Me and My Stubbornness... Thank goodness for Grace!

I have come to realize that God doesn't change... ok wait, that wasn't the realization; that's a given. But what I realized is that something God tells you to do years ago, He still continues to tell you... until you finally decide to listen...

Rewind six years (wow! Six years!) when I went to the inner city for the first time. I was going to HIU and we had to do so many hours of service per semester so a group of us went down to the Dream Center in Echo Park. From there, they split us onto teams and sent us on buses with food, clothing, and an eagerness for the unexpected. My team was sent to a hotel where many people lived there, in a one bedroom with their many children. They were happy and grateful for our visit regardless of their living situation. From that moment, I already knew I needed to be apart of the lives of people on the street.

The next time we went, we were put on a bus to Imperial Courts... a public housing project in Watts. The crips erupted here, the bloods in another housing projects just a few blocks from there, and part of "Training Day" was filmed there to make it more "realistic"... thank you Hollywood having the open eyes to see the state of the city, but doing nothing more than exploiting the people...

eh, anyway...

I really loved it there. I never was able to make it back to the Dream Center while I was at HIU but I often thought about the people living there in the projects. In the years to pass I often took part in homeless outreach opportunities but being there once a week at the most wasn't enough for me. I knew eventually I would want to live in the inner city. I often told people that too... "If money was no option, I would live in LA and be with the people full time."

I kept making excuses though for not doing it. I needed to finish my degree first. I would have no way of supporting myself. I had to finish paying on my car. I have to save up enough money first. All stuff that made sense to me, and even to people who I told, but over all... all excuses! All excuses to hide the fact that really... it wasn't that I didn't have the money, the degree, or the lack of car bills, etc... it was all a lack of faith in God that He can do anything and that if He has given me a passion for his people, I need to go for it! No matter what!!

A few months ago I started going to the Dream Center on my own and, wouldn't you know it... they put me on the bus that sent me to Imperial Courts. I had the same feeling all over again that I had been ignoring so many years... "I need to be here! Every day!" I knew it wasn't enough for me to do what we were doing once a week... smile, hand person pineapple, tell them Jesus is all they need, and then disappear to my cushy home in Simi Valley as I complain that my laptop isn't working right. That would no longer do.

So all of that to get to this... I have quit school... and I am applying with World Impact to be an inner city missionary. And that's where I will close (even though there is SO much more detail to tell... ask me sometime how I came to the actual decision to quit school and how I learned about World Impact... God moves in crazy ways!)

I haven't told a lot of people about applying. I think because if it doesn't work out (or if I chicken out) I won't have too many people to keep me accountable to keep pressing or to be disappointed when my lack of faith kicks in again and I stall another six years. But I know I can't do that, so here I am! Push me guys! Don't let me drag my feet as God shows me where He wants me to go!


Here is a video that I keep watching... it is helping me stay focused on God's will... and mindful of my own selfishness...