Meet Chan and Tin. They worked most of their lives in the rice fields of Thailand. After working all year on the farm, there was barely enough money to feed the family. They struggled year after year in desperate poverty.
One day a recruiter for a company called Global Horizons came to their village promising high paying jobs on farms in America. In one month in America, they could earn what they make in a full year in Thailand. It was the opportunity of a lifetime to change the lives of their children and their whole extended family.
There was just one catch. To enter the program, they had to pay a recruitment fee of almost $15,000. They mortgaged their farms and their houses. They talked their relatives in to mortgaging their farms and homes. Tin’s loans ranged up to 80% annual interest, but Chan’s loans reached 152% annual interest.
When they got to the airport, Global Horizons forced them to sign a host of new documents - including a visa renewal fee of $8,000. When they reached America, the recruiters confiscated their passports “for safekeeping.” This meant that they had no identification and no way to prove that they were in the USA legally.
At first, there was plenty of work and on-time pay. After a few months though, the work began to run out and the pay started coming later and later. Often, they sent 100% of their pay checks back to Thailand so that their families could make the payments on their loans. That meant they often didn’t have enough to eat, so they caught wild animals for food and gathered wild vegetables from forests. They usually lived in overcrowded housing without enough beds for each person. Sometimes the toilet wouldn’t work for weeks at a time. They often lacked kitchens, washing machines, and sufficient heating. To limit their contact with outsiders, their handlers told them that Americans are greatly prejudiced against Asians and that leaving their housing grounds would be very dangerous.
Surely this couldn’t really happen in today’s world, right? They are free people. They could just change companies, right? Wrong. Global Horizons was their legal sponsor and guarantor. If they quit, they would lose their visas and be sent home to Thailand ... and their families would lose everything.
Well, then, they could complain. They could talk get help from the police, right? Oh, you mean, the same police who arrested them as illegal aliens because they didn’t have proper identification? They thought that if they went to the police, then they would be sent home - either by the police or by Global Horizons ... and their families would lose everything.
Well, then, surely, they could at least go on strike and protest for better working conditions, right? Managers continually reminded them that if they complained, they would be sent home to Thailand. Then, they would have no way to repay those huge loans ... and their families would lose everything. The U.S. Justice department decided that Chan and Tin were “victims of human trafficking.” They were officially, legally, modern day slaves ... in the United States of America ... in 2007.
They aren’t the only slaves. The US government estimates that there are somewhere between 4 million and 27 million slaves in the world today - at this moment.
This is a horrific tragedy, and the Church of the Nazarene and many other Christian and secular organizations are actively working to stop human trafficking and to protect those most vulnerable.
However, today I ask you to consider that the problem of modern slavery is far more widespread than we have ever imagined. I think you will begin to understand as we read our Old Testament lesson for today.
