WIN on Another Border

As a young girl, her father gave her strong words of encouragement: “You can do anything you want to if you want to do it bad enough.”

Taking those words to heart, Leanna learned to fly a plane at nine years of age, helped her parents build houses, and became an accomplished horse woman. When she received the call to missions on the Nepali–Indian border—where 80% of the girls suffer some kind of abuse or slavery, 4 in 10 children grow up not knowing how to read or write, and half the population is illiterate—she didn’t hesitate to roll up her sleeves to serve the least of these.

The woman who would one day become the president and founder of We Ignite Nations (WIN), Leanna Cinquanta heard the Lord tell her that “the most Christ-like act a person can do in this life is to give Jesus and a bright future to a child who has no hope.”

We Ignite Nations along with a team of local believers are now giving that bright future to many children. For one, WIN has been fighting child trafficking along the northern border of India, where an estimated 25,000 girls are trafficked from Nepal to India annually.

In impoverished villages, poor and illiterate parents can fall prey to traffickers, believing these predators are actually offering their child an opportunity through the promise of a good education, employment, or the offer to find a boy for their daughter to marry at a low dowry price. And tragically, there are some parents who knowingly sell their daughters into prostitution to get out of debt themselves.

Perhaps the most horrific form of selling children comes in the form organ harvesting. A child as young as six can be trafficked, then murdered in order to steal their organs for transplant recipients, who pay for a “donated” organ. It’s hard to believe this heinous crime exists against innocent children.

WIN effectively fights trafficking by training families in remote villages about the dangers of trafficking. Drama teams travel from village to village, bringing an awareness through their stories that helps prevent trafficking, child marriage, and familial abuse. They train an average of 12,000 villagers each month and visit 800 villages a year.

Prevention and Awareness

Their big goal over the next five to ten years is to reduce rural trafficking along this border by 90%. Their presence and connection with partners and social workers in every county and village puts them in a position to succeed with financial support.

A Strategy to WIN

With twenty years of experience working in global missions, WIN has developed a “4-E” approach:

• Ekklesia: Establishing a fellowship of local believers, an ekklesia, helps train and disciple people to walk in Christ’s love.
• Empowerment: By providing wells and micro-businesses, WIN empowers villagers to live productive lives.
• Education: Education for needy young people enables them to break the cycle of poverty and prepare for a promising future.
• Emancipation: WIN seeks to cut the root of human trafficking via rescue (emancipation), awareness, and prevention.

The good news is that 43 girls and boys have been rescued from sex trafficking and organ trafficking in the past four years. Here’s a testimonial about the work WIN is doing:

“In northern India, one of the most hardened, unreached and difficult areas of the world, Leanna is pioneering and leading a work that is transforming a nation. Today, WIN’s vision to end child trafficking and illiteracy among millions of needy children may seem overzealous. I would not have believed it unless I had touched this work personally. But God is doing it! Leanna’s team through WIN is well on their way to seeing this vision become a reality.” —Rev. Gary Wilkerson, World Challenge, Colorado Springs, Colorado

Visit the WIN website.

Prayer

Father, you said “let the little children come unto me.” Thank you for WIN and their bringing the life of your Son Jesus, freedom, and opportunity to these children and their villages. Pour out your provision and strength for the anti-trafficking work they are doing. We pray for the drama teams and the film viewings, that people will apply what they learn and many children will be kept safe from predators as a result. We agree with their goal to reduce rural trafficking by 90% over the next five to ten years. Nothing is impossible with you, Lord!

Decrees

We decree the restoration of the captives, the rebuilding of lives, and fruit abounding from renewed lives. Amos 9:14

We declare your signs, wonders, and miracles over this region of the world, and that these will lead many to call on the name of the Lord. Hebrews 2:4

Assign your angels, Lord, to guard the children and bear them up in their hands so no harm befalls them. Psalm 91:11–12