Be the Change: Your Guide to Freeing Slaves and Changing the World

By Zach Hunter

Most people think the average teenager isn’t capable of much beyond hanging with their friends and wasting time. But Zach Hunter isn’t your average teenager. And he’s hoping to show you that you’re not either. Zach has been trying to end slavery around the globe. Most people (maybe even you) think that slavery has been over for a long time. But sadly, there are more people bound in slavery now than at any of the times we read about in our history books. Now Zach is working to end slavery and free the men, women, and children who are being held against their will. He’s even found some friends in the fight, including Jon Foreman of Switchfoot and Leeland Mooring of Leeland. Just look around the world and on the news and you’ll find that there are plenty of things wrong with our planet—homelessness, hunger, global warming, AIDS…the list goes on and on. And we usually look at these problems and decide they’re too big for us to do anything about. But Zach is proving that one person can make a difference. And in his book, he’ll reveal the elements needed to make amazing changes in your world. In the end, he hopes you’ll find the thing you’re passionate about—and start making changes!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Zondervan
• Release date: Aug 1, 2009
• ISBN: 9780310569138

Zach Hunter

Zach Hunter is a teenage abolitionist and activist, spending much of his time working to end modern-day slavery around the world and fighting other problems in the world today. When he was twelve, he started a campaign called Loose Change to Loosen Chains, helping to raise awareness and money to free people from slavery. The author of Be the Change, Zach speaks to hundreds of thousands of people each year, inspiring them to find their passion and make a change in the world.

Book preview

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Special Thanks

There are lots of people I want to thank for supporting me and believing God can use a kid to change the world. The people listed below are some of my favorite people in the world—and their encouragement has, in many ways, made it possible for me to write this book:

My parents, my little brother, Nate (another abolitionist), Steve Carter for allowing me to share my story, the Element gang, Uncle Ted Johnson, Ted Haddock, all the youth pastors I’ve ever had, each of whom has invested in my life (Nick Silvestro, Mike Rogalski, Kenny Schmitt), Christian David Turner, Jennifer Nix, Malcolm DuPlessis, Leeland, Jack and Shelly Mooring, Jeremiah Wood, Mike Smith, Jake Holtz, Darryl LeCompte, Brenton Brown, Brooke Fraser, my friends at CFS and PCA, Peter Furler, Troy and Sara Groves, Dan Haseltine and Charlie Lowell, Joel Houston and Hillsong United, Ty Anderson, Charlie Peacock, Jon Foreman, Roger Owens, Micheal Flaherty, Debbie Kovacs, Jennifer Lee, Clayton Ferguson, Erik Lokkesmoe and the whole Walden Media Experience and Walden Media staff, Sean Chapman, Justin McRoberts, Matt Maher, Bob Kilpatrick, April Hefner, Given Kachepa, David Ngure, The Livingstone Collective, The Worship Together team, and Joseph Rojas.

I’m grateful to Ben Eisner, David Bean, Rich Mikan for saying yes to helping out a kid like me, the Parva, Broas, Rehfeld, Howell, and Robinson families who have my back in prayer, and Jamie Hinojosa for being a champion of this book.

Thanks to Jay Howver and the rest of the team at Youth Specialties and Zondervan, and to Doug Davidson for putting polish on my rough work. I also want to thank the leadership at Creation West, Spirit West Coast, Lifest, AtlantaFest, SoulFest, and Power of One for giving me opportunities to talk to my generation about God’s heart for the oppressed. Thanks also to all of you whom I’ve met at festivals, speaking engagements, and on MySpace—you continue to encourage me as you lend your own voices to help bring freedom to victims of slavery.

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INVERT

Be the Change: Your Guide to Freeing Slaves and Changing the World

Copyright © 2007 by Zach Hunter

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of Zondervan.

ePub Edition January 2009 ISBN: 978-0-310-56913-8

Youth Specialties products, 300 South Pierce Street, El Cajon, CA 92020 are published by Zondervan, 5300 Patterson Avenue Southeast, Grand Rapids, MI 49530.

ISBN-13: 978-0-310-27756-9

Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible: NewInternational Version®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or any other—(except for brief quotations in printed reviews) without the prior permission of the publisher.

Web site addresses listed in this book were current at the time of publication. Please contact Youth Specialties via e-mail ([e-mail]) to report URLs that are no longer operational and replacement URLs if available.

Creative Team: Doug Davidson, Rich Cairnes, Heather Haggerty, and David Conn

Cover Design: Burnkit

Cover Photography: The Visual Reserve

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

TITLE PAGE

COPYRIGHT PAGE

FOREWORD BY JON FOREMAN

INSPIRATION (AN INTRODUCTION)

INFLUENCE

COMMUNITY

COURAGE

LEADERSHIP

COMPASSION

ENDURANCE

SACRIFICE

OVERCOMING

STANDING FIRM

PASSION

ABOUT LOOSE CHANGE TO LOOSEN CHAINS

ABOUT THE AMAZING CHANGE

ABOUT THE PUBLISHER

SHARE YOUR THOUGHTS

FOREWORD

A Letter from Jon Foreman

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INSPIRATION

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DREAMING BIG

If you’re like me, you want your life to count for something. When little boys and girls are asked, What do you want to be when you grow up? no one says a loser. When kids are asked what they want to do with their lives, they never say, I hope I’ll live a few years and no one remembers me. Most kids dream of being superheroes, fighting villains, winning battles.

Well, I still have those big dreams. And I believe God likes it when his kids dream big. I just turned 15 years old, and I’m a modern-day abolitionist. Some of you might be hearing that word for the first time and going, What in the world is an abolitionist? An abolitionist is someone who’s committed to ending slavery. Three years ago I started a campaign called Loose Change to Loosen Chains to motivate students to get involved in freeing slaves.

Maybe you think slavery was eliminated a long time ago. That’s what a lot of people think. Unfortunately, it’s not true. That’s right, slavery still goes on today.

I first heard about the plight of modern-day slaves about three years ago. I had been studying the history of slavery in the United States and learned about Harriet Tub-man, a former slave who went on to help free many other slaves. I remember telling my mom, Man, if I had lived back then, I would have fought for equality, and against slavery. But then my mom told me slavery was still going on throughout the world in many ways, shapes, and forms. My mom was working for an organization that frees modern-day slaves around the world, and she was learning about many forms of slavery for the first time. I, too, realized slavery is not just some outdated thing you read about in your history books. When I found out slavery still occurs today, I was shocked. And I knew I had to do something about it.

Modern slavery takes many ugly forms. It can be anything from whole families getting into medical debt and having to work in a brickyard till they die; to little girls working in brothels; to kids being forced to roll cigarettes all day long. In fact, there are actually more slaves in the world todaythan there were during the entire transatlantic slave trade!

You may be wondering how people become slaves. Many think it all starts with a dramatic kidnapping, but that is rarely the case. Usually, it has to do with money, or lack of it. Sometimes a family allows a child to go with a trusted family friend who

Reviews for Be the Change

[navets_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

It should be noted that Zach Hunter, the author of “Be The Change” turned 15 just before this book was published. Yes, that’s 15, as in ‘fifteen years old’.Wow.Quick read, great stories of freedom from slavery and a great challenging message from one 15-year-old to a nation FULL of able-bodied, passionate young people who could very well change the world.Zach continuously calls himself an abolitionist - one who desires to abolish modern-day slavery. He is passionate and well-versed in current trends in slavery around the world. He draws from numerous examples of today and hundreds of years ago of regular people making a difference by standing up for what they know to be right.I’m sure that the Church will be hearing more from Zach Hunter in years to come!

[true54blue · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

slavery, social action

[rushans_2 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Zach Hunter is a 16 year old who calls himself a modern-day abolitionist. He launched the Loose Change to Loosen Chains campaign while he was in seventh grade. His goal is to have slavery wiped from the planet in his lifetime. Most of us think that slavery no longer exists, however, we’d be wrong. Modern-day slavery is people working in brick kilns, rice mills, fishing villages, or brothels. It is human beings being traded like chattels. In the book, Hunter helps us understand the reality of modern-day slavery by providing startling statistics, real life stories from former slaves and practical tools to mobilize people into action. Zach Hunter parallels the powerful stories of those who fought for change centuries ago, such as William Wilberforce and Harriet Tubman, with examples of contemporary people fighting for justice, such as Mother Teresa, Bono and Jon Foreman from the music group Switchfoot. He believes that today’s generation can abolish slavery and looks at the elements people need to make amazing changes in the world; elements such as courage, leadership and compassion. This young man, responding to God’s call, is encouraging all of us to ignite our passion and start making changes.