On a routine visit to her eye doctor more than a year ago, Maribel Yow was told that she had shadows in her eyes that could be the beginnings of glaucoma. She was told that she could lose her eyesight partially or completely within a few years.

Yow is a student at La Sierra University who participated in the California Youth Rush literature evangelism program in Southern California Conference in the 2006 summer program. As a young person with the best of her life ahead, she had a hard time coming to grips with the idea of losing her eyesight and understandably struggled with feelings of depression over the issue. All summer she tried to surrender it to God, but couldn’t find peace. On a particularly hard day she met an older gentleman at his door and found that they had something in common.

“Could you come a little closer? I can’t see you very well,” the man said.

“Can I ask what your particular problem is?” Yow asked.

“Glaucoma,” he replied. It was obvious that giving this man a book wouldn’t help him much since he couldn’t read, so instead she shared her story about glaucoma.

Yow said later that the man was blessed because “some random person spent some time with him and prayed with him in a lonely period of his life.”

“I was blessed because he encouraged me to surrender this to God because He is in control,” she reflected.

In August 2006, Yow returned to her eye doctor, who sent her to another doctor, who sent her to another doctor. Each one came to the same conclusion: there were no shadows in her eyes! Today, Yow is a resident assistant to the dean of women at La Sierra University, and she can see just fine.

The California Youth Rush program involved 19 young people in the Southern California Conference. They distributed almost 11,800 books in Ventura and Los Angeles counties, and 150 people expressed interest in some type of religious resource such as Bible studies and Revelation seminars. Students like Maribel who participate in the program receive a commission averaging about $2,600 for their 10 weeks of work, but their reward is much greater than that. Each participant has the joy of meeting people in heaven who will be there because of a book that they left in a home.

For more information about participating in California Youth Rush in the Southern California Conference territory, please visit www.youthrush.org and click on the Southern California Conference link or call Jason Worf, director, at 818-434-0558.