Koy is an orphan from a slum — but don’t count her out yet

On my trip last week to Bangkok, Thailand, I got to meet the newest residents at the Freedom Home there — including a 15-year-old girl I’ll call Koy.

Koy’s mother was a sex worker. Her older sister died of AIDS, and her other sister has HIV. But thanks to generous donors who made it possible for her to live at the Freedom Home, Koy’s future will be different. Hers will be a story of freedom — one with a beautiful, happy ending.

Koy never knew her parents. Her mother died shortly after Koy was born, and her father was one of countless customers paying to abuse women in Thailand’s bars night after night. Most likely, he never even knew Koy’s mother’s name … or that she had a child nine months later.

At the Freedom Home, though, Koy is learning that she has a Heavenly Father who knows everything about her and loves her unconditionally.

It was Koy’s sister who first brought her to the Freedom Home. She’s fought all her life to shield Koy from the dangers of the red-light district and to even keep her from finding out about her mother’s past profession.

Unfortunately, Koy’s sister is losing her battle against HIV. She is extremely sick and weak even with the help of medicine, and she worried she would soon be too ill to work and provide for Koy. Even worse, she worried that when she was gone, her baby sister would be forced into the sex industry like her mother was.

That’s why she brought Koy to the Freedom Home. There, Koy can continue her education and become the teacher she’s always dreamed of becoming.

At the Freedom Home, girls are able to live in a safe, nurturing environment.

“We focus on the girls one by one,” our partner at the Freedom Home said. “We want to have a family and help them understand how to have a family.”

They can work on getting a degree, learning a trade, and preparing to enter the workforce and find good jobs. At a Christmas party last week for girls in the home and others still working in the bars, our partner shared how so many Freedom Home graduates are now thriving — several are working in the travel industry, one has a job at a bank, and one young woman recently received her master’s degree!

Not only do these girls receive an education plus physical and emotional healing, but they also get to hear the Gospel and experience the love of Christ.

But neither Koy nor any of the other girls would able to live at the Freedom Home if there weren’t generous donors supporting them. And today, you can help give another girl that same opportunity.

What a wonderful Christmas gift — to bless one young woman with the possibility to have a life of freedom from the sex industry and freedom in Jesus Christ!

All it takes is $50 to introduce one girl to freedom by providing essentials like a safe place to live, education, medical care, trauma counseling, and more.

Your gift will help a girl escape a life of working in the bars and selling her body night after night. You’ll be showing her that she is worth more than the price men pay to use her and abuse her.

You can make sure that her story, like Koy’s, has a beautiful ending.