Porn Convention Update

This weekend, the Treasures team partnered with Craig Gross and XXX Church at the LA Erotica Convention. If you missed out on our instant updates, make sure to follow me on Twitter @youareatreasure

In addition to giving Treasures gift bags to the girls, in all, we gave out over 4,000 “Jesus loves porn star” bibles to convention attendees and men and women in the industry. And as Craig noted throughout the weekend, God’s word will not return void. We are praying that people would be inspired to read the bibles they received and that God’s love and truth would penetrate their hearts!

We saw firsthand, how moving and powerful God’s word truly is. A Treasures volunteer witnessed a special moment when a grown man sitting on a staircase, cradled the bible (which he kept referring to as “this book”) in his hands with tears in his eyes. He was reading God’s word in the middle of a porn convention, perhaps for the first time, and he was visibly moved.

“Jesus is here? At a porn convention…” one girl asked after telling me how horrible the “preachers” standing outside with picket signs had made her feel. Knowing Immanuel, God who is with us, I confidently said, “Yes. He is here, at a porn convention. He is with us.” I could see in this woman’s eyes that this was an entirely new concept to her and the idea that God would meet her there in such a place, seemed to disarm her. Isn’t’ that our God though? Meeting us where we are at, in the middle of our circumstances, and loving us right there, as is. It is this sort of love and goodness that leads to transformation and healing.

Still, there were so many people at the convention who have experienced the opposite of that kind of love. From an ex-reverend who professed to being almost atheist, to a ex-seminary student, to a husband and wife that had been kicked out of their church, to the daughters of pastors, to a woman who had been raped by a pastor and a man who had been raped by a priest. We saw people with real hurts and heartbreak so deep that it has caused them to run from the Only One who can heal that sort of pain. I wonder about the depth and severity of the wounds in their hearts and all I can do is pray. The common thread among all of these people is that they have been hurt, not by God, but by His people.

And, as a friend of Treasures recently posted on my Facebook page, “if I call myself a Christ-follower and treat others like garbage, it is completely reasonable for others to question the positive value of following Jesus because I am telling them by my life that Jesus is unloving, unkind, uncaring, etc. God uses people as an avenue for Him to come to us. I would suggest that God uses people as His most common method of getting in touch with us (with the Holy Spirit being intimately involved in that process).”

I love that idea that WE ARE AVENUES. By our actions and the way we love people, we can either lead people closer to the heart of God, or farther from Him. May we each honestly and carefully examine our own actions and determine where we want our avenues-our lives- to lead people.

Love, Harmony
www.iamatreasure.com