Dear Ministry Partners,

The Story

"Yeah, I was supposed to already be home, but my friends left to go stay with some guy. So I'm trying to figure out where I'm gonna go."

This was what I heard come out of the mouth of a girl who was finishing up her Senior year of highschool. She was 18, but that did not make any of this situation better. Me and Alli, my team lead, shared a look and started trying to figure out how we could help the situation. As Arden, our girl in the front seat, continued to talk to this girl, I heard a prayer come from the back. Tim was leading one of the guys in the back of the van in a salvation prayer. About 10 minutes later, I heard Ben having a conversation with the other guy in the van, who recommitted his life to Christ. During all of this, Elena was praying in the middle row.

This was the last run of the night, and it was my last run for the week. We picked up two guys and a girl from a hotel parking lot and took them to a gas station a minute away. This was 2:30 in the morning. Elena posted on the Prayer Wall that every Beach Reacher whose job it was to pray could see. "Less than a minute drive. Pray we have all the time we need." We left that gas station at 3:05.

The girl was already a believer, but was not that knowledgeable of the faith and wanted to know more. Arden greatly connected with her and eventually the girl got ahold of a friend who was able to pick her up and take her somewhere safe to stay. And like I said, during that 30 minutes, one guy came to Christ and the other recommitted himself to his Savior.

Prayer works, and God saves.

The Successes

We had three students who had been to Beach Reach before. The other six had never been. It was so awesome watching God work through and in these students! I watched introverts share the Gospel as if they had known these people for years. The three students from the previous year, Ben, Arden, and Kai, really stepped up as leaders. They encouraged the group, shared the Gospel like pros, and helped take care of any students that were struggling.

Ben was blessed to be a part of a guy giving his life to Christ! Arden was also blessed when she was able to help lead a girl to Christ. Tim was blessed to reach two guys!

The Struggles

Beach Reach is never without struggle. If you put people in a confined space, with little downtime, and very little sleep, all while sharing the Gospel and dealing with spiritual attacks, you tend to get some struggles. For some it was reminders of past trauma. There was some conflict between team members. For others, it was being discouraged because it felt like they weren't actually making a difference.

Praise God that He worked in all of those instances to draw people closer to Him and closer to eachother. No matter what the enemy throws against us, Jesus has already won.

The Stats

4 salvations in our van!

2 recommitments!

10 trucks honking at our sign during pancake breakfast.

2 of our students baptized! Regan had never been baptized and Tim got rebaptized because he had done it as a kid because it was expected of him.

Way too many Redbulls consumed.

The stats for the entire week can be viewed in the attached photo.

Ways to Pray

• That we will all take the momentum from Beach Reach back to UTD and reach the people there.
• That God will work in the hearts of every person that we talked to last week.
• Recovery for everyone. We are tired.
• Two Wylie students on our leadership team, Freddi and Saleem, both got into car accidents during the break. Freddi is on bed rest, but is recovering. Saleem is fine, but no longer has a vehicle.
• Collin Wylie's next Gathering is Thursday, March 26th. I won't be speaking, but pray that God uses it spectacularly.

To God Be the Glory,

Jacob Gaines