God's Love

A SATURDAY NIGHT EVENING IN 2001 — As we prepare to do our Saturday walk our team, consisting of Sharon, Dan and Jeannie assemble all the materials that might be required for our walk in the streets of Vancouver’s Eastside. The candy bags are the most important. They have been packed with care and carry a message of GOD’S LOVE. This message is printed on a small card, which is placed into each bag. Each one of the girls can experience the power of God this night, through His written Word. How the girls ended up in this most unsightly area of Vancouver doesn’t matter much to us. We are there for one purpose. We will be with them tonight to remind each woman that they are so special to God, and loved by Him, that in all time and eternity, He only created ONE of them and that He only wants to pour out His love upon them. What we don’t know is that tonight we will meet a girl named Rachel. She’s not so much different that all other girls we will meet with this night, but for some reason Rachel will enter into our hearts in a special way. All the girls are important to us, but many of us who have Ministered on the street have experienced how the power of the Spirit sets human bonds, giving life and love in a new a wonderful way. Rachel did have that “special smile” cute little freckles on her face and that “twinkle in her eyes.” Each and every night thereafter we would do our best to find Rachel. Rachel would drift in and out of our lives, some times we would not seen her for weeks at a time. Later on that year we found our Rachel had news to share with us, she was expecting a baby in early 2002. What was most wonderful was that despite the encouragement she had to abort her child she was determined to give life to the child that was a gift from God. Many of the women who give birth downtown cannot keep their children because of their situation but what is such a blessing is their understanding of the value of life. We lost track of our Rachel again and as time for her delivery drew near so did our desire to find Rachel. We were pleased to find her in hospital, and although we were not able to visit due to her circumstance we were linked together by phone and were able to share the joy of the birth of her little boy. After Rachel had her baby she really disappeared. Weeks dragged into months and still no sign or word of her came to us. She remained close in our hearts. Every Saturday night after our street walk we would look at her picture, wonder where she was, and we would ask the Lord to keep her safe and free her from this dreadful addiction. .

APRIL 29/04 — The phone rings at Pat and Vicki’s home— a call from a girl they don’t know, but soon Vicki realizes that this is Rachel — the girl that was so close to our hearts. Our Rachel is in jail and wants us to be at her parole hearing on May 5/04. Praise the Lord she is back in our lives and she is safe. For one and one half years our Rachel has carried that little Agape Prayer Card with God’s message of love. She reaches out once again with the words of a very lonely girl HELP ME I NEED YOU. God needs to do some work here and he does. The justice system has it rules and in order to get us into her parole hearing we needed some miracles and quickly. The Lord very quickly and quietly cleared a pathway for Rachel’s Parole Hearing. Sharon and I will be with our Rachel at her parole hearing this week. This is what Agape Street Ministry is all about, accepting the women for who they are, loving them, caring for them and being there when they call “HELP ME I NEED YOU.” PLEASE PRAY FOR RACHEL on her road to recovery. May she experience God’s infinite love and healing in her life and come to the place of hope and new life in Him.