Hope Eternal: My Journey from Brokenness to Blessing

Below is an exert from the autobiography I am writing with my husband. There is more to come:

I could barely recognize the girl in the mirror. I couldn't believe it was me.

Sore… beaten… broken… desperate… vulnerable.

I could barely move. My fingers… frozen. Wrists… curling up. Eyes… swollen. Mind… foggy.

My life was as dark and empty as the filthy bus stop I was standing in. Everything in me was dying. They had crushed my body, and my heart.

One tiny shred of hope remained. A small flame still flickered in my darkness.

“God, help me.”

It wasn’t long before the answer came. I stood in line, waiting to get back on the bus that had carried me to safety. But where was I going? Who would help me? What was I going to do? I was homeless.

Then I heard her, making her way through the crowd, preaching. Could I trust her? Was she just like THEM?

Then I heard his name. Jesus. She was talking about him. He was all I had left. But was her Jesus the same as my Jesus?

Despite my crippled fingers, I managed to grab her hand. “Do you believe in Jesus?” I asked. “I need help.”

She looked me over. Would she flinch? Would she walk? I can’t imagine what she was thinking.

She gently guided me to a payphone. She dialed, and someone picked up. “Mother Howard? It’s me."

The person on the other end was speaking. Then the woman looked closely at me. She just started nodding her head. “Yes,” she said. “Yes,” she said again. “Yes.”

That was it.

“I’m taking you home,” she said.

“What just happened?” I wondered to myself. But I didn’t really need to know. All I really knew was I needed a refuge, and God had just provided one.

I remember that day like it was yesterday. Salvation… rescue… alone no more.