Seeing what these kids write on the stones breaks my heart.

As you know, Mercy Chefs has been on-site at the Lonesome Dove Ranch providing hot meals to abused and neglected foster children along with the staff and volunteers here. Each week-long camp concludes with a very emotional gathering in which the children are provided a small white stone and given the opportunity to symbolically write on it something they want to leave in God's hands.

We're in our second week of feeding underprivileged at-risk foster kids at Lonesome Dove Ranch in Texas. Mercy Chefs has been part of this annual outreach for four years, and this year we helped complete the permanent kitchen that will enable this ministry to reach even more hurting kids.

+ + "These kids wrecked me"

But the kids aren't the only ones touched by our efforts to feed body and soul. This is also a life-changing experience for the workers on site. Here's what one of our volunteers shared about her experience:

As I've been sharing with you, this Spring and Summer Mercy Chefs is helping launch four standalone kitchen projects that together will provide thousands of meals this summer and beyond. While these projects have been under way, we also were recently deployed in Ohio in response to the "swarm" of tornadoes that struck the Dayton area. It's been a busy several weeks!

I'm thrilled to report that our work in Texas with the Lonesome Dove Ranch is already making a difference this summer. Lonesome Dove is the home to an amazing ministry that is providing summer camps to disadvantaged foster children in Texas, many who have faced unspeakable difficulties in their young lives.

+ + Amazing encounters for hurting kids...