Americans want crosses? And I said, well, we're Christians. And she said what's a Christian? And I said, well, we follow Jesus. And she said who's Jesus?
Speaker 1:Wow.
Speaker 2:And I remember Abilene, texas Southern Baptist, didn't? I don't know it blew my mind? Yeah, I don't know it blew my mind, yeah. And so I remember walking back out and telling Ann I'm coming back Because people just don't know They've never seen the love of Jesus.
Speaker 1:Wow, your wife probably has these experiences with you where you go. This is what we're doing. It sounds like I'm coming back to China, surprise.
Speaker 2:Yeah, she is very. We're more of a partnership. Yeah, and I'm kind of I don't remember the I Love Lucy show.
Speaker 1:Oh, I definitely watched that with my grandmother. Okay, I'm the crazy Lucy who's always off.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and she's Ethel. Okay, we'll do this, but let's make sure that everything's planned.
Speaker 1:That's good. That's a good team. I love that.
Speaker 2:That's right, and so, with that, I started going back to China with my best friend, who wound up being called to go with me. Wow, I was scared.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:You know, I was going to a communist country, Sure, and we worked for about 10 years there with friends, and some Asian friends who had really started it in China created an underground seminary and so we would take young adult Chinese through a two-year program. We rotated in and out seminary professors from the States and we would go in and we would teach them all about the Bible and things like that, and then they in turn, when they graduated, they would go start a church and then we would help them with the funding and things like that.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, it was some amazing times, some amazing people that I met that God brought to me.
Speaker 1:So tell us a little bit about at some point that segued into your work in anti-trafficking.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:At what point did that begin, and how did that even? What was the genesis of that?
Speaker 2:You know, when we were going and working in China a lot like we would take our whole family there for the whole summer to work. I was fortunate in being able to do that. We thought we'll come back to china when I can retire and we'll have an income so that we can you know, pay for our way.
Speaker 2:But that didn't work out because it was interesting. When we were in china, we were saying it's a good thing that God has called us right now because China is so open and it was opening more and more because you never know how long that door is going to be open. Well, it started closing and, you know, China really shut down from Westerners and any type of Christians, and so we were unable to go there. But we still felt like we wanted and we were called to go to Asia, and so we found another Asian country that we went to, and that was also crazy. My best friend said I think that this might be the country. And like four days later I got on a plane, went to that country, country. And like four days later, I got on a plane, went to that country, touched down and by that evening I called Ann and said this is it?
Speaker 2:You know, it just thinks you could just tell this was where we're supposed to be, and so she went back with me to make sure this was it?
Speaker 1:I'm sure she did.
Speaker 2:And then we made our plans for me to retire and then for us to move as a family. Wow made our plans for me to retire and then for us to move as a family and then to work in this country. My oldest daughter you know who at the time was had graduated from college was the one who introduced us to anti-human trafficking work.
Speaker 1:Oh, interesting.
Speaker 2:She was very you know this younger generation very strong about justice issues and, you know, being authentic and things like that, and so she had brought that to our attention. I had also been an adjunct professor at the University of Texas Law School, so I went over there thinking I would help educate, because education is certainly the key to a lot of opportunities.
Speaker 2:And so I went there and there was a Christian man that I met that we together started a university and then, as that was, it got tangled up in politics and as that was coming to an end, the anti-human trafficking came back.
Speaker 1:Okay, so it kind of came up on your radar.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:And then how did you transition to knowing that that was kind of the call the mission field?
Speaker 2:full time.
Speaker 1:How did that look?
Speaker 2:It was several months of trying to make sure that we had it right, and my wife was already working with a group of Christian NGOs to help children in and around the city we were in, and so an acquaintance came to me and he said that we're trying to start this NGO and what we're going to do is we're going to go rescue children who have been trafficked, and as I learned more and more about it, my heart just broke for them.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And definitely this is where we should go.
Speaker 1:So now you guys started a safe home specifically working with minors who had been rescued and doing that rehabilitation process. Can you talk to us a little bit about the challenges?
Speaker 2:maybe that process Sure Well it's interesting because we first started I was training attorneys on how to prosecute under anti-trafficking laws and then a friend of mine who was a former police officer had trained up some investigators.
Speaker 2:They were undercover investigators and they would go into the places and act like they were going to try and buy you know, traffic girls for sex, and so that was what was first created and it was successful. Yeah, and after our first raid, we got together with the anti-human trafficking police and we would go in and raid this place with them. We had, I think it was six girls, probably ages 12 to 15. And we took them to a local care home for children and within five days they were all out. So their traffickers had come back and said I'm her brother and they'd let them just go and so um, we realized, then stop yeah we've got to have a home.
Speaker 2:There's no play there's. You know this is defeating what, and and that was very hard because the government said no more um children's homes.
Speaker 1:Wow.
Speaker 2:And so it took a lot of God giving us opportunities and meeting with people until we found, actually, a guy who Ann was working with in that NGO community and they had a license for a child home that they were not using.
Speaker 1:No, yeah, wow so you know, we just married the two.
Speaker 2:Thank you, you know, kind of dropped in our laps and it took some time. Then we had to do the fundraising several hundred thousand dollars, and but within probably nine months the home was opened.
Speaker 1:Wow, that's incredible. So let me just I want to pause here, because the people listening to this, a lot of our listeners, have done this work. You know, they're in the field, have gone through a similar process, maybe even in the States, but I think one thing is key to take away is that you guys came up against many multiple obstacles, but definitely one where you go. Okay, our model was, this part was successful, but as we go down the pipeline the continuum of care, if you will now we have like this huge gap and we're losing people, and so that's like a key takeaway. I see that here in the States, I see that all across the anti-trafficking you don't know what, you don't know right.
Speaker 1:Exactly Until you start doing the work and then you go oh, wait a minute, yeah. But the amazing story from I mean your experience is God had the solution.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:He already had it in play. You know, you just had to say that, okay, we're going to take the first. Yes, we're going to take our first step and say yes to the Lord, exactly, and say yes to the. Lord, sort of blindly.
Speaker 2:But he knows the path. I would tell anybody that's going to do something like this expect a lot of learning. Yeah, that's true, and just take it not as a defeat. Yeah, I mean it is a setback, but you've learned something. Take that and go forward. Because then, miraculously, god also introduced us to a psychologist from the US who had worked in a safe home for minors who were victims of trafficking in a nearby country, who came in and he became the lead for this and really took over the safe home.
Speaker 1:That's incredible. Lead for this and really took over the safe home. That's incredible. And now you guys? I think what's so amazing too is that y'all raised up the people there to lead it to take over, so you were no longer needed. In that sense, you didn't have to be so hands-on, which allowed that transition back into the United States, which allowed that transition back into the United States.
Speaker 2:I think, almost when you go abroad, your goal should be, absent extraordinary circumstances, to train up the locals because they can do everything much better than we can. They just need to do the learning and understanding, and so we worked with Christian brothers and sisters in a country where Christianity is under persecution.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:It's very difficult, it's incredible. And a lot of the Christians aren't educated, but they're on fire and they want to learn, and so I can tell you today that both of those the NGO with investigators and attorneys, and the aftercare home are doing much better now that we've left Wow. And that the locals have taken it over.
Speaker 1:That's an amazing story. It's amazing, yeah, what a success story. I mean you guys had so much work to do that you had to come in train law enforcement, train the justice system. I mean that's a lot.
Speaker 2:But you don't know, it going in, thank goodness.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you're like, okay, we can do this.
Speaker 2:We didn't know that If someone had told me you're going to need to start an aftercare, I've been-.
Speaker 1:Yeah, oh, wait a minute. No, no, hang on. There's no way we can do it after your home, hang on.
Speaker 2:I know nothing about that Right?
Speaker 1:There's no way.
Speaker 2:But it happens step by step and you just keep walking.
Speaker 1:Mm-hmm.
Speaker 2:And then all of a sudden-.
Speaker 1:That's awesome.
Speaker 2:God's done his. Thing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, what a legacy.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:Now, one of the challenges too I think maybe seen or unseen was whenever you guys transitioned back to the United States. There's always a there's a term for it, but it's like admissions when you come back kind of that culture shock Right right. Do you mind sharing with us a?
Speaker 2:little bit about how that happened with you guys, I'll go ahead and tell you that when I was there, it was tough times was there. It was tough times for me personally. I went through a very tough time. I'd heard about the caregivers being impacted by trauma, vicarious trauma, and that really hit me, and probably four years. We were there for six years, four years in.
Speaker 2:You know, having a five-year-old on the streets come up to you and ask if he can do sexual favors for money is devastating yeah and seeing what I saw with the girls um gang rapes and the horrible things that were happening to children, I was wrecked and I had to go into counseling and actually when I first met you, you knew that I told you, I guess, and I remember you telling me and I don't remember exactly what you said, but it basically was lose the fear, and I've hung on to that. It's been very helpful because that's where I was. I had, even through counseling, I still was. I don't know why I'm fearful, but overcoming that and claiming what I needed to claim the victory helped me. But I'm sorry that wasn't your question.
Speaker 1:No, you're fine. I think I remember saying not being afraid to, I guess, make the step that the Lord is calling you to, because what you're talking about, the vicarious trauma, the secondary trauma, is all very real.
Speaker 2:And we don't want to minimize that for anybody or say, just pray it away, cause that you know that's not like yeah.
Speaker 1:But if the Lord is calling you into a position knowing that he'll supply, you know what you need as well. So there's kind of that tension and that balance I can't imagine. Yeah, because here in the States, whenever we deal with minor sex trafficking, it's usually it's like behind closed door, not that it's any less pernicious but it's not out on the street corner, you don't see it.
Speaker 2:We don't have it nearly as much as in some of the Asian countries.
Speaker 1:Definitely.
Speaker 2:But my mindset was I was afraid I couldn't function. Yeah, it wasn't pray it away or anything like that it was just that I needed to step forward in confidence that the counseling and everything I had gone through, I had recovered and I was ready to move forward Because you had done a lot of work with your counselor for a while as well. Yeah, I came back for a visit. This was our fourth going into our fifth year there and I remember talking with my physician, he said you've either got to come back or you've got to get into counseling.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and so I got into counseling and they told me you know you, you don't need to go out anymore, yeah, and see the things you need to um, take a step back right, take a step back, and that was good, because I needed to turn it over anyway, yeah, that's, that's healthy. I mean, I feel like there's only a certain amount that the human spirit can kind of endure Right right. And even as somebody who's maybe at one degree removed from the trauma, it didn't happen to you, but you are hearing about it, you're watching it Right. Those are very disruptive. It's probably not even an adequate word. And you have the images in your mind.
Speaker 2:Exactly yeah.
Speaker 1:So if we don't as caregivers, if we don't adequately care for ourselves in the midst of that, we can do more harm to us, to our families.
Speaker 2:You never think it'll happen to you. Of course it wasn't going to happen to me.
Speaker 1:Right yeah.
Speaker 2:But I think a lot of it is my strength, is my ability to love, love, love people and to really care about them. I think that also became a weakness.
Speaker 1:I probably have like a high empathy.
Speaker 2:Very high empathy. I probably have like a high empathy, very high empathy, and so then when you can't cut that off when you're trying to do work, that is really tough you can get drawn in and you can get to where I was. Thank goodness if you just counseling and coming to an understanding. We were all trauma informed so we knew about it and I could. An understanding we were all trauma-informed so we knew about it and I could understand it but I didn't prevent myself from getting hit by it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean, how can you? Yeah, exactly, how can you? Right, and this is a sidebar, but I just think of the Lord, even Jesus, when he was walking in the earth, even now, when he sits in the heavens and he intercedes for us, he doesn't remove himself.
Speaker 2:Right, he sees the pain Right.
Speaker 1:He not only sees it, he says he's right there with us in the midst of it, exactly, and so I think it can be a very godly thing to be in the midst of the place of pain with people, right.
Speaker 2:And then I needed a time, a season of rest, and so I've had that, and now I'm ready to go fight again.
Speaker 1:And I'm so glad you're on our team now.
Speaker 2:Me too.
Speaker 1:Now there must have been kind of some surprising things. If we shift from Asia to the States, specifically Houston, where you're at now, what are some of the differences that you see, and was there anything maybe that surprised you?
Speaker 2:Right, right, it's so interesting. How did this surprise me and hit me so much in Houston? Because re-entry was much harder for me than going to Asia. Wow, re-entry in American culture is very different.
Speaker 1:Sure.
Speaker 2:Thank goodness for a lot of things and we have some things that you know are not so good. But I guess you know, after coming to Houston for a few months I told Anne I'm surprised we ever went to Asia. There's so much work to do here. Wow, I had no idea the extent of illicit sex all over the city. I mean, when I learned that there was ways that people could find out where to go get a list of sex and you pay a fee and you get this list, I just I don't know, I never thought that happened here, and so, as I've learned more and more, it's been shocking to me.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:The extent of it. It's been shocking to me, yeah, the extent of it, and I don't know why. Why is it so hard to get the word out? I haven't worked in Houston for very long.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And I'm trying to understand why can we not raise up the people to fight back to this, and we need to find a way to do that the people to fight back to this, and we need to find a way to do that.
Speaker 1:Mm-hmm, I remember when we were coming against this robotic kind of AI brothel that was trying to be established and how riled up people got rightfully so.
Speaker 1:It was horrific. Thankfully it did not end up coming into our city, but I remember even government officials but I remember even government officials, the public so riled up, I mean we got such an outrage and I remember somebody speaking at the council and was like yeah, but you allow this to humans. You're not allowing this. You're outraged and you're doing all these things to do this for robots Wow, but you're not doing this for the humans that are right next door, literally a block away, and that really stuck with me.
Speaker 2:That's good.
Speaker 1:Isn't that? It's like something where we have become so. I don't know if it's like complicit or it's like oh, this is just how our city is, maybe we're in our own world.
Speaker 2:I mean, I was like that for sure and still am to a great degree. Maybe we just can't handle so much of it.
Speaker 2:I don't know yeah you know, when I I realize now that there are Asian women who are brought to Houston, told we've got great jobs for you, yeah, and they get here. They don't speak English, yeah, and then they're taken and yeah, and then they're taken and into sex trafficking. How do they get out? Who do they talk to? Yeah, exactly, I don't see anybody. But they're trafficker. Right, I mean, that tears me up. Yeah, and I want to go find them and rescue them.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:You know and hopefully you know you're doing that and hopefully I can be a part of that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I think the anti-trafficking movement as a whole. We're seeing at least what I've watched over the last decade is similar to your journey overseas is that we've run a few steps forward and we make some progress, and then we go oh, there's another gap. How do we fill this gap?
Speaker 2:The learning.
Speaker 1:Yeah, who's going to be raised up to fill this gap? Now we have another gap. Who's going to? Yeah, who's going to be raised up to fill this gap? Now we have another gap, right? So, and really the this movement as a whole is only gosh, 10 or 15 years old, really at this level that we're seeing.
Speaker 2:That's something that I learned, yeah, so to okay.
Speaker 1:Okay, we're pretty new, or pretty young, nevertheless. So young, um, nevertheless. So it does seem like, although there's some similarities between you know what we're seeing in houston, what you're seeing in asia?
Speaker 2:there are definitely differences as well, definitely differences we don't see as many.
Speaker 1:Not that we don't see as many minors, we just don't see them out in the open right, like you guys did.
Speaker 2:Which is you. One of the things that is common is a lot of and I'll talk about women or girls, because that's what I've worked with but whether you're in the US or in Asia, things happen to them at a very young age.
Speaker 2:Oftentimes their parents, their mother and dad, were drug addicts. They were trafficked by their parents for money. Poverty is a common I mean there's a lot of commonalities but then there are some differences, in that here we're more sophisticated with investigations and being able to find children and minors, but the children minors who were trafficked at a very young age that are now 20, were not so successful.
Speaker 1:Were not.
Speaker 2:And this is all they've known for the last eight, 10 years. So we've got to figure that out as a society.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I would say that this common misconception that people who are in prostitution are willing, and so you see women, children who have grown up. Okay, now I'm 17. I'm 16. And somebody has more empathy or compassion or chutzpah to come and do the rescues, do the investigations, but then once they hit 18, 17, 18, it goes, oh, now they're an adult, they want to be there, right, and it's like I'm the, it's the same person, it's the same experience, yeah, so they, they have not had a choice. No.
Speaker 2:You're, you stay in that Right. You know, for good or for bad. A lot of people are born into wealth and you have opportunities, and if you're born into a family of trauma and drugs and poverty, it's hard to kick that.
Speaker 1:It's hard to let that go kick.
Speaker 2:that's all they know when you start in that way when you're 10, 12, sometimes six. Yeah they haven't had any choices. They don't have the choice when they're 20,. Oh, I'm going to step out of this.
Speaker 2:And all of a sudden, that's all they know they think of. If I don't do this, I can't survive. And their traffickers are so manipulative that the mental gains and getting what I learned here was the number one way now that traffickers use to keep women in sex traffic situations is through drugs. So they encourage them to get drugged up and start putting drugs into their bloodstreams more and more. So then if the drugs are removed, if they won't perform.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:And they're just trapped yeah, absolutely, and that's the reason I love Eliza Rison's group that is working with drug rehabilitations and things like that. Maybe that's not the correct word.
Speaker 1:We call it recovery, but I mean, that's exactly what it is.
Speaker 2:So successful, amazing work.
Speaker 1:Now, as we kind of come to a close, is there anything? We've talked about a lot about the problem. Is there anything, any story that stands out to you, maybe on the other side, where you've seen really the rehabilitation process take root, to be successful, if you will, and somebody come out of that? Because although it's so difficult, we do see those. I hate to say success stories, but that's the only thing that's coming to my mind right now.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, I hadn't thought of this, it just popped in my mind. I'll talk about Asian country and then I'll talk about here. But the Asian country, you know, I came to see our work there as teaching people how to love.
Speaker 1:That's so good To love, like Jesus. How do you teach someone?
Speaker 2:to love a child instead of to take advantage and abuse them. And now we see, not just from our work but through Jesus' work, there's 31 girls in the home. We need a second home.
Speaker 1:Wow.
Speaker 2:And they're being loved on every day and they're learning and they're breaking that cycle.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And so I see the churches loving and that's a victory. I mean just the spreading of love into countries where people don't know how to love anyone other than your I say other than your family, and sometimes the way you love your family is not what we would think is love. Yeah, and then here yesterday, I've been not surprised, I've been encouraged by former residents who just walk in and say hey, family. You're like well, yeah, eight years ago.
Speaker 2:And you see them repeatedly and there's hugs and you really are their long-term family Because you love. You never give up on them right, never, never, never give up. And so yesterday we had one woman came in and I had met her before and so I knew her story, where she had been when she was a child and her mom was addicted and had wound up going to jail and had used her for sex trafficking and she had again been introduced into that. There's no choices for her.
Speaker 2:When she became 18, there's no choices. That's all she's known her whole life and so she came here to. Elijah Rising. I think did she have four kids. Then, you know, she came here to Elijah Rising. I think did she have four kids then.
Speaker 1:Do you know what I'm talking about? Yeah, okay.
Speaker 2:I think she had four kids then, and you know, it's just amazing how that love can reach people.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And that you can. It's risky for a lot of these women to leave their trafficker it is. Yeah, they're fearful. They have to trust us and we have to get them out and we have to get them safe. Yeah and um, she went through the program. Um, she also was through a vocational training program here and she brought something back. She's working in that area now, I think on her own and doing great, so she's got a good job. She's been in a transitional home for many years and she came in and she goes family. I'm gonna buy a house oh, that's incredible, unbelievable.
Speaker 1:It's unbelievable, it really is, and it's years. I think what is so poignant, or it stands out, is like she went through the program for probably a year and a half. She has been in transitional care for probably two, maybe three years, which is like living independently, paying rent, but still with some recovery, and she had her children then too right, yes, because she had lost her children when she came here and then through.
Speaker 2:Yeah, amazing work, yes, and now she has grandchildren and she's supporting.
Speaker 1:She's like the matriarch of her family. But it took years. It has taken years for her to get legal remedy or credit restitution or work on all of that, so it's not a quick process.
Speaker 2:It is not a cheap process.
Speaker 1:Not a cheap process. That's such a good point.
Speaker 2:But Christians are wealthy in America. Okay, let me get on my development. If you don't know, tom, it takes a lot of money to help these children who become adults and to give them a chance just an opportunity that we take for granted, absolutely, and so I'm excited about getting out there and letting people know. It takes a lot of money and we need more beds and there's a lot of work to do.
Speaker 1:There's a lot of work still to be done.
Speaker 2:Yes, there are, but did she always smile like?
Speaker 1:she smiles now.
Speaker 2:I mean every time I see one of the former residents walk in, even when they're here out of a very difficult situation and they need advice. There's a lot of joy.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's so good. Thank goodness, god sends them back to bring the joy, because the battles that we're in otherwise can overwhelm you. Yeah, absolutely. There's so much more I'm sure we could cover and I hope that you'll come back on the podcast at some point in the future, but I've loved having you, tom. We're so glad you're on the team obviously Such a great gift to us and I think the Lord is crafting your story and you guys are going to have a legacy.
Speaker 1:Yes, a legacy of justice, of caring for the poor, and we were talking about this morning in prayer and it was like if you give a cup of cold water to one of these you know, it's like you're doing it to jesus and so I am, I feel privileged to work alongside of you and call you my, my colleague thank you so much, and I I honestly believe that elijah rising has been a major part of my healing and so I thank you for that.
Speaker 1:It's been You're welcome. Praise God. Where I'm ready to go, let's go do it again, god, let's do it again. Well, tom, thank you, and if you have not liked or subscribed, please do so. Please share this content with your friends, with your family, and we'll see you next time on the Elijah Rising podcast.