Mother and daughter Christina & Sierra having fun togather

Happy Monday everyone! Here’s a wonderful story of restoration to get the week started on the right foot!

When Christina thinks about her childhood, she just closes her eyes and shakes her head.

“My mom was an alcoholic,” she remembers. “I was raised in bars.” Drugs eased the pain of growing up under such difficult circumstances. But they didn’t answer the bigger questions lurking deep down inside. “God, what did I ever do to deserve this?” she remembers thinking. “Why won’t you just provide a way out for me?” Several years later, God did provide a way out — the day she stepped inside the doors at our Village of Hope. Years from now, she says she’ll look back on this time and remember this as “a turning point in my life.”

“This is where I learned to live . . . and where I learned how to love God and trust again,” she adds. All because your generosity opened the door to her heart to embrace the God who never stopped loving her .

Most of us will go home to our nice, safe houses tonight and not give it a second thought. But what if you don’t have a home? Christina moved into her mother’s mobile home for a while. But when her mom passed away, she couldn’t keep up with the payments – even after her selling TV, laptop and iPod. Christina fell into a deep depression and got hooked on drugs. That’s how she ended up in a cockroach infested drug house where she cooked on a camp stove in her bedroom and washed her clothes in a plastic tote.

“I knew I needed help,” she says, “but I was afraid that if I told anyone, they’d notify CPS and I’d lose my daughter.” There has to be a better alternative for people like Christina who fall on hard times. And thanks to your generosity, there is the Orange County Rescue Mission.

For Christina, your gifts made it possible for her to go back to school, where she has now received her certificate in administrative assistance through Irvine College. “It was difficult, but I did it!” she says proudly. For the first time that she can remember, Christina has achieved something real. Tangible. An accomplishment that has helped her discover newfound confidence as she thinks about future possibilities for herself and her daughter. It’s amazing what an education can do to get someone back on their feet and on the road to self-sufficiency.

“The Rescue Mission has really helped me to learn to live life on life’s terms,” she says. More proof that amazing things happen when you give.

You can watch her video here.