Originally Published July 13, 2012
Love can be a dangerous thing.
I have a friend who is 24 and single. She loves people and wants to help them. The people she likes helping and loving the most are ones in some of the scariest places of the world. She called a mutual friend the other day while running for her life from rebel soldiers in a war zone in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). She and the people she was with, barely made it out of a village in time.
What in the world was this young 20-something Canadian girl doing there? Loving people. She has helped start schools for children in war zones where there are no schools. She goes to listen to women ravaged by war to offer hugs, friendship and prayers. And she goes to reach out to the rebel soldiers, to tell them they are loved as well. She loves the rebel soldiers who are hurting other people she has come to comfort. How can that be? She is filled with a heavenly, self-sacrificing kind of love, and this love compels her.
She also loves hanging out in brothels. Yes, really. She likes to befriend the ladies whose lives are being sold out from under them. They are her friends. She does all she can to help them escape their trafficked lives. On one of her last visits through Kenya, she negotiated the freedom of a young girl. And on one of her next visits, she bought a house where these young, rescued, former prostitutes can live and be loved. She lives a life of love. She has experienced love and so she gives love. She’s changing a corner of the world.
Sometimes love is dangerous. But love is also always the safest route to take if you want to make a difference. This friend comes back to the U.S. to visit and rest, but she is continually dreaming of her next trip to the “bush,” or about visiting “her girls” in the brothels. She is happy and fulfilled, pursuing love, pursuing a life she calls normal.
To find out more about where this friend of mine is, and what she’s in the middle of, visit her site here. Then pray for peace in the DRC. And then love. Love wherever you are. Love even when it’s dangerous and not deserved. You just might change a corner of the world.