FINAL WEEK

Wow... I apologize for not updating this things in weeks!
So much to update you all on but I figured I would just post a few pictures of the impact your support has made on these kids.

My middle school girls 

Me and the girls

These girls have impacted my life so much. They have grown so much and Im just so proud of them. I got a letter form one of them and wanted to share it with you.

" I just really wanted to thank you for being there for me & the girls, and just helping us to get to know God better, and you've been such a blessing in my life and just thank you for that. You've really helped me to become a better & stonger person, while you were here. And like what me & the girls said last night, you're like our second mom, and we know that you'll always be there for us no matter what. Even though you have been here for only about 1 or 2 months, its seems like we've know you forever. And me & the girls are truely gonna miss you when you leave. And again, thanks for everything Raquel!"

Your support has made such an impact on these girls lives. 

I also have been able to help out at Moanalua High School and have been able to work with the youth there. I have seen such growth and was able to mentor a few of the girls. 

Those guys are amazing and I know that they appreciated your support in sending me here.

God is just doing great things here in Hawaii and I just feel so blessed to have had the opportunity to be a part of it.

some of the youth from Moanalua

so this week is my last week in Hawaii. The internship is over. 

We have graduation this weekend and then we get trained all next week on raising support.

Its been an amazing journey!

Thanks for being a part of the ride!

my single tear moment

driving up the mountain 

more off roading

one of the views from the top

driving on the NE part of the island

Hello everyone!

Hope you all had an amazing weekend... mine was super long but amazing!

Saturday was spent driving all around the island, literally. We went off roading on the west mountains in the morning and then drove to the north east pat and did this thing called the Haunted Lagoon. It was super fun.

Anyways, I wanted to share another cool testimony from my middle school girls if that's ok.
So this past friday the girls invited one of their friends to join us and it was her first time at youth service. 2 of the girls have been having a really hard time with family things and had been talking to me all week asking for prayer and encouragement. Anyways, so we spent about an hour just talking through some things and all of a sudden their friend just completely opens up and starts sharing about some big issues in her life and it quickly turned into this emotional healing session but the craziest thing happened. God was totally there and the girls started to pray for their friend and started encouraging her. Then they requested that we all gather in a circle and one girl prayed for everyone before heading to service. Well, at service their friend ended up giving her life to the Lord and decided to start following Jesus... it was awesome!!!
I just started to cry. I mean this was discipleship at its fullest.
Three girls that I have been mentoring and investing into really growing and stepping up despite personal hardships. Then seeing them reach out to their friend and her friend getting saved.
CRAZZY!!!

God is just way too awesome for words and it is just amazing to see these young girls grow so much and have such a heart for God and for their friends.
Im so proud of them!

On a completely random note, I have been thinking a lot lately about a few of my youth pastors from middle school and early high school that really made a huge impact on my life. Those foundations that they helped build really have come to light in the past couple of weeks. Anyways, I called one of them up out of the blue today and we hadn't talked in years but it was like we just picked up right where we left off. I got to thank her and tell her how much she meant to me and how grateful I am for all the hard work she did years ago but that it was worth it because who knows where I would have been without them. We talked for a while and I just was so happy to have finally gotten a hold of her. Now, I want to call a few others and thank them as well... the end

3 weeks left of the internship!!

Also, Im going to be coming up with a newsletter in the next couple of weeks of so and if you are interested in receiving one, just let me know!

Thanks guys!
Love you

Amazing 22nd Birthday

Me and my two roomies!

So friday was my 22nd birthday.
I love birthdays.
I love the idea of celebrating life with your closest friends and family.
This year, being in Hawaii for this internship, I had a very unique birthday.
Fridays are usually my longest and busiest days of the week. My birthday was no different. We had prophet Jim Laffoon teach our class all day. WOW. Thats really the only word that can describe the 6 hours he taught us. We went through about 75 pages worth of notes and Im still processing everything. After the class he prophesied over our class. For me it was a great birthday present. I got so much confirmation and encouragement about going into youth ministry, leading youth on mission trips, and my musical abilities.
So after Jim Laffoon all day, I got to spend my 2 hours with my middle school girls. As I mentioned in my last blog, this girls have become like family. I love them so much and am so proud of the way they just yearn for more Jesus. It's been great really getting to invest so much into them. They were excited it was my birthday and got me a cake. It was really sweet. Then we just hung out and did our one 2 one discipling before youth service.
After youth service, I was finally able to really celebrate my birthday. My roommates planned a dinner for me and about 25 people showed up at this Japanese restaurant and we all just hung out and had an amazing time!
Someone asked me what I would normally be doing on my birthday back in LA, I kind of laughed. The past 5 years, I have celebrated my birthday in different locations and with different people. I always kind of hated it but on friday night I realized how much of a blessing that is. No matter where God has sent me, he has always provided and surrounded me with so many people.
Saturday I went to my first Luau. It was a show. Basically it was circle of life meets lilo and stitch. haha.
It was pretty amazing to see some of those dances. My favorite part was the drums. Those drums were amazing and brought the level of intensity to this greater level. It was awesome!!
Now that the celebrating is over, I'm excited to finish up these last 4 weeks of the internship. That's right, there are only 4 weeks left!
Thank you for you prayers and support.

Hope you all have a blessed week!

a testimony and cake

hey everyone,
its been a while since I updated this here blog so I thought I would share a story of a couple of people I have been reaching out to.
As I have mentioned before, I have been helping out with the middle schools girls each week. In particular 3 young girls who I have grown to love. 2 of the girls just got saved this summer and I have been helping them in their walk by disciplining them and mentoring them. Last friday was their fall break so only one girl was there. We were talking and she shared with me how much she loves our meetings each week. She was saying that she would always have a hard time walking out her faith during the week but she said that it means so much having someone who is walking with her and lifting her up.
It took everything in me not to cry.
I mean, Im not doing anything special. But the fact that I have invested time into these gils lives, valued them as individuals, and encouraged them in their walk is actually making a difference is crazy. I never saw myself being able to relate to Jr. High girls. I hated those years of my life. Yet, its crazy to see what God does when you put yourself out there. Lives can be changed. These girls are yearning to learn more about God. They are so hungry. It blows my mind. It blows my mind to think that God is using me to reach them. I just love those girls so much and Im so proud of the progress thats been made in their lives.
I just wanted to share that with you guys because you all had a part in it too. Those prayers, the financial support, the random texts, whatever support you have given has directly impacted 3 amazing young girls.
Tomorrow is my 22nd birthday.
I think this internship is one of the best gifts ever. I have grown so much this year. God has been able to use this broken vessel to reach people here. It has humbled me so much. To think that this 22nd year of life is really just the beginning to this next phase in life.
I honestly can't wait!!
Thanks you again for all you support.
4 weeks left of the internship.
i think im gonna go have some cake now.
love you guys!

A Runner's Mentality

Hey guys,
So I was running the other day and just had this crazy cool time with Jesus.
Thought I would share with you.
I don't know about any of you guys but I hate running. I mean I love it, but really I hate it. I did cross country and track in high school and haven't done very much until recently. But as I was running the other day I was just thinking about life. There are so many times when I feel like quitting, there are so many times when I actually have quit. When things get too difficult, when I reach the half way point and think that its good enough. But really, what good is that? Why quit?
God has called us to run a race, not just run a race but give it our all. We should persevere through the difficult times cause the reward is worth it. Every time I run in the mornings, I'm so tempted to stop halfway, to just be content with the amount of running I have already done. I mean its better than not running at all right? But really, where does that get us? What kind of growth would happen in our life if we always stopped halfway? Not very much.
Being a little past the half way point of the internship I started to feel that. I'm being completely honest. We have learned and done so much in the past 10 or so weeks its so tempting to just start to get lazy and start to give less than 100% here. NO! I won't let my body win, I can't give into that.
When I ran cross country, I can honestly say I was never the fastest. I don't think I ever won a single race. I can say that I never gave up. I would always push through and run the entire time. While others would begin to walk at certain points, or would start off really fast then barely have enough energy to finish, I would persevere through. That was my secret weapon. See, as that final 200 yards approached, thats when I would push through. I was already super tired, but I always pushed myself to the very edge. What was amazing was that even through I never won the race, there were always people I would pass in that final stretch because I had a goal. I didn't want to finish my race knowing that there was still energy I could have used. I would give it my all.
That's how we should live our life.
Thats what God was telling me to do.
We should live our lives in a way of that runner's mentality.
Instead of just walking through life afraid of going through challenges or quitting when life gets tough, run even harder. When you feel like you are about to fall over, push even further. Then you know what happens? You keep running, you don't die even when you feel like you are. God honors that hard work and gives you the energy and strength and pretty much everything to see it through.
Then, the next time you face something, it's easier.
So I just wanted to encourage you guys and share this. I know it really encouraged me the other day.
Have a great rest of your week.
P.S. Greg Tipton spoke yesterday about fasting, prayer, evangelism, and 10 Days mission. As one of my classmates said, my life is ruined now thanks to him (in a good way.) I think the whole class left feeling a greater compassion for people. I think GOd spoke to us all and gave us all some sort of vision for our life. Greg also prayed over us and prayed for power, and let me tell you, the power came! It was pretty crazy.

Fear

Hey everyone.
Hope you guys have had a great week.
Mine was amazing!
Let me explain...
So some of you may know this, some of you don't but around middle school I struggled with rejection a lot. I guess like any other teen. However, for some reason it grew stronger as I got older and fell into a depression. God was totally able to heal me and bring me out of my depression and has helped me and my insecurities however, I have still struggled with that fear of rejection and that lack of confidence in myself.
This week that battle was conquered.
You know, the past 4 years of my life are a huge testament to God and stepping out in faith. I feel like its always been easy for me to take leaps of faith financially and in other things, but when it comes to people, I always comes short.
Peter Dusan, amazing young pastor from Texas, came and hung out with us for a week and just showed us how to have that fear of the Lord and share with others about Jesus and what he has done in our lives.
This guy was a beast. No fear of man. He had such a huge heart for people it really challenged me.
At first I was feeling really discouraged, I felt like a failure. I wanted to go up to people on campus and build friendships but that fear of rejection kept weighing me down.
Wednesday evening however, I drew the line. I had enough with this constant defeat.
This is really the one area of my life that I felt Satan still really had a hold on and I was through letting him have it.
I prayed for a greater compassion and burden for people.
I prayed for God to truly help me put on the armor from Ephesians 6:10
I prayed for a warriors attitude instead of one of defeat.
Then I started to cry.
I didn't really know why.
I realized that literally all of a sudden God gave me that heart of compassion.
It was almost like the movie The Grinch when his hear grew so much it didn't even fit the screen. I felt my hear grow so much for people that nothing else didn't even matter.
The next day we went out on campus and God blew me away. I was able to talk to 2 people and share with them and love them. One girl was Mormon and told me that she had never really met a christian who was so nice to her and not judgmental. I got to pray with her and she thanked me and invited me to hang out with her next week.
The next day I talked to 4 girls. All of which grew up in the Catholic church and were really hurt by religion. I was able to talk and pray with all 4 of them and 2 are actually gonna try and come to church tonight.
WOW.
Thats all I thought at the end of the week.
Did God really just use me to reach out to others?
3 days ago I had just been complaining to God how impossible and stupid it was for me to try and do something like that.
Here is the main thing I learned.
I love Jesus.
He loves me more.
I need to break down the religious walls.
Give them More Jesus.
Show him how real he is.

You know, I also realized that by going out there are winning this battle of fear, its helped me also be more confident.
This week I also got to help lead small group and continued helping out with my middle school girls. I realized even with those two things, I was a lot more confident in what I was doing.

So I just want to encourage you guys. Fear is a big thing in life. But, fear can be defeated. I just want to challenge you to keep pushing through knowing that God has your back and you can fight this. Sometimes its hard when we dont know the final result or when God feels far away, but by believing that he is going to take care of you and trusting in Him, he will see you through.

So, that was this week.
It's October, only like 6 weeks left.
Time has been flying by so fast.
Love you guys!
Thanks for the continued prayers.

P.S. I still don't know how to post pictures on here but there are a few pictures on facebook of the middle school group I work with if you guys want to see.

youth transformations

Hey everyone!
Sorry that I have failed in the blog department. It's been a great but super busy couple of weeks.
With the internship taking off, we have all been getting amazing opportunities to start building relationships on different college campuses and I have been loving the time I've been spending the the high school and middle school girls. This past weekend we had this event called youth transformations which was basically a time for the youth to come and learn how to let go of certain areas of their life such as bitterness, loneliness, and any other hurts or wrongs and learn to just surrender and give it to Jesus. We had 14 girls come and all just learned and grew so much. There are a few pictures that I took from the overnight portion of the weekend. You can look on facebook or flickr.
I cant' believe its almost October!! The internship is going by soo fast! Hope you are all doing amazing!
Love you guys