Blog.

    Its definitely been a pretty awesome couple days for me. We pulled into the Dream Center on Thursday not really expecting how incredible it really would be. The Dream Center is Christian based and for people that have been addicted to drugs, alcohol, abuse, homeless and the list goes on. The campus is an old 700 room hospital and been renovated for it current purpose of housing all these people. It's volunteer driven and serves over 40,000 people a month. Most of the people there have been through the ringer and are now some of the happiest people I have met.  They send a few food trucks out in the morning and afternoon and give out food to the poor and people in need. We went in the most dangerous parts of town where it would not be safe at all for me to walk around. Seeing how some people live definitely put it in to perspective how blessed I was to be raised where I was. Every house and business has metal bars over the doors and windows because of theft. We would unload all the food, tie it up in bags and hand it out. There was quite a language barrier but the smiles alone were enough. I also went down to Skid Row. Skid Row is the lowest of lows. It seems like a lawless land littered with blocks of homeless and drugs. People smoking crack right in front of us and in complete survival mode. We walked around on Friday night and handed people water and some snacks and would just talk to them. If they were ready for a change, we would talk to them about the Dream Center and how help is always there if they wanted it. The blocks were divided up into the certain drugs and while one block might be happy and receiving to us, the next might cuss us out and have nothing to do with us. I have never seen anything like it and didn't know anything like that even existed. 
    On Sunday, we went to the Angelus Temple Church which is affiliated with the Dream Center. The congregation was the most diverse I have have seen and also had the most heart. Everyone there was there because they truly loved the Lord and you could feel it. In my 24 years of life, I have never been to a better church. On our way back to the bus, the three of us were talking about how the presence of of God was so evident in that church while being in such a dangerous place. The people were there because they wanted to be there. We did not want to leave the Dream Center, what they are doing is incredible to say the least. If we weren't so pressed on time, we would have parked and stayed for much longer. The past few days has opened my eyes to so much and is on top of my list for "the most incredible places we've volunteered." 
    On a more humorous note, I talk a lot in my sleep. A lot of mornings Ben or Derek would try to remember the things I said but with no luck. So we got a voice recorder and put it above my bed. It starts recording when it hears a noise or talking, so we don't have to listen to eight hours of sleeping. Every morning we listen in anticipation of some new material. We've picked up some real gems of both Derek and I and hope to make a compilation of it all in the end.