His Sisters Prayers were Answered

Leaning my tired and dirty body against the cement wall felt good. Though it was still warm from the afternoon's sun, I was shivering from the approaching chill. Wrapping my arms across my chest for warmth as I settled down for the night didn't make me feel any better either. I was homeless and extremely unhappy.

Just six years earlier I was an impressionable twelve year old boy wanting to be accepted. Peer pressure eventually led me into my life of drug abuse. That's why my stepfather moved us to the Sacramento area. He believed a better life awaited me far away from the influence of LA gangs. Little did he know my "new friends" would be just as bad as those left behind in LA. Not long after moving, I dropped out of school, eventually wound up in jail, and was given the "opportunity" of living in a group home for boys in Stockton.

Life in the group home wasn't much different than the street. Incredibly, it afforded all the fun of the street, along with three reasonably good meals, a roof and a warm bed. Other than that, it did absolutely nothing to help me out of my addiction. So when I finally got out I found myself locked out of my parents home . . . unwelcomed in my drugged out condition. Living on the streets and dealing drugs gave me the perfect opportunity for multiple visits in court and a year in county jail.

That's when my sister and her husband wrote and invited me to live with them when I got out of jail. And they began to pray for me. Sis was never pushy about her religious beliefs, even when I refused to attend church with them. That was cool, since I thought some of her friends were a little fanatical. Getting a job offered me extra freedom but also funded the ability to fall back into drugs. It took me a year before I decided I needed help again. That's when I asked my sister if I could attend church with her. Everyone was thrilled that the evening when I asked Jesus Christ to come into my life. Someone even flippantly told me, "Barry, now you're gonna feel different."

The next day I didn't feel one bit different. So I went across the street to the park and found some of my buddies smoking some weed. When it finally passed to me I took a long puff and discovered something was definitely different . . . not with the marijuana; but with me. At first I freaked out and thought I'd smoked some bad weed but no one else agreed with me. Despite that peculiar encounter in the park, I continued with my addiction until I wound up again in the Orange County jail.

One day I began to tell my cellmate Bill my story. He listened then told me, "You need to go to Teen Challenge!" At that point I'd never even heard of Teen Challenge. All I knew was my life was a mess, so I pleaded with the judge to send me to there for a year. He was well aware of Teen Challenge's success and probated me to them. When I returned to his courtroom a year later, the judge didn't even recognize me! As you can imagine from my photos, he noticed quite a change and intently reviewed my Teen Challenge diploma while interviewing me in front of a packed courtroom. He even asked me to tell my "story." So I told him how Teen Challenge had changed my life. How Teen Challenge introduced me to a person, Jesus Christ. It was an incredible experience for me! Jesus Christ forgave the sin in my life and He set me free from my addictions. And when the judge learned I still had several months remaining on my probation, with a decisive voice and a slam of his gavel, he wiped it all clean.

Since then I've worked for Teen Challenge, served as a youth pastor and an evangelist before returning to the community where my life was in shambles. There I started a little church in my living room where street people could feel comfortable and hear about God's love and forgiveness. Today our living room-sized congregation has grown to over 120 each Sunday. Even my old nemesis, a retired cop who chased me around town in order to haul my drugged-out body off to jail, attends our church.

Am I thankful for Teen Challenge? Were it not for Teen Challenge pointing me to God, I'd be dead today. Teen Challenge gave me a candle of hope and taught me that with God, all things are possible . . . even escaping the clutches of addiction.