"What can I do?" There's a task for everyone when you're building 3500 square feet in just two days. Jean and her team will keep the builders well fed throughout each day. Lunch will feel like a luxury and each night we'll eat like kings as a fantastic support group will surround Jean with their best effort to keep up with her amazing level of energy. Jean's battled heart problems in the last year, her husband Harry, a great friend to Siempre, passed away just last month... and she was with us Wednesday sharing what she's already prepared and going over the details of how we'll get everything cooked in Mexico. We eat our meals in one of the banquet halls at the Marriott- they chose this week to tear out their kitchens for remodeling, so Jean will be using the kitchen we built last year at Siempre then transporting food for 150 people back to the hotel Friday and Saturday night. She didn't even flinch when she heard the news. Ellen and her husband Tom will become essential to her success and Cynthia... well she usually works on the painting team... but from the looks of this photo she might be getting recruited by Jean and Ellen!

Our bike rides have become the great Wednesday afternoon escape. Heading up the hill towards TJ or down the dirt roads towards the coast, we get to race each other, stop and throw rocks and last week we even caught a snake! I'd followed up on the group, making sure everyone had made it over a little hill, when I coasted down the hill I found Pastor Israel and the boys surrounding a gopher snake- innocently sunning itself -with rocks, ready to stone it to death. My brother use to keep a snake or two and I don't have much fear of them... so... jumping in, I grabbed the guy by the tail and pulled a Crocodile Dundee for the group. Shocked, they jumped away, once I had the snake firmly in my hands, we examined it's scales, looked at it's beady little eyes, then I passed it off to Pastor Israel so I could click this photo with my phone. When we were done, they asked, "How do you make the snake go home?" Gently setting him on the road, I showed them how he was happy to get back to the tall grass. The snake had nearly made it away safely when Israel decided to pick it up again by the tail- giving it a good overhead twirl, he hurled the 4' gopher snake over the bluff to the great delight of the boys. Stunned, I asked why he'd do such a thing? He responded that he thought he'd help the snake get home a little faster. Amazingly, looking down the hill, the snake, apparently none the worse for his flight, slithered into the rocks. Riding back towards Siempre I thought about the lesson's we learned together that day... father/son kind of lessons... the kind none of these kids would ever get, without Siempre. We'd held a living snake, talked about the difference between a gopher snake and a rattler, king or coral snake and I learned that the boys of Siempre will probably never be keeping snakes as pets. They don't seem to be real popular! It's a day we'll all remember for month's to come.

Record breaking heat in the west has the homeless coming out of the shade after dark looking for any respite they can find. Our line stretched WAY... down Main St. as men and women waited anxiously for a taste of one of Jodi's famous BBQ turkey sandwiches served with baked beans. The food hit the mood and everyone was thrilled to share the evening. Robert had his hands full as everyone wanted something to drink and Bart and Karl handed out sandwiches and bags to the guys while keeping the conversation going. One or two of the guys have made it tough lately. We've had a guy who for the last six months or so seems to love causing problems in our line. He's really just begging for attention- but he thinks we should break our set up routines to stop and talk when there's still work to do... when we don't ... well, he can go off in less than friendly ways. Sunday he decided to go off on Jodi, on Bart, throwing a cup of coffee, making lot's of threats... I caught just a bit of his anger. Driving home, listening to the stories, I couldn't help but think of the different kinds of people living in chronic homelessness. A man begging for attention, angry and striking out... another person who told me about her life, sobriety and the battle to maintain her health on skid row... Then there was Dee, a friend of over 19 years, having spent the last two decades on the streets... last week, he broke his leg while working a skid row job... showed up in line on crutches with a full length cast from his hip to his foot. He's still sleeping on the street. Says the cast is hot and sweats, plus it makes it hard to sleep on the ground. Amazing that every man and woman coming through line isn't angry. Make's it a little easier to forgive the rantings of someone crying out to be heard.

Hope... impossible to put a price tag on what it means to have it as a child, abandoned by his or her family... a senior citizen, living in homelessness, leg broken, trying to find a way to feel comfortable in the middle of the night... a roof over the head, a meal in the darkness, so necessary... but hope... it's indispensable... without it, might as well not set the leg... without it, no point in giving shelter and protection... Hope, it's one of the common threads God's used to draw our work with those living in poverty, whether on the streets of TJ or LA, together. Hope, it's what your financial support supplies. Thanks to those of you who've given generously to see that we're able to build this weekend... thanks to those of you who give to Jackets for Jesus so that while some of us are in TJ, a team will be on skid row, serving in love. If you'd like to begin to support our work- with a one time gift, or on a regular basis -the little money button's an easy way to start. You can go directly to PayPal and give securely, online, using whatever form of payment you choose. The money will be deposited instantly according to your directions... more importantly... it will be a seed of hope that will grow and blossom for years to come. May God richly bless you as you bless those who so desperately need hope today. It's a great way to give... a gift that can save a life.

Thanks... I know I send both the Jackets for Jesus update and Siempre update to most of you and that some of you have a primary interest in one or the other... thanks for your heart for your ministry. Poverty and the heartbreak, hunger and pain that follows it is moving like cancer in our community's. We can't do it all... but we can do something... thanks for choosing to do something good for God with your life. The best part of our work is that you're invited to go... you're always needed. We'll be in Mexico and Los Angeles this weekend, it's not too late to join us.

siempre,