A one of my conferences this past month, I found myself sitting across from a young girl listening to her story of how she found herself forced by her supposed "boyfriend" to become a stripper and a prostitute. At first, she didn't know her boyfriend was part of a large gang... and once she found out it was too late.

She is afraid to go to the police because she knows they have been infiltrated by the gang. How far up their influence goes she has no idea, but she knows that another girl just like her who was able to get out was eventually was tracked down and killed.

Sitting in front of me, in flesh and blood, talking about being killed.... There's a harsh reality in her eyes, a hard knowing that is almost careless abandon. She doesn't care any more, life or death. She doesn't care. God has to protect her, she says. She finally understands that. Amazingly, she's in the middle of her DTS, trying to figure out how to trust God and put her life back together at the same time.

All I am is an advocate, a story teller, a motivator... but somewhere in the back of my mind I wonder if my proximity to the issue will eventually make me a victim, if I may possibly one day become the person I am trying to save. In the face of her story a hypothetical danger draws uncomfortably closer to my reality. And yet what a selfish thought! I'm worrying about an insubstantial mist while her nightmares daily haunt her very existence.

So I tell myself what I've spent a year telling others. Do not ever proceed with a plan to impact this issue without hearing first from God. Do not let pride or confidence blind you. Do not be impatient or selfish. It is a matter of survival, no longer a nice thought, no longer a game. Take it to God always. It's a matter of life and death.