Hello friends and family!
My roommates and I have a group of college or high school students come visit and do mission work for a week or a weekend. A group of students come mostly in the spring and in the summer to do mission work in LA. Just last week, a group of girls came and stayed at the community house. They were from a boarding school in Texas. These girls had been in trouble with law or with their family in the past. Most of the girls I talked to, told me that their mom or dad had no choice but send them to boarding school or to jail. A girl named Dorothy have saw my corlear implants, and sat beside me as I was talking to Paul which he was a director or the boss of these girls. She started to sign language to me, I laughed and said hey, I don't do sign language. I read lips very well and can hear. So we open a conversation over deaf stuff and corlear implant stuff. She have told me that she had a hard time studying foreign languages in school, so she took sign language and love it! She deicided to do volunteer work at deaf school somewhere in Texas and communicate with deaf students. She did that for a year and half. That was the first night they stayed at the community house. So every morning and after work, I see the girls and talked to them. They had worked at homeless shelter folding clothes one day and another day, they served food to homeless on skid row. One of the girls, she want to be a part of the YAV/Doors program like me and my roommates are doing. They asked us questions, why we doing this, why LA, and they think it is so awesome that we are given a opportunity to do this. I answered their questions and heard small part of their life story from the past and how boarding school helping them out and get a 2nd chance at life again. At boarding school, they don't get no internet, if they want to email their family, they have to type their email letters, then give their disc drive to the staff, and the staff will take that disc drive and email the letters to the parents. No phone calls, a few visits, and no communication with their friends from outside. Back to Dorothy, On the last night before she left, She opened up about her past. She had hit her mom and was with the wrong crowd. She didn't wanna be with her parents all the time and get in trouble with the law. When her mom decided to sent her to boarding school, Dorothy hated her. She said after the first week, she missed her mom so badly. She wanted to call her. The staff wouldn't let her. As a few weeks goes by, she regrets what she have done and wished she could be with her family all the time. She finally got to email and call her parents every now and then. She said boarding school have a church and she got involve with it. She felt closer to God and understand that she didn't have to do what she did in the past. It was pointless. There is more to this story than what I am typing. She will graduate in Dec. and want to go to community college close to home for a year and then transfer to a big college to do journalism. She said when she go back home, she knows her friends will be there, but she knows what is right in her heart and family come first. Sadly, I couldn't leave any contact info for her to keep in contact with her. The staff wouldn't allowed it.
The girls and the staff
A few weeks ago, when PATH had a gala event in Beverly Hills, we raised over 280,000 dollars to help the homeless. Gala event was successful. Me and Paul did the photo shoot during the event and I did the slideshow. Here is a video slideshow of the gala event.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JePp6XHQ9rs (Copy and paste it on the browser.)
Last weekend. my roommates and I went to Forest Hills on a retreat with Hollywood Pres. Church. It was amazing meeting people and listened to their stories. The guest pastor Scott Scruggs spoke on trusting God, knowing who hold your future, and God loves you. He provided me notes of the sermons of the 4 sessions he had. The last night, Pastor Scruggs talked about getting rid of your sins. Start a new path. No sins from the past will hold you down. Let it go! God got greater plans for you than you know. So after the sermon, we all got a small wood pad and wrote of our sins on there. After that, we all went to a outdoor theater where there was a fire, and we threw the wood pads into the fire as we sang hymn songs.
I bounded with my roommates closely and God closer. During the day, we did rock climbing, high adventure trail, hiking, and freesbie golf. We listened to my director's wife Darice's testimony. It was uplifting of hearing her story of how she overcome the mountains. As we was coming back home from the mountains, we got a flat tire. We got 4 brand new tires after 3 hours of waiting. Awesome!
My work at Path and community tutoring with the kids is going great! In the previous blog, I talked about the young man who was doing bible study at the community house. Well me and him had wonderful conversation about God and how he works in mysterious ways the other day. At the end of the conversation, we both mention the names of who do you want to pray for. I mentioned of the Chinen miners and he wanted me to pray for his family. The next day, is when the few of miners finally got out of the hole. I am glad they are safe! God is good!
Every Monday, we have a community day with roommates and the director. During the day, we do small part of worship, then discuss on the book that we been reading currently, then we do some activity from going to the beach to preparing food for the aids victims. Last Monday was our personal day off, I felt God was speaking to me to do something for the homeless on my day off during the previous weekend. So on Monday morning, I went to grocery store and got 1 loaf of bread, peanut butter, snacks, and 10 mini bottles of water. So I got 10 bags of peanut butter sandwiches with snacks and a water bottle each. I also put a paper in there that had a story of Matthew 14:22-34 It was about Jesus walking on water and Peter sinking cause he lost his trust in Jesus. I put a paragraph at the end talking about trusting in Jesus and that God loves you so much, that he gave his only son to die for us. No matter what you done in the past, God still love you. Just trust him! So I went out and gave away 3 bags to the homeless that was out on the streets on Hollywood, Sunset, Vine, Gower, and Santa Monica Blvd. All 3 of them thanks me and one of them look at me and said what am I doing? I said here is some food. He kept staring at me like he was puzzled about this moment. I just smile back at him and said God bless you. As I walked away, I turned my head to look at him, his face buried inside the brown bag. One homeless lady was so excited, she couldn't wait to open the bag. It was almost like Christmas day opening presents. The rest of the 7 bags, I took one each day to work, just in case, I see a homeless on my way to give a bag to them. I don't know why God was speaking to me over the weekend to do that. But I know this, those people who got the bag, at least they have a meal and a bible lesson on that day.
God is Awesome!
There is greater things have yet to come to this city and I have already seen so many things of God's glory since I been here. I know there is more greater things to come to this city! God is good! I am learning so much from the people I have met from homeless, neighborhood kids, my bosses, church members, and more!
Please pray for my dad's family and my Aunt Linda. My uncle and my Dad's brother in law passed away this weekend.
God is Good
Kyle
