We know that not everyone will complete the full 12 months, but this in and of itself is not a failure: the lives we touch and the seeds of faith that we plant as a ministry still have the potential to grow into incredible fruit in time.
Take Eddie Stone for example, a former Hope Center resident who left our program due to family issues and recently reached out to us after seeing our Transformation Tuesday posts with his own incredible testimony of recovery!
Eddie's battles with substance abuse began at the age of just 9 years old, but like many, his addiction truly began with a shocking trauma: at the age of 17, his brother and fiancee betrayed him by falling in love with each other, and his reaction was, understandably, far from a healthy one.
The fallout from this betrayal led to years of homelessness and habitual drug use, which in time came to define Eddie's life. He began to feel like everyone in his life who he loved had left him behind, and abandoned him to his fate as nothing more than a homeless drug addict. He eventually suffered another heartbreak with the loss of his best friend to overdose, a pain felt by so many who struggle with addiction.
It was in the aftermath of this loss that Eddie began to get the first inklings of a desire for change, and after reaching out to a friend who'd formerly been incarcerated, was told about our program at Hope Center Ministries. At this point Eddie was tired of the life he'd been living, and was ready for a change, figuring that if the alternative was dying on the streets from an overdose, just like his best friend had, he may as well give recovery a shot.
Eddie entered our program not necessarily knowing what to expect, but felt God begin to move in his life almost immediately upon entering. He felt God not only speaking to him through his sobriety, but showing him that who he was and what he had done in his addiction didn't have to define him anymore: there was a chance at a better life waiting on the other side of a door, and all Eddie had to do was make the choice to walk through it. If he chose to set his identity in Christ, and not in any of the substances that had held him captive for so many years, he too could be redeemed.
Eddie didn't end up staying the full year at Hope Center, eventually leaving to be closer to family, but the seed that was planted during his time with our ministry is one that stayed with him long after he left. He now celebrates over a year of sobriety, of holding down a good job, of managing his bills and navigating the stresses of every day life, and credits his newfound faith for all of this and more.
Something we celebrate is that Eddie actually reached out to us to share his testimony after seeing the testimonies of others; and this is exactly why we do this in the first place. In his own words, "It finally dawned on me that I'm not a screw up any more. I'm worth a real life because GOD SAYS I AM," and at Hope Center, we believe that sometimes that's all you need: faith that God is in your corner and wants to see you succeed in this world that He's created for us. Belief that God doesn't want us to suffer obligates us to find a path of happiness, and we couldn't be more proud to see that Eddie has done exactly that.
If you take one thing away from this story today, let it be this: a step backward doesn't have to define you, so long as you learn from it and make every step forward that you make from there in the right direction!
Thank you Eddie for sharing this powerful testimony of recovery, and thank you to all who support the mission of Hope Center Ministries in all that we do to reach those struggling with addiction.
Happy Transformation Tuesday!