Ministry Spotlight: ChangePoint Alaska
When caring people are willing to enter unselfishly into dark, ugly situations to help those who cannot help themselves, lives are changed, horrible circumstances are reversed, and “impossible” situations are transformed. The members of ChangePoint Alaska and the surrounding community witness these types of life changing turnarounds on a regular basis.
ChangePoint Alaska describes themselves as a community of people on a vital mission to bring life in Christ to every Alaskan and the world beyond. They believe that God’s heart for the world is to restore it. They seek to demonstrate this heart by actively fighting back against evil and injustice, and showing God’s love to hurting and broken people. Toward this end, ChangePoint has formed or been active in numerous local, statewide and global outreach initiatives. Some of their local efforts serve the needs of the hungry and homeless, prisoners, those caught in cycles of addiction, women suffering crisis pregnancies, children aging out of foster care, and many others. You can see ChangePoint’s various outreach initiatives here: https://changepointalaska.com/missions/.
Having served ChangePoint for 12 years, Enable has had the privilege of witnessing how these many initiatives have resulted in remarkable life change. One of these outreach initiatives that has produced dramatic life change is Love Alaska and its Priceless program. Love Alaska is a ministry that “exists to mobilize people into the most painful, dark, and hurting areas of society. The world marginalizes people in messy situations, but Love Alaska runs to people in messy situations because people matter.”
In 2012 a women’s group from ChangePoint was looking for a way to give back to women in Alaska. It was becoming clear to them that sex trafficking was not just a third-world problem, but that it was thriving in the shadows of their home state. A ChangePoint staff member, Gwen Adams, served on the governor’s task force for the Crimes of Human Trafficking and Sexual Slavery. Her time on this task force was eye-opening and made her realize the extent of the problem. Sex trafficking is one of the fastest-growing, most lucrative crimes in Alaska.
The women of ChangePoint decided to intentionally engage in this issue, and Priceless – an initiative of Love Alaska – was born. Priceless is on a mission to “redefine worth” for the women and children caught in Alaska’s rampant sex trafficking trap. The ministry operates on a (mostly) referral basis, and focuses on creating relationships with victims to help them see all of their options clearly to create a path out of their situation. Priceless walks alongside these women with the use of mentorship teams. The program also provides important services including emergency and long-term housing, counseling, medical and legal services, job training, education completion, relocation services, mobile food pantry connections, and many more. Since Priceless began its direct client work, law authorities and other Priceless survivors have referred over 150 survivors to the program. The combination of meeting the voids of true unconditional relationship and physical needs has allowed so many women to find freedom! You can read some of the stories of women whose lives have been changed by the work of Love Alaska and Priceless here: https://www.pricelessalaska.org/stories/.
ChangePoint and Love Alaska are precisely the kinds of organizations that Enable exists to serve. In serving them, we can play a small part in seeing peoples’ lives changed. Enable was able to tangibly help Love Alaska by reimaging some retired laptop computers, locking them down and protecting them from malware. These donated laptops are now used to search the “dark web” for girls trapped in sex trafficking rings and then reach out to the girls to help them get out of slavery. Just days after we provided these laptops to Love Alaska, Adam Legg, executive director of the program, informed us that they were able to use the laptops to find and rescue one of their clients. The availability of a system that they could use in this capacity was literally lifesaving.
We have witnessed firsthand that when caring people from many of the churches that we serve are willing to run into messy situations to help those who cannot help themselves, lives are changed. The type of results that Changepoint and Love Alaska are witnessing regularly is why we do what we do at Enable. It is a privilege and a thrill to be able to use technology skills to enable ministry and to help churches and ministries reach people with lifesaving help and support.