Home of Hope 2

Home of Hope 2:
It is easy to get swallowed up in the blessing of a place. It is so easy to just sit back and watch miracles happen and feel the love and peace transforming lives and turning generations to God. It is so easy, that you tend to assume that everyone in it and around it, sees it too. But some people just float through life.

The Home of Hope women have addictions and wounds that would make us cringe. It is hard to understand the depth of their pain. They come to the Home of Hope Teen Challenge as a last resort of sorts. They spent years being broken and scarred and making bad choices, it won’t take a small amount of time to get to the root of their pain. Some of these women are pros at blocking out reality. So much so that living on the surface of who they are, living for survival, living for the moment, is all they know. This is how they survived their life experiences. This is how they survive who they became. If they don’t look too long or too deep, it can’t affect them. I understand that pain.

Unfortunately, when someone is an expert blocker, they not only miss the pain, but they miss the pleasure. Most don’t know how to build relationship, or communicate effectively. They can’t talk about life or all of the tough choices. They don’t trust. They have had plenty of reasons not to trust. When they are hurt, they simply block it out and/or run. So when these women, and their children, come to the Home of Hope, they have no idea how to address their pain. They are like infants learning to co-exist with a houseful of other women and children who are also not schooled in communication or problem solving. In fact, they have developed some primitive, and very poor, methods of dealing with other difficult people.

These women can’t move past the life they chose until they address the bad decisions and painful experiences. They develop a hard shell with a really soft center. Unfortunately, their poor decision making skills lead them to bare their souls to many of the wrong people. They tend to give their hearts too easily, just for the ultimate betrayal by other people who are broken. Much like every other woman that walks into the HOH, she hits bottom. Praise God.

To be there every week and watch the transformation is so encouraging and uplifting. These women come in filled with shame and defensive hostility. Most don’t even know they need to be there. But over time, they share their pain and unfold their damage and iron out those wrinkles in life so that it makes sense. They allow faith and God to heal their wounds. They succumb to the need for spiritual and emotional support. They work through and help others in the process. They come to understand who they were meant to be.

They have a better chance here. The Hope of Hope is filled to the brim with strong spiritual women filled with the Light of God. The warmth and love they exude fills the air. Though there may be sprinkles of darkness that are bound to occur where humans are present, that darkness is in the process of being diminished. After all, they take in a lot of damaged souls and they are always at varying levels of progression into the light. The atmosphere is primarily light. It literally makes me gush with joy and love.

This Home doesn’t just grow up the women and children here. It can reach their parents, grandparents, siblings who may be dabbling in drugs or alcohol, friends see the miracles and want it too. My own son commented that he had never in his whole life seen this type of joy and love on his older sister’s face before. He was awe struck.

The Home Of Hope gradually acclimates the women and children, over an 18 month period, so that they can face the world. They must re-enter the dark world again with new weapons of faith and light. They have strength and faith in God and have re-built their foundation to include an autopilot to God when trouble arises. Now, they must be more careful, because the world is primarily dark and they must constantly turn to their faith and hold up the light to see their true path in the dark.

No matter how much I write, I cannot do it justice. It is something that you just have to see to believe. Take a tour. Sponsor a woman and her children. Read their letters of struggle and triumph. Know that when you change one life, it has a ripple effect on all others that pass by.

God bless and keep you all.