Setting The Captives Free Ministry: Fighting For Chavez Ravine

"Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free." 
John 8:32

Chavez Ravine, located in a valley a few miles from downtown Los Angeles, was home to generations of Mexican Americans.  Named for Julian Chavez, one of the first Los Angeles County Supervisors in the 1800s, Chavez Ravine was a self-sufficient and tight-knit community, a rare example of small town life within a large urban metropolis. Viewed by neighborhood outsiders as a “vacant shantytown” and an “eyesore,” Chavez Ravine’s 300-plus acres were earmarked by the Los Angeles City Housing Authority as a prime location for re-development. In July 1950, all residents of Chavez Ravine received letters from the city telling them that they would have to sell their homes in order to make the land available for the proposed Elysian Park Heights. Some residents resisted the orders to move and were soon labeled “squatters,” while others felt they had no choice and relocated. Most received insubstantial or no compensation for their homes and property. ("The History of Chavez Ravine." PBS. PBS, n.d. Web. 21 Apr. 2014.)

In the wake of this tragedy, many who resisted the orders to move began to take drastic measures. Many people chained themselves to their homes, both young and old fought, and vied to not give up their homes without a fight. In fact, there still exists in the history books of Chavez Ravine, photographs and film of these residents desperately fighting to keep their homes, their livelihoods, their very well-being.

The birth of this website is our cry of solidarity. We have planted our feet in the ground and have readied for battle. Our desire is to reach the lost and dying at any cost. To minister to the hopeless and forgotten of Los Angeles, throughout this country, and around the world. To spread the love of Jesus Christ, the message of the cross, and the hope of salvation to all the nations. Just as the residents of Chavez Ravine were willing to give up of themselves at any cost, so we too desire to do the same. We are living testimonies of the freeing power of the Truth, the Gospel of Jesus Christ, for it is "the power of God unto salvation." (Romans 1:16) We know the power of sin that once kept us in bondage and now cling to the freeing power of the blood of Jesus Christ. We have been redeemed "not of seed which is corruptible but incorruptible, that is, through the living and enduring word of God." (1 Peter 1:23) And so we say in one voice, for the sake of lost souls coming to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ...

We have decided to follow Jesus
Though none go with us, still we will follow
No Turning Back