Perfect Love

I’ve seen pain. Hard pain. Hard, gut wrenching, not worth living sort of pain. I’ve seen it for years. I have seen it in adults across the world first-hand, in poverty, in abuse, in orphans… in children… but never have I singled out one child and saw brokenness, loneliness, confusion, and sadness in one child. That’s what I saw today.

My classmates and I had the wonderful opportunity to serve at a prison ministry today. We got to meet the prisoners, their families, perform dramas to encourage them, and just love on them. An opportunity that has changed a part of my life forever. I was a part of the team that got to love on their families.

I will never forget Tyrone. 

Sweet sweet kid. 

But his face read pain, sadness, brokenness, and a lot of confusion. He sat down in the chair next to me with another young woman. My classmate, Justin was just about paint a snake on Tyrone’s cheek. He sat still. Didn’t move. Didn’t smile. Wouldn’t speak. He was shy.

But his body language also spoke anger and terror. It spoke abandonment.

He was going to visit his mom in prison.

My heart melted. Everything within me wanted to scoop him up, take him to the prison and bust open those doors and look for his mom and take them home. We don’t realize that people who are imprisoned have families too. And poor Tyrone was paying for the consequences. He’s an orphan.

I watched Justin paint that snake on his face… how much love we poured onto that kid just then. And it made me realize how much love can impact this one child; how it can impact the whole world. It impacted mine… it saved my life. I cried, I have to admit. I felt so much compassion for these kids, and I felt so angry too. Angry at Satan for destroying kids’ childhoods; the most precious thing in this world.

I have experienced pain. Hard pain. I’m sure we all have. But I’ve experienced not having the greatest childhood too and I am so pissed off that these kids aren’t getting what they deserve: a childhood. But then it’s people like us that are in their lives for a short time and give them a childhood for a good day. I wish I could give Tyrone a million more. But I’m praying that one day makes a difference.

After Tyrone got his face painted by Justin, he went back to his table with the young woman. Five minutes after, I saw him running around with a slight smile plastered on his face. So maybe my classmates and I were successful in making Tyrone’s day.

So often we believe love isn’t going to overcome the violence, suicide rates, hate, crime, the broken homes… but I believe if Jesus can overcome the grave, He can overcome these things. The song from The Beatles is singing through my head, all we need is love… love is all we need… Except the hippy love parts….

I believe love changes hearts, overcomes addictions, frees slaves, puts a smile on an orphan’s face…

Benjamin Sledge.
The name that helped save my life two years ago when all I thought about was suicide. I didn’t care about love and what it meant. I didn’t care about anything. He’s a part of a great organization called Heart Support

– an online community founded by the lead singer of August Burns Red: Jake Luhrs; designed to help young people like me overcome addictions, suicide, and other struggles. He never gave up on me when all I did was give up on myself. He loved me when I didn’t even love myself. And it was his and Heart Support’s love and grace that helped save me.

I met him this past week. And this whole week that went through my mind after meeting him is how accepting he is to everyone. His face shines with love. Everyone he sees, he looks at them with an adoration saying you and I are equal and I love you. If we all just did that…

Have you loved someone today?

Just Some Updates and Photos

After coming back from India and our Christmas break, we headed to Galveston Beach for some quiet and fellowship with each other... a retreat for the week. 

After the retreat we started back on our normal days here at Master's. Normal days look like West Coast classes, normal reading, studying, drama training.

Lately we've been doing a lot of drama training for our own church since we just opened up our huge and brand new sanctuary, we've been having fun with it. We've done training for Red Pill - our School Assembly program. We also continue to work every Saturday for Adopt-A-Block.

This last week of the month, we are heading to Louisiana for our annual MC Conference! It's where all of the Master's Commissions across the US meet together for a couple of days! We're excited!

March is just around the corner where things will start to pick up fast. With March being our busiest month! We are serving at the rodeo to raise money, and we also have services and such! We'd appreciate your prayers for strength that month!

Here are some photos...