For 15 years, violence was my life. But I couldn’t handle it. Getting high on crack was the only way I could live with myself, the only way I could bury the guilt and memories of what I’d done.

By 29, I tired of it all and left gang life for six years. However, I kept smoking crack and even went back to the gang. Then one night in 2010, I got ambushed. I should have died right there in the street. But they missed. That’s when God got my attention.

I left gang life for good and tried to get clean, but I still couldn’t live with myself sober. I finally said, enough is enough. It was get sober or die. I came to Union Rescue Mission—not just to quit drugs, but to deal with me.

Over the next year and a half, I got into God’s Word and met my Lord, who died for everything I’d ever done. Through His love and forgiveness, and the love I experienced from the people here, I started to change. Then God began opening my eyes to all the other hurt men and women inside these walls. God filled my heart with so much empathy for them, and He started using me to help transform their lives.

Little by little, I learned that a tough man isn’t the guy with a gun or a knife. A tough guy is a man with compassion. I spent my life hurting so many people. I have so much regret.

Thank you for supporting Union Rescue Mission. I should have died years ago. I deserved to die. But thanks to you, I’m alive and a man of God. Thank you for giving me a second chance to change and to help others. May God bless you.

I should have died right there in the street. But they missed.

Even in sunny Los Angeles, winter nights can be dangerously cold. Yet thousands of men, women, and children experiencing homelessness will curl up to sleep tonight in parks, in back alleys, in cars, on city streets, and under bridges.

Often their health and even their very lives are at stake as the increased rains in January and February make LA winters even more miserable. Tragically, more people devastated by homelessness died of hypothermia last year in Los Angeles than in New York City and San Francisco combined.

• Hypothermia occurs when the body loses heat faster than it can produce heat, causing the normal body temperature to fall below 95 degrees. This can lead to heart and respiratory system failure and eventually death. ‍
• Hypothermia is caused by exposure to cold temperatures and cold water, and commonly occurs when a person is in the cold for too long, doesn’t have appropriate clothing, or isn’t able to change out of wet clothes and move to a warm, dry location.
• Hypothermia can set in at temperatures as high as 40 degrees and rain virtually guarantees hypothermia

With your support, we’re able to offer warm shelter, safe beds, hot food, and other emergency services that save lives. Thank you!

Many men and women devastated by homelessness in Los Angeles have little hope that their lives will be different in the coming year. But not at Union Rescue Mission.

Every day, someone here or at Hope Gardens is gaining the skills, courage, strength, and tools they need to start over again. He or she will have a brand-new chance for a brand-new life—because someone cared. Because YOU cared.

Today, someone else needs your help. Your generous gift of any size will help a struggling man, woman, or child start a new life in 2020. Thank you!

$25.40 can provide 10 nourishing meals

$83.90 is enough for 2 nights of shelter

$37.50 can provide 1 day of job training