It’s called Project Suma but to me it will always be “Casa Esperanza” (House of Hope) because that’s what I saw and felt from the moment I walked in until the moment I left: that not everything is lost. That in the midst of this broken world and a lost generation there are still people who hear the voice of God, align themselves with His will and calling and courageously respond to the challenge of establishing the Kingdom.

Casa Esperanza is that and more. It is a refuge for women who never felt safe or protected and who therefore gave in to whatever was offered to them in order to survive. It is a space of practical knowledge where they acquire skills, competencies and abilities that allow them to aspire to a future and to a dignified life. It is a temple where they are taught to know the love of Jesus Christ in the everyday; where, by feeling loved unconditionally, they learn about true love: the kind that doesn’t charge or demand, the kind that frees and forgives, the kind that restores.

In my years of knowing Jesus—which are not few—I’ve had the chance to serve in all kinds of circumstances and settings. I’ve seen death, sickness, hunger and poverty up close. I’ve met people imprisoned both physically and spiritually. I’ve ministered in loss and defeat. I’ve consoled the abandoned and shared encouragement with the rejected. But what I had never seen so closely is the ground into which my friends at Project Suma step with the skill of a specialist who needs to be part ninja and part SWAT. It’s that combination of stealth and surgical precision. They rescue people, protect people, plant seeds. They set off bombs. Coordinated operations, intentionality at its peak.

The women they rescue, because of what they’ve lived through, are distrustful and wary. Some have children which makes it even harder to believe that their lives matter to someone. It’s difficult for them to accept that a place of peace and restoration exists for them. After so much abuse how could they believe that someone offers help without expecting anything in return?

But that’s just how Jesus is. And how beautiful that those who walk with Him are the same. That’s how the people of Casa Esperanza are: people willing to open their arms, to hold, to heal wounds. All of them are highly skilled professionals who put their talents, their experience and their time at the service of a noble cause. There is nothing wrong with a secular job but how special is a job that restores dignity to others and at the same time fulfills God’s purpose in the life of the one carrying it out!

In the midst of strategic planning and devotionals a focused team of specialists carries out a task that seems larger than their strength or potential and yet they face it every day, certain that they are making an eternal impact in the world—and without a doubt in the spiritual realm.

That is the essence of rescue: to have a plan, define a course of action, gather forces, choose the souls and enter enemy territory to save even the last survivor. Some missions are completed in a day and others will take a lifetime. The important thing is not the duration of the rescue but the satisfaction of knowing that a difference was made. Our calling is great, our mission clear, our God powerful and our weapons the best: to tear down and to build up, to plant and to reap, to make the light shine in the midst of all darkness. We trust that the darker the outlook the more powerful the light of Christ will be in that place.

I couldn’t help but think for weeks about the rescued women I met at Project Suma. Their faces lingered in my memory. Their stories, their smiles. They had regained hope. Can you ask for anything more? Those who work daily in this tremendous task should go to bed satisfied at the end of each day. After all (hopefully someone reminds them) their names are being written in chapter 29 of the Acts of the Apostles and that is not something that can be said of just anyone.

- Carlos Alberto Paz, Pastor and friend of Project Suma.