Or we could just do it...

When you find an email in your inbox that basically asks you, begs you, pleads with you to please clean up after yourself at work, you could

• a) write an email back, accusing everyone BUT yourself of dirtying everything and blaming it on other people (although the said email specified places that the other people don't have access to...)
• b) tell the staff that is just checking out facebook to go and do their work duty, coz it's probably their area that's dirty, not yours... Although, come to think of it, you might not have done your work duty in ages either....
• or c) you could just go and clean up... Even though it might not all be your dirt, dishes or cups... But in general you do recognise that discussing the dirt will actually not clean it up! Talking about who made it dirty unfortunately is not the way to a cleaner self...

Bummer we all seldomly choose c...

This is a work of fiction. Names, character, places and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or a used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead is entirely coincidental.

'MaD' in Las Vegas (Makin' a Difference...)

Summer in Vegas…
This summer Mission Adventures trained over 150 young people in inner city mission. We saw about 30 people come to Christ and many of the young people really had a life changing experience.

Fun in the Summer
In August we partnered with the school district and gave out free lunches to kids from the neighborhood. Of course that wasn’t all: With the help of STARS and other volunteers we ran a kids program including education, crafts, dancing and of course we had a water day!

Most of the 20+ kids each day were between the age of 4 and 10 and lived in our neighborhood. Getting to know these kids was a huge blessing and I would like to pass that on…

So let me introduce you to Jamarian and Draezhon.

These 2 little boys were a blast.

Jamarian is very mellow and over the 3 weeks he never had a bad day. He is a very happy child… Unfortunately he didn’t like underwear and his jeans were slightly bigger than they needed to be. So for a few days the most used phrase during the afternoon was ‘Mari, pull up your pants!!’... Until we were able to give him a belt and some Incredible Hulk undies! :)

Draezhon is his brother and is not as mellow, but as much fun. One day Draezhon had a really bad day and was spending half his time in time out.
During one of those times I walked over to him and let him know that we really liked having him around and we were sad that he was in time out so much that day.
After that conversation his attitude for the rest of the week completely changed. He was still a kid with attitude, but he knew he was loved and accepted when he walked through the door.

At the end of the 3 weeks STARS put on an amazing showcase for all kids and all the parents/guardians came to watch the kids dance and to admire the artwork! It was a great night and such a great finish to 3 weeks of hard work!

STARS
STARS is a youth development movement. I met these guys about 3 months ago and they happened to be looking for a place to meet at, as they were busting at the seams at their old place.
We were able to partner with them and now they meet 3 times a week at the Pier helping young people to excel in whatever gifts they have. That includes writing, speaking, dancing and much more.

I am very excited about the possibility of STARS and the Pier hosting Open Mic nights for the community!!! This would include showcasing local talent, encouraging young people to host the night and inviting people from all different churches to participate and volunteer!

Some discouragement:
These past couple months have been very encouraging in many ways ministry wise. On the other side of things I have had my laptop’s hard drive crash… My laptop has difficulties turning on now and really, seeing it’s 4 years old I fear I might need a new one soon.
I also would still like to actually have my own car again, instead of borrowing someone else’s…

Financial stress has been huge as my cost of living has gone up a bit since returning and my support has dropped a little due to the bad economy.

Would you please pray with me for these specific things:

• my own car to come through ASAP (waiting on a duplicate title)
• more people to give towards my ministry on a monthly basis. (I need another 10 people to give $25 each month)
• $400 to go to the Go!Conference (Missions Conference) that I help staff in October.
• A new laptop in the near future...

Thank you so much for being part of this team! I really appreciate it and love that you're on the team with me!

It's really been an exciting time this summer with many people finding Christ, being able to serve around 200 families each month with our grocery assistance partner, feeding more than 90 meals to the kids in August, getting some new and key volunteers to help out in the building and start a job readiness program.

Now we are talking about starting After School Homework Help, Open Mics and would love to look back into ESL classes. Please pray that The Pier (our community resource center) really would be a tool of God to start transforming this neighborhood (one of the poorest and most crime ridden in Las Vegas)

Exciting stuff ahead!

Frauke

If you would like to support this ministry check out http://helpfrauke.blogspot.com/