Weary Hearts Rejoice
With parents rarely home, and a brother deep in a world of drugs, Jerry fell into a lifestyle modeling his family’s. “I can remember being a little kid and having to carry backpacks full of drugs,” he shares.
From a young age, Lindsey also lived in this world. But it was only one side of her suffering. Soon after high school, she began a relationship with a man that led to ten years of severe abuse. “I never unpacked my stuff.” She was always prepared to run. “He was going to end up killing me.”
Jerry suffered a different abuse in his first marriage – a wife unfaithful to him. The devastating news contributed to a relapse after many years of his successful sobriety.
Both broken and alone, Jerry and Lindsey met and would later marry – but even together, they struggled to escape the pain of their past.
This unhealthy lifestyle resulted in jail time for both. But soon after their release, Lindsey became pregnant with their son, Gunner. “We’d already made the conscious decision to be sober, and I think God blessed us,” Lindsey says.
For a time, the couple saved enough to live in a small apartment. But two weeks before Gunner’s birth, Lindsey fell and broke her ankle. The added medical expenses meant they’d be short on rent and would have nowhere to stay. “But the Mission helps whoever comes through these doors,” Jerry says.
At first, Lindsey feared relapsing at the Mission. But God made His plans and provision clear. “I heard the same Scripture five times in three days,” she remembers. “‘Seek first the kingdom of God, and all these things will be added to you.’ God said, ‘Don’t worry… just work on our relationship, and everything else will be taken care of.’”
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