Merry Christmas to you! I hope you're having a good Christmas season.

I just wanted to give you a quick update on what's been going on with me...

We finish up this year with some great reports:

• grocery assistance is going strong, serving up to 120 individuals a week with various groceries such as meats, eggs, veggies and juice.
• one of my clients gave me a little Christmas present which blew me away. This is huge for this neighborhood and I was so blessed by her.
• we have been able to give away about 200 pounds of new and gently used clothes over the past 4 weeks to families in need. Some walked away with one bag, others with a trunkful of clothes! All according to their need.
• my time at the boys and girls club in our neighborhood is getting to be more and more fun and I'm starting to learn more names. The kids like to hang out with me and we play loads of games in the gym.

Some exciting changes for the next year:

• I will be working with Mission Adventures again, at least for the Spring. I am very excited about this opportunity, as this means I will have more contact with young people, get to challenge them to step out of their comfort zone and share the Gospel with people in Las Vegas and the world. It's one of those amazing programs that God uses to bring people closer to Him and I'm so glad to work with MA again this year.
• I will still be overseeing parts of the Pier ministry such as grocery assistance, clothing and the general running of the Pier. There will be new staff coming on to Pier staff and I'm sure we will come up with some exciting ministry opportunities for this neighborhood together. Our desire is still to see our neighborhood (the 8th worst neighborhood in the US) transformed and changed for God.
• I've got my OWN car!! Since December 17th, I am the proud owner of a 1998 Mazda 626 (in gold). So thankful to God for His provision and faithfulness.

Prayer Points:

• I was praying about New Years Resolutions and if I should do one again this year. (this past year I spent an extended time with God every 2nd Sunday of the month). So it's still fairly nebulous, but would you please pray that I would be able to be the closest I've ever been with God in 2011. I'm excited.
• Pray for Mission Adventures: The students that will be coming between February and April. The people we will talk to and share with. For impacted lives.
• We need new and strategic ideas for this neighborhood. Please pray with us to strategically impact our neighborhood.
• I've got a few financial prayer points:
  

I still owe $400 for the car. Thankfully the guy who helped me get the car is nice enough and I can pay it off over the next few weeks. It was too good of a deal to let it go.. (I got a $4000 car for $2200). I will also need to pay registration and license plates very soon.

I need to see financial provision and breakthrough for me personally. Like a lot of people I've had a decrease in income (support) over this past year. I need to see $200 more a month come in to be able to cover all my bills. On top of that comes, that my laptop is starting to really pass out on me on a regular basis... Something I really don't need! Please pray for me!

Thank you so much for being part of my team. I love serving Jesus and I love doing it in Las Vegas. But without you, I wouldn't be able to. So thank you.

I pray you have a very merry Christmas.


Frauke


PS:
If you want to follow my life, there are a couple different ways:
Facebook.com/jackie.doyle
twitter.com/jackie_doyle
jackieinvegas.tumblr.com
frauked.blogspot.com

or email/call me
frauked@ywamlasvegas.org
702 273 7166

Real quick

A new update will be up soon. Til then I just wanted to say that

the car fund is now at $1600!!!
Looks like I will be coaching a Basketball team with the Boys and Girls Club starting soon!!!
Please pray for our grocery assistance program. We've had some problems with the food bank and it affected our volunteers. It's been a roller coaster ride for the past 2 weeks. We feed more than 70 individuals each week, so I really want this to be sorted soon.
I still want to have an open mic night at the Pier, but it has not worked out so far at all. Would you please pray?

Thanks!

My very sensitive relationship with my car

The car I drive right now is not mine. I just would like to preface this post with that fact…

I love the fact that someone is lending me and has been lending me their car for over a year! It’s a huge blessing and I don’t know how to even thank that person.

The car is a 1995 Saturn, stick shift with no AC. So summers have been a struggle, but better than not having a car at all.

This is the story of the car and me:

-Last year every now and then the car would just cut out. Especially annoying when you’re going 65 mph down the highway and suddenly your engine dies and you have to get it going again… (4th gear, clutch in let it come slowly). It worked every single time and I didn’t say anything before because, when I did, people seemed to freak out about my safety here and there… Thanks, I guess.

-This year the car started to overheat whenever it was not going a solid minimum of 45 mph. I started to find out how amazingly convenient the Las Vegas Freeway system is. It was just a couple times that I got stuck in traffic and was yelling at others to ‘KEEP MOVING’. By the time I got to where I was going I was completely drenched in sweat and had to actually sit down for a minute to avoid fainting. Plus I was pretty grumpy! LOL Real story! Only happened once that bad tho.

-My clutch broke. But since I didn’t have any money I kind of learned to live with it for a while. So I parked only in spots where I didn’t need to back out of (the use of reverse was pretty limited). I only learned to start driving in 3rd gear, since that was still working fine. Then, through the incredible generosity of my friends I was able to fix the clutch and can now back out of parking spaces again.

-My latest fun thing are the windows. Since I have no aircon I greatly appreciate the use of the windows. All windows in this car are automatic, which makes it hard (aka expensive) to fix.A few months ago the passenger side window stopped about 4 inches down. that was it. Then a couple weeks ago, the driver’s side window stopped working all together. Now I drive a sweat bucket, with 4 inches of air coming through. And the saddest thing is: the passenger side window doesn’t even go up all the way anymore. It stops 2 inches short.

Ready for a new car… Any chance you want to join me in prayer to get a new car? I got $1400 towards it right now and need at least $600 more before I can really look for something that would work.

Now, if you have a car standing around and would like to donate it, please let me know! :)

YWAM turns 50

Loren Cunningham founded YWAM in 1960. Since then the staff has grown from 2 to over 20,000 (holding over 150 passports I think). We have bases/presence in over 1200 locations and we are still passionate about Jesus and finishing the Great Commission.


Last week we celebrated YWAM's 50th in Denver. Loren and Darlene Cunningham (and their daughter Karen) came to tell us more about what's going on in the world, where we are at with the Great Commission and what still needs to be done.

It was a fantastic time of meeting new people, catching up with old friends and just having some much needed time of getting new vision and excitement for what I do.

Since we drove to Denver (13 hours!!) and took the DTS, it was also a great time to get to know the students and talk with God whilst driving... Totally legal! :)





While at the conference we stayed at 'Eagle Rock', part of the YWAM Denver base, just located in the middle of nowhere... Beautiful... So here are some pics! :)





The dorms















the sun











more sun
















YWAM Vegas peeps











dining room and kitchen











YWAM Colorado Springs peeps










yeah, it was nice! :)












the crazies...












fearless Vegas DTS leader













fearless Vegas DTS












Vegas peeps












Vegas peeps

The rubber band gun and why it is significant for me

Last night we had a giving night here at the YWAM Base. Giving nights are awesome and usually very powerful.
This is the way it works: you ask God what He might want you to give away and to whom. Then you wrap it up (just cover it) and bring it to giving night.
You ask the person to join you in the middle, give him/her whatever you brought, explain it if you need to or if God gave you a word or something and then you pray for that person.

It's amazing how powerful giving something away can. Sometimes God asks me to give something big, something my heart is really attached to... (i.e. guitar, money, ipod, computer) and sometimes he asks me to give something small (flag, candle, clock etc)

This time I received something: A rubber band gun!
I'm pretty excited about the gun, but it was the 'explanation' that came with it, that made me cry and thank God for the fact that He really knows what's going on.

It was just one sentence... The guy who gave me the gun said: 'when I see you, when I see you lead, you lead out of a place of fun with God. You're a fun person.'

You got to understand that I don't know this guy very well and he doesn't know me.

To hear that he sees me as 'fun' and to hear that he sees me and God having fun was amazing...

Why, you ask?

Well, for the past couple weeks I haven't heard that at all. in fact, I have heard quite the opposite! A person I really respect came up to me and told me that I look pissed off all the time and mean. He has a problem with my face! (which I can't really change...)

I've asked God to help me through that, coz it seems petty to make a big deal out of that. I love having fun with God and I know that often times that is NOT reflected in my face. But there's nothing I can do about it... except for fake smiling, but that's actually exhausting and not me.

So for someone who doesn't know me to say 'here's a rubber band gun, because I think you're a fun person'... That was pretty much God speaking to me audibly.

So I've had WAY too much fun with that gun today!

Thank you Lord.

Grace

These past couple weeks I've been studying up on grace.
In YWAM we have the privilege of getting some amazing teaching and the grace teaching is one of those that really started to change my life.
And now it was time again to brush up on what grace really means in my life and how I can live it out more.

Here are some things/quotes I learned/liked so far:

Grace is always free for the one who receives it, but it always costs the one who gives it.

The Russian Doll Analogy...
When we get saved the Holy Spirit comes to live inside of us (Smallest doll placed in next bigger one)
Then we are also placed IN Christ. (put first 2 dolls into the next bigger one)
When God looks at us, He sees the righteousness of Christ.
The image of grace is the image of Christ.
(thanks to Daniel Susenbach for that analogy)

Of course the question of 'cheap grace' comes up... How can you learn something when you're just constantly being handed grace and sort of a free way out? What about knowing that you WILL be forgiven if you sin? The whole attitude of what can we get away with?

Philip Yancey in his book 'what's so amazing about grace' describes it pretty well (page 190)

He makes a great example with a groom who in the wedding night has this conversation with his bride:
'Honey, I love you so much and I'm eager to spend my life with you. but I need to work out a few details. Now that we are married, how far can I go with other women? Can I sleep with them? Kiss them? You don't mind a few affairs now and then, do you? I know it might hurt you, but just think of all the opportunities you'll have to forgive me after I betray you.'

If I approach my relationship with God the same way this groom does, then I don't understand the first thing about love or grace.

Extending grace to others means forgiving them.
Receiving grace means knowing and trusting God, that everything really IS taken care of. Sometimes that is still the hard part for me.

What do you think?

PS: Read 'What's so amazing about grace?'. Great book. :)

Huge Praise:
My car fund grew from $500 to $1400 in just 2 month. Pray for the remaining $600+ to come in soon, so I can get a car with air con soon!

110 degrees (or 43 Celsius) is just about normal for summer in Las Vegas and insanely hot! The fact that it is a dry heat doesn’t matter when you burn yourself with the seatbelt!

212 (or 100 Celsius) is the temperature that water boils at and changes from water to gas. During Junior High Camp we talked about living your life in pursuit of 212—having a relationship with God that’s boiling hot and at that level you have the ability together with God to start changing the world.
The 5 day camp with 300+ Junior High Students was up in the mountains in Arizona with lots of trees and rocks—beautiful, but I was glad for the 5 day limit.




My girls (a group of 9 students) were amazing. Throughout the week we had lots of time to talk about what it means to live a life in pursuit of 212—even though you’re pretty much going through hell at home. These girls want to live their lives for God and have so many ideas on how to make that a reality.
It was a huge blessing and privilege to be their leader and I can’t wait to see what God has for them.


In the beginning of the summer I had a chance to ‘go back to my roots’ and lead the Mission Adventures Summer staff in an afternoon of team building activities.
This is something that goes back to my days in Darwin eons ago! :)
I hadn’t had the chance to lead anything in terms of team building for ages, but it felt like ‘home’.
Since I get to hang out with youth at the Boys and Girls Club in our neighborhood, I will try and do some team building activities with them once summer is over.

Boys and Girls Club has been going good, with me hanging out and playing Basketball with the teens.
Most of them come from broken homes and want nothing more than someone who cares about what they do. This makes for interesting conversations at times.

Please pray that I will be able to share the love of Christ with them and the hope He brings for their lives.

The Pier is continuing to grow in several areas. We now offer Basic English Classes 3 times a week with an average of 6 students each time; Tutoring, and the Job Readiness Classes are starting at the end of this month.
Of course we are still serving over 800 people with food each month.

By the way….
Germany got third in the world cup!! Just in case you missed some awesome games!

My friends and me hung out at the Las Vegas Hofbrauhaus every now and then to watch the games! Go Germany! :)

Tweets

* YWAM’s Mission Adventures Training had a great summer, seeing people saved,
healed and delivered.
* In January 2011 YWAM Las Vegas will run it’s first Abolitionists DTS, fighting Human Trafficking in the world
* The August DTS has just started this week with 6 students from 3 different nations!
* I have a car fund of $1400+ !!!!

Thanks for all your friendships, prayers and support. I couldn’t do this without you!


frauke

That guy... And me....

It seemed like a normal day. I had just finished the shopping trip for the week and came out of Walmart, wondering why people were going on and on about how hot it is in Vegas. Didn't seem that hot today...

As I was putting my groceries into my car I noticed him. He was in his mid to late thirties, dirty clothes that were hanging off him.

From a distance he asked me something, but I couldn't understand him.
As I was coming closer I heard him say 'Don't come closer. I'll just stay back here. I was just wondering if you had something to eat for me?'

This is almost normal in Vegas, as sad as that sounds. Depending on what part of town you're in, you will be asked by homeless people for food, money, booze, whatever else they feel you should give them.
I usually don't buy into that, knowing what services are available and how little they are used at times, and also knowing people who have made it off the streets and the stories they tell me.

But we were far away from any place that I knew of that offered services to the homeless, so I decided to dig through my groceries and see if I could share stuff with him.

Til this point all was very normal, except for this: he kept on insisting on staying away and not coming close, and whenever I came closer, or handed him stuff he said that I must either be an alien or a Christian...

While he's dead on with both (Legal Alien AND Christian) it saddened me to think that only Aliens (I know what he meant!) and Christians would even consider giving towards people who are asking.

I mean, don't get me wrong... Go Christians... Apparently you DID listen to that sermon...

But do you know what I mean?

Communing with nature AKA Junior High Camp

Next week I will be communing with nature... WITH 300+ Junior High Students. So there won't be much time for communing, which is fine with me!
I will be leading a group of 8 girls, all 7th and 8th grade.

Please be praying for this time away, as of course the whole idea is to introduce the kids to God on a deeper level. In between worship, sessions, crazy competition, painball, rock climbing, mountain biking and who knows what else my heart is to really help my girls to understand who God is and get them ready to follow God in their day to day life, especially once school starts again in September.

I really want God to show up for my girls (and the other 300 as well) in a huge way and change lives.

Please pray that God would show up, that He would help me to get to know the girls, pray for them, have fun with them and that team YELLOW would win all the competitions! LOL

But seriously, would appreciate your prayers. Camp is from July 30 - August 3. Photos will be posted soon after I'm back...

To get immediate updates, follow me on twitter: twitter.com/jackie_doyle or go to the official church camp blog: centralparents.com/blog

Thanks

A Saturday Story

Last Saturday my friend and me ended up having a few different events where we both would be at the same time and place.
So to help me out (no air con in my car) she decided to pick me up at my end of town, drive all over town, go to House warming Parties, pick up craft supplies, dinner and craft night.

It was a great day and I had decided to treat it as a 'Fake Road Trip'. Here are some pictures from that day! :)

All packed for the 'roadtrip'

First Stop pretty much on the opposite end of town! Nice neighborhood eh?

Oh yeah, Juan Pablo Montoya was with us all the way! He is very helpful and doesn't stress at all when you take a wrong turn!

I had a bit of time to kill... There are probably about 15 more pictures that look exactly like this one! LOL

After the House warming party (no pictures; forgot to take in the camera) we went to dinner at Red Robin! Best deal ever: BOTTOMLESS Rootbeer Floats (or coke float in my case) So fun!

Fun with my friends. We usually get together and they scrapbook.. Since I don't scrapbook (coz I don't really like it) I go and hang out, do cards, and my newest thing: necklaces.

I love these nights. Mainly because everyone is slightly crazy.... From a parent who had a 'boys vs girl spitball fight' in her house, to the young adult who's parent pretended to be an alien... LOL Oh, the memories....

Such a classic picture.

And this my friends is my science project for the day. I accidentally left gummy worms (see picture) and Lfesaver gummies in the car during the House warming party. After more than an hour in 110 degrees the gummy worms (generic brand) looked like this....










The life savers hadn't changed at all... I'm not sure what scares me more...








And this concludes the pictures of my 'fake roadtrip'. Hope you had a good insight into my life! :)

The car fund is growing!!!

As of today I have over $1,000 set aside for a car,
with another $300 ready to be processed soon.

My goal is to have at least $2,000
before I start looking seriously for a car with air conditioning. :)

It's been one of those cool experiences with God, as I have been praying for more than a year now for God to provide a car for me. It's a prayer said every day and sometimes it comes out with frustration and questions. But most times it's just me and my Dad talking about how cool a car with AC would literally be; how cool it is to be able to drive the car I currently drive, that is not mine and how much I still have to learn.

A few years back I really wanted an ipod. Now, an ipod isn't one of those things that you NEEEEED. But I knew I wanted one. So every now and then I would mention it to God. Nothing happened.

Then one day in the summer I heard God clearly say that I could now start really praying for an ipod and so I did. I made a couple commitments (such as no more buying fast food, drinks or treats until I had the money for the ipod).

I saved up up every dollar for the ipod and I didn't ask anybody to give towards it.
There was an ipod listed on craigslist, but it had been there for a while. Since I didn't quite have the money together yet, I was not holding my breath that I could get that ipod.
Yet, God came through and to this day I have still no idea how exactly the money came together. Within 3 weeks I had all the money to now call the old craigslist listing and ask if the ipod plus all the extras was still for sale.
It was.

I picked it up that day... And I think I've been using it every day since then. Thank you Lord.

Any chance you could do a similar thing with the car? :)

An epic fourth of July

On Fourth of July in the States you basically celebrate the birthday of this country. On that day you're allowed to set off fireworks like crazy.

This year I went over to my friends place again, who puts on one heck of a show every year with lots of fireworks, good people and good food.

This year we managed to set the neighbor's lawn on fire. It was awesome. Apparently he burned his leg hair while he stomped out the fire... (This is where I was happy that girls shave the legs...)

Luckily I was wearing shoes and could participate in the fire suppression efforts.

The fireworks were great, but setting the lawn on fire might have been my favourite part of the night (since nobody got hurt, the lawn has a few black spots and nothing much else happened...)

It was also fun to see the neighbors jump when another thing blew up sideways and went into their bushes about 2 yards from them.

What a night! Happy birthday USA.

The car fund

It's growing, it's growing....

If everything works out, then my wonderful car fund will have $1,030 in it by August 1. Can I please hear a big 'YAY GOD'?

It's really been pretty awesome to see my car fund grow slowly, but surely. I need a reliable car with air conditioning, otherwise the people of Las Vegas are going crazy, coz I can't stop cranking my music and my voice... And let me tell you... The music is sometimes questionable to start with, the voice is downright awful.

So if you would like to give towards my car fund and save the ears of the people of Las Vegas, please contact me or check this out

The latest and greatest from my life... :)

Pier Ministries
Last week we had one of the most amazing grocery assistance weeks ever.
On a schedule with 32 appointments we usually have a minimum of 8 no shows. Last week we only had 5 no shows and were able to provide food for more than 80 individuals.

Pier Clothing
Last Saturday we had our big clothing blow out with more than 70 people receiving brand new clothes from us.

We had a GREAT team of 10 volunteers who helped with security and getting as many clothes as possible to as many people as possible. I think for all of us it was the highlight of our week.

Here you see Alice and me in a picture. She is one of our clients who's been coming to the Pier for over a year now.

The rest of my life…
I’ve finally started to help out once a week at the Boys and Girls Club in our neighborhood. On my first day I even got to lead the hockey game for the young ones, who in turn challenged to play me in carpet bowling for candy… In the end I lost all the candy I had, but it took them a little while… Who knew I would rock at carpet bowling?

In the future I will continue to help out once a week, but I will get to work with the teens, which I am very much looking forward to.
I hope to do team building exercises with them, similar to the stuff I used to help with at YFC in Darwin.

My Car….
The great news is that I have $530 towards a car in my newly established car fund. If you would like to give towards a car, please attach a note, saying it’s for the car.
If you know of a car WITH air conditioning, please let me know! :)

Good news…
During the summer I will be receiving about $100 support a month more than usual! This is such an answer to prayer!

No one in YWAM receives a salary and we all raise our own funds to do the work we feel God has called us to. If you would like to be part of my support team (presently I still need $250 more a month to meet my budget) please contact me.

If you would like to help with practical needs, the 2 very real needs at the moment are a new laptop and a car with A/C.

In May I celebrated Thanksgiving with friends who needed space in their freezer. :)
In this picture you see the amazing spread we had...

Tweets

* YWAM’s Mission Adventures has started. Expecting more than 200 students to be
trained and released in Evangelism
* January DTS returns from 2 months outreach this week
* English Classes at the Pier have been running for 8 weeks with 6 students average each week
* My 8th grade girls from Junior High Ministry at church have officially graduated to High School! Sad but exciting.
* I have a car fund of $500+ !!!!
* 2 new partner ministries at the Pier: Tutoring and dance!
* Word of Life Christian Academy came and painted the inside of our building.

Thanks for all your friendships, prayers and support. I couldn’t do this without you!


frauke

If you want to find out how you can be involved check out http://helpfrauke.blogspot.com/

Why you should pray about giving to my car fund.. :)

So I am praying for a car...

My car fund right now has $500 (!!!) in it, due to the amazing generosity of my friends!

The car I am driving right now is on loan to me from another very generous friend of mine. It's been almost a year!

But it's time for a new car... One with air conditioning.

Not because it's hot or anything. That's really just a side reason. But not having air conditioning is seriously cramping my style.
I am not America's next Idol, but I love to bust out a song whilst driving. Now you go driving down the road with your windows down, (100 degrees), wind blowing and a good song comes on. Of course you totally want to sing along. But if you're stuck in traffic or driving on a side street, chances are people will hear you...

That is why I need air conditioning. I would love to put the windows up and save the general public the pains of listening to me singing.

And clearly, I could not stop singing... :)

So think about it, will ya? Then check out http://helpfrauke.blogspot.com

Grocery Assistance at work

Every Tuesday we give out boxes of food to the people of the neighborhood. The way it works is, that they have to make an appointment to receive a box.
Each week we have up to 30 appointments, each appointment representing between 1 and 8 people per household.
Each week we have the food to serve all 30 appointments and each week we have between 8 and 15 no shows. It's frustrating, because we want to help them with food. But if they don't call and then come late or don't show up at all, they forfeit their appointment and at the moment I can't even reschedule them until a month from now.

Today though, was different. Today, almost ALL of our 32 (!) appointments came, representing 80 individuals that were able to receive food today. There were only 5 no shows, which is unheard of in the history (1 year) of grocery assistance.

And on top of that... Today almost everybody was so grateful... I'm not sure you can imagine how hard it is to cheerfully hand a box of free food to someone who in return demands chicken instead of the beef in the box, refuses to take the bananas, because 'they attract bugs' or gets mad at you when they find out there's no coffee.

I really like helping people. And I really like it best on days like today... When everybody comes in, no missed appointments, no complaints, no verbal abuse (oh yes, that happens)... Just a fairly straight forward time of helping people make ends meet.

Days like today help me remember why I do what I do. Days like today make me grateful and help me continue to pray for the people of our neighborhood.

Days like today help me go through the days when I feel like a punching bag; when everyone who walks through our door seems to see something wrong with the way we serve them; when it's just not fun.

Thank you Jesus, for reminding me how much I like helping people. I learn from the best.

On The Rocks - Bad Romance

And that, my friends, is the truth

Church was almost over. It was almost time to go.
Actually I hadn't really spend any time IN church. I mean, I was here and all, but was feeling so sick that I ended up spending most of the time outside the doors of the auditorium. But going home was out of the question, because this afternoon I was hanging out with him again.

I was pretty excited. We usually hung out once a month. Always on a Sunday, although I'd wondered about that. I'd always thought he was busy on Sundays.

Anyway, once church was over I was going to go and meet up with him at the strip and we were going to hang out for the afternoon.

It's not that we don't hang out any other time. But these times were just more... special. It was just him and me. Sometimes we just sat and talked, sometimes he dragged me into the 'wilderness' and sometimes we just decided to check out stuff on the strip... Like today.

Church was finally over and I couldn't wait to leave. Still not feeling 100%, but that was ok.

I drove over to one of the biggest casinos on the strip, parked the car and walked over to our meeting point. As always I was the one who was late. But I knew it didn't matter.

He beamed at me when I got there and we hugged. Man, I was so excited to see him. Although... I decided to come right out with it...

'So, I know it's my turn to come up with food options, but... well, I don't have the money for lunch today. So I was thinking, we could just not eat today. Or maybe later at home?'

'Dudette, I got a surprise for you!'

And with that we started walking towards the market research center.

I had no clue what he was up to. Surprises I expected, but the thought of lunch I could probably kiss good bye. While he totally enjoyed having a meal together he was not one for actually carrying any sort of cash or other payment methods.

We walked down the casino walkways, pretended that we couldn't walk on any red tiles, which meant we had to hop every now and then to keep on going. Some people were looking at us funny, but I didn't care. If they only knew how cool it was to spend the whole afternoon with him.

We finally made it to the market research center. For today we had decided to do a little market research and help out the world by watching a TV show and rating it.
He grabbed a pair of tickets that were almost shoved into out face as we walked up to the counter. The whole deal was for free. You just needed to show ID and bring a bit of time.

We were lucky and had a show starting the minute we arrived (although I wouldn't put it past him that he'd arranged this). We snagged the last 2 seats and listened to the instructions. Then the show finally started.

It was a fun show and I was totally engaged in the whole deal, almost sad by the time it was over. We rated the show and then made our way out of there.

I almost just left, but he said, no, let's wait for the instructor to give us our 'parting gift'. I remembered that the people at the counter had mentioned that we would get some vouchers and stuff.

'Let's just go. Even the 2 for 1's are useless when you don't even have enough money for the 1.'

But he resisted and we waited until the instructor had finished helping someone. She came over and gave us 2 envelopes.

Once outside he gave them to me to open... I was stunned to see that the first one had $20 bill in it. Unbelieving I looked up into his eyes.

He just smiled and said 'It's a special they have today.'

I opened the second envelope and saw a bunch of coupons. He helped me sort through them until he found the one he was looking for. $5 off any purchase at a coffee shop...

'Do you suppose it'll work even just for drinks?' I asked.

He smiled and took my hand and we walked to the coffee shop. I ordered the biggest frappocino they had and paid 39 cents for it. That was lunch.

'Ready for the rest of the afternoon' he asked.

'I'm ready Jesus, let's go.'

Ignorance really can be bliss. The question is if Bliss is a good thing.

If you don't know something, then you don't care - because you don't know.
If we would know ALL the injustices going on in the world, we'd probably spend our days curled up in a ball on the floor, crying, because we wouldn't be able to deal with it.

But once something grabs your attention and you hear the stories of what's really going on, that's when your ignorance turns into action.

Living in Las Vegas there's injustice all around me and I'm well aware of the poverty, sex trafficking, drugs etc.

But for me it's always been about youth. I like hanging out with teens and there are all kinds of teens all over the world.
Some, when asked to DREAM, write: 'I want to get a job. Any job.'
Some don't say much, but rather let their fists do all the talking.
And some are so lost in the tangled web of 'normal' that they don't think anything is wrong.

Normal these days means you have to care about parents, teachers, friends, peers and coaches.

Caring about those people means watching what you wear, what you eat, what you say, what you do, how you look, what phone you have, what sports you play, what sports you watch, what music you like, who you like and who you don't like, if he/she likes you and why, what car your Mum drives, what movies you like, what you buy, where you go and how long you are there.

These pressures are real. We can smile about them, belittle them and do whatever we want to, but they are real in the lives of young people.

And that list doesn't even include all the things that kids from broken families have to care about.
I dare you to try and split your life in half, live in different houses and rooms every other week, pretend that you like that life style, pretend that it doesn't matter that the person you love most doesn't live with you anymore.

Kids are some of the best liars when it's about pleasing the people they love. Yes, I am sorry to tell you, but if you have heard your kid say, that he/she is doing fine with the divorce and all that comes with it, then he/she probably just lied.

Here's an excerpt from the Movie 'Fame'. I think it has some truth to it. What do you think?

My theory is that when parents get divorced they’re given some kind of a handout.
When my parents were splitting they told me 3 things

1. It’s not your fault
2. It’s not your fault and
3. It’s not your fault.

The problem is I don’t buy it. No kid does. I’ve seen the pictures of when you got married, when you were good-looking and you smiled at each other, hell when you even just looked at each other. so what happened between then and now?

ME

I came along and I made you tired and cranky and anxious and I made you lose your hair and gain 20 extra pounds and somewhere in all of that you stopped loving each other.
So I have my own idea for a handout. Next time tell me

1. Happiness is hard
2. Don’t make the same mistakes that we did
And 3. Ok so maybe it is your fault a little

You want me to be honest, you go first.

April Newsletter

If you wanted a PDF version, you could download my newsletter here

What's been going on with me...

I love Jesus
Last weekend my friends took me on a trip to visit family in Colorado Springs. We went and saw ‘The Thorn’, an Easter Production put on by New Life Church.
It was amazing and a good reminder why I do what I do. I want to tell people about Jesus and the fact that He died for all of our sins.

Pier Ministries
Over the past few weeks I have been able to visit people in our neighborhood, talk with them, pray for them and just listen to what’s going on in their lives.

It’s really fun and a good change from sitting in the office. Since January we’ve been able to visit and pray for 10 people, more than 800 families have received food from our grocery assistance program and more than 20 families have received brand new outfits.

We have seen clients from the food program transition into volunteering their time to help other people. It’s really been great.

We are partnering with another ministry to offer After School Homework help at our building 4 times a week.

This month we are starting to offer basic English Classes for our Spanish speaking neighbors.

It’s been a great season with some really good success stories and I couldn’t have done it without you. Thanks for being part of the team.

I want to be honest with you. For the past few months I’ve had some major financial struggles. Due to the economy some of my supporters couldn’t support me financially any longer and some of my basic cost, such as rent and phone have almost doubled. This leaves me almost $300 short each month and it makes it hard to keep going.

I need your help
Would you please pray and consider giving $30 a month towards my ministry? More details are here

Exciting New Ventures
While I love working with the ministries at the Pier, I also realized that I miss working with young people. Right now we don’t have enough staff, volunteers or money to start a youth program at the Pier.

So I asked the Leadership Team if I could volunteer some time over at the Boys and Girls Club down the road to start building relationships with teens. They agreed and I’m pretty close to finishing with the volunteer application process (Interview, drug test, finger printing, orientation) and am quite excited to start hanging out with some teens.
Please pray that I would be able to relate well and have chances to tell the kids about Jesus.