Union Rescue Mission, The Way Home

The Mission: March 2010

by Erin on Wednesday, March 24th, 2010, Filed Under In The News, The Latest | View Comments

 

An Investment in New Expectations

Daniel was a rising star in the investment world until alcohol ruined his life. Your investment in him gave Daniel another chance.

Daniel’s friends and family expected big things from him.  After all, he had earned a spot on the National Honor Society in high school, appeared on the “Who’s Who” list of American students, and was awarded a full academic scholarship to study business and finance in college.

“People would always tell me what a great man of God I was going to be and that I was going to affect so many people,” Daniel says. “But I didn’t want any part of it.”

To cope, Daniel turned to alcohol, and the more he climbed the corporate ranks of the banking industry, the more he drank. ” Every night after I got home, I drank myself to sleep.”

Finally, in January 2007, his drinking cost him his job. By Christmas, he had lost all his savings and found himself on New Year’s Eve in downtown Los Angeles, with only $17 to his name.

“As I sat there, I started to pray,” Daniel recalls. “Lord, I’m sorry. I know this is all my fault. Please forgive me and take control of my life.”

The next morning, Daniel heard about Union Rescue Mission and immediately joined the one-year Life Transformation Program. He knew it was his only chance – and he wasn’t going to miss it.

“Every day I attended classes taught by the chaplains, met with counselors, studied my Bible, prayed, and completed every assignment designed to help me be more honest with myself, and dig into the deep-rooted issues and fears I had always tried to cover up,” he says.

He dealt with resentment he felt towards his father for abandoning him as a child, and even reconnected with him. He learned to trust friends and authroities, and to let himself be vulnerable, exposing his weaknesses – and most important, accepting their help and support.

And finally, the Program helped him uncover his crippling “fear of success, a fear that had always kept me from going after big dreams. “

One year later, in January 2009, Daniel graduated from URM’s Life Transformation Program a new man. “I haven’t touched alcohol in over two years,” he says today. “Every day I feel myself becoming a stronger man in God.

“God has called me to some big plans and I’m no longer afraid of the success He has planned for me. I’m like the Prodigal Son. I was once dead, but now I’m alive. And I know the life I have now is all because of what Jesus did.”

“The people who give to Union Rescue Mission aren’t investing in stocks or bonds, they’re investing in human souls and transformed lives. I know, because their investment gave me a second chance at life.”

Please watch Daniel’s story online at www.urm.org/stories.

 

Transforming Lives From the Inside Out

How your generous gifts give people experiencing homelessness a second chance.

Men and women trapped in homelessness must often overcome significant barriers before they can return to a productive life. Devastating emotional challenges from their past, broken relationships with family, addiction issues, criminal pasts, and insufficient job or life skills all hold people back and keep them trapped in homelessness and poverty.

Overcoming these barriers usually requires a structured, long-term recovery process. Union Rescue Mission’s Life Transformation Programs, lasting between one and three years, give men and women experiencing homelessness the real help they need to rebuild their broken lives.

For 118 years, generous people like you have offered tens of thousands of hurting men and women the chance to rebuild their lives. The three most important parts of our programs include:

The Discipline to Change

People experiencing homelessness often distrust structure in their lives and resist accountability. Our programs give people a daily structure that demands discipline. And we provide them with a network for mentoring relationships, including chaplains, counselors, and each other that encourages and strengthens them.

Support through Tough Times

Many people who enter our programs face long-term emotional abuse, neglect, addictions, and life-related issues that have shipwrecked their lives. Our programs provide ongoing counseling and classes with chaplains and counselors that help them deal with the wounds they carry with them.

Learning to Lean on God

The most important component to change is spiritual growth. We encourage each man and woman to develop a relationship with God and rely on His strength to rebuild their lives. Then we offer regular Bible studies, worship services, and daily opportunities for personal devotion.

 

Notes from Andy

Living Second-Chance Lives

Every day when I come into Union Rescue Mission I’m reminded that when Jesus died and rose again on that first Easter morning, God promised every man, woman and child a second chance at new life. I see that promise at work every day in the lives of hundreds of people here at URM and at Hope Gardens.

In addition to counseling, classes, caring love, and menoring, I believe the single most important part of our life-transforming programs is helping men and women experiencce the power of Jesus Christ in their lives. In the end, it takes a miracle of God for people to experience real, lasting change.

Right now, more than 48,000 people are experiencing homelessness in Los Angeles, most of them able-bodied men and women who have the portential of returning to work and rebuilding their relationships as husbands and wives and mothers and fathers- to be productive members of society again.

All they need is one more chance, a little help, and the power of God to overcome addictions, learn to change their lifestyles, gain new job skills, grow their spiritual lives, and build a firm foundation that enables them to live in a healtyh way. Thank you for being a part of this miraculous, life-transforming work.

Blessings,

 

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