Philip Yancey recounts stories of prostitutes who have been brought into the kingdom of God:

Juanita, for example, was sold into sexual slavery by her own mother at the age of four. While other children went to school, she worked in a brothel, earning for her mother the higher rates paid for young girls. Eventually she had two children of her own, whom her mother took from her. With no education and no other skills, she continued working in the brothel, in the process becoming addicted to alcohol and cocaine.

One day a customer grew enraged when she wouldn't do what he asked, and hit her on the head with a baseball bat. She lay in a hospital bed, desperate. "I got on my knees and pled with God. I wanted somehow to escape prostitution, to become a real mother to my children. And God gave me a vision. He said, 'Look for Rahab Foundation.' I didn't even know the word Rahab." She found the organization's phone number, though, and a few days later Juanita showed up, bruised and bandaged, at Rahab's door.

"I need help," she said, sobbing. "I'm dying. I can't take it anymore." A kindly woman named Mariliana took her in and told her about God's love. "I couldn't believe the hope on Mariliana's face," Juanita recalled. "She smiled and hugged me. She gave me a clean bed, flowers in the room, and a promise that no men would harass me. She taught me how to be a real mother, and now I am studying a trade to live for the glory of God."

Sandra, from Australia, told a story more typical of wealthy countries. "I knew I was beautiful because in school guys always wanted to sleep with me. So why not charge for it? I signed on with a pimp, and for six months it was great. He put me in a nice hotel, and I had more money than I could imagine.

"But then I got addicted to drugs and alcohol. I cannot tell you how unutterably lonely I began to feel. I sat on my bed and watched TV all day until the men came in at night. I had no friends, no family. I lived with a deep sense of shame. For a solid year I never got out of bed, I was so depressed."

Sandra found her way to Linda's House of Hope, a Christian organization run by the former top madam. "I'm still struggling, after six months off the streets. I got addicted to the power and money, as well as the drugs. Yet I know what God wants for me. I need to be healed."