Venessa:
Hello, my name is Vanessa Hardt and I am 26 years old. I am a recovering addict. I have two wonderful children. I came from a pretty normal childhood. My dad's side of the family is Christian. I grew up knowing who God was and accepted Him in my heart when I was about 8 years old. It was in my teen years that I really turned away from Him. |
Jack:
I started using drugs and alcohol when I was 10 years old. I had a pain in my heart that I thought would go away. After using for 16 years, I realized how much more damage I had caused and what kind of animal I had become. |
When I was 14 I started having sex and smoking. I went from one abusive relationship (not always physical) to another. I first tried marijuana when I was 14, but didn't care for it too much. I graduated high school in January of 2000, and it was then that my life went really down hill. I started using marijuana on a regular basis and was introduced to methamphetamines. It only took one time and I was addicted. At the age of 19, I met my husband. I was married in February of 2002 and had my first child, a boy I named Cody, in July. I thought that after I got married things would get better, but I was wrong. My husband was an alcoholic and was verbally abusive. We had our second child, a daughter named Chyanne, in September of 2003. By now I was very depressed and turning more and more to my drugs. We were never able to keep a place, and my husband was never faithful.It was in July of 2006 that I lost everything. Within a week, my parents had taken my children, I lost my house, and my husband left me for another woman. I was homeless and hopeless.
I came to City Light and checked into the emergency shelter. It was there that I learned about the program. I put in an application, and on October 25, 2006, I entered the New Life Program. When I came in I was broken and scared. I thought that I had lost all chances in life and the only way out for me was death. Now that I have completed the program and am working for the Rescue Mission, I realize I am a totally different woman. Instead of worrying what is going to happen to my children or husband, I now know that God is control and will restore my family when the time is right. I am taking steps forward, which I know is only through the grace of God. City Light and God have given me the best gift anyone ever could. I was given a new life and an opportunity to become the woman that God had always intended me to be.
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I gave up everything for the dark lifestyle of drugs, especially meth. I didn’t care who I hurt or what happened to anyone as long as I got what I wanted.
By God’s grace, I had an awakening that changed my life. Throughout the 18 months that I was in the New Life Program at the Lighthouse, I was transformed into a new man. God has made it possible for me to be free and to gain back all I had lost. Praise God for all the great people and things he has put into my life, for without them and God I would have nothing.
This is my life verse: “He has delivered us from the power of darkness and conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love, in whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins.” Colossians 1:13-14. |
