Video Transcription

I'm Mary and I have lived in Oregon my whole life. I've been sober 13 years. I was what they called in the alcoholic world a functioning alcoholic and there was a lot of shame and guilt. There still is. When I was at my worst and it was Mother's Day, it was May 9th, 2010. It's the last drink, the last cigarette. I was outside. I was drunk. I had my son driving. I audibly heard to my core like I shook so hard. God said, you're done and he yelled it like everybody could hear it. I hit the ground because I wasn't really sure what was going on because I was drunk but I knew that I had to quit drinking and that I had to quit smoking and that's the last time that I drank or smoked.

I graduated New Hope Christian College. That was a whole big thing. I found New Hope and I drove in and I just wanted to check it out and there was a bronze statue of a man letting a bird free, go free out of a cage and I got the ugly cry and a guy named Tony Joyner came out. He was there at the time and brought me a bunch of Kleenex so I could put over my face and went inside and he was like, I think you're supposed to be here and I thought to myself, I'm in my 50s. I don't need to be here. This is just weird, right? I had three days to get transcripts that were locked because I owed money, FASFA scholarship, and everything. So I prayed about it and I asked God, I'm like, if this is what you want me to do, you have to fling that door open so wide that I know it's you and that I'm supposed to walk through it. I got a call from them three days later saying your first year's paid for. And yeah, I could tell you about all the negativity with the drinking and all of that but that's not where I am anymore and God's taken me from that.

And I feel very blessed to know that I'm okay now and that wreckage of marriages or abuse or whatever you want to label all the stuff as is no longer. I don't live there anymore and I always talk to my kids about that. I say that your rear view mirror in your vehicle is small because you need to see behind you so you don't back into it. But you're, it's making me cry, sorry, but your front windshield is large so you can see what you're doing going forward. And I think that's all Christ is asking us to do, is to take the time, be with Him, build the relationship. None of this would have happened if I didn't have an intimate relationship with Him. What I would say to anybody that's lost or dealing with abuse, domestic violence, addiction, John 10.10 says that the enemy comes to steal, kill, and destroy. And if that's the way your life looks right now, there's hope. And that's the biggest thing I could say to you is that there's hope. You have to know that He hears you, that He wants you, that He loves you, that He doesn't love you anymore today than He did yesterday in all your mess. He still loved you then, He still loves you now. You can't give up. You just can't give up.