Rescue Portland May 2013
One Last Drink God Pulled Teri From The Darkness “This is it,� Teri thought. She poured the last drops of vodka into her glass and downed it, hoping the nearly half-gallon of spirits would be enough to kill her. Darkness consumed her as her eyelids fell heavy. Her body went limp... - Continues inside -
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A Matter Of Life Or Death Death seemed like an irresistible friend to both Teri and Jeremy. Daily life only drew out the overwhelming heartache, loss, depression and loneliness that eroded their will to live. Most of the men and women who come to the Mission know all too well that same kind of despair. Addiction has destroyed everything they ever held dear – family, job, home and safety. They’ve lost much more than most of us can bear to imagine. They’ve lost hope. That’s why your partnership is so vital in our life-giving ministry. You do more than help us serve a hot meal to a hungry person. You do more than help provide a safe, warm bed to a weary body. You help breathe life into a broken soul. You give hope.
P.O. Box 3713 Portland, OR 97208-3713 503-MISSION (647-7466) www.PortlandRescueMission.org
Mission Needs Socks are a constant need for men and women on the streets. We also need: • New undergarments
Lives change at Portland Rescue Mission. Generous financial support and dedicated, compassionate volunteering from friends like you make it possible.
• Blankets
Grateful to you,
• Deodorant (spray or solid)
• Backpacks • Disposable razors • Toothbrushes • Toothpaste • Travel-size toiletries
Eric Bauer Executive Director
• Jeans
P.S. Thank you for generously partnering with us in offering hope, transformation and total life recovery to men, women and children in great need.
• Life Recovery Bibles (NLT) • Yard equipment: mowers, weed-eaters, leaf blowers, garden soil and pea gravel • Office furniture: conference table (8‘ x 4‘) with 10 chairs • Couch/chair set Please bring donations to the Burnside Shelter at 111 W. Burnside, Portland, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Short-term street parking is usually available at our front door.
Celebrate Next Step! Renovations of Next Step are nearly complete! Next Step is located in Northeast Portland and will house our entire men’s New Life Recovery Program, including staff office space and classrooms, three meals a day, and increased volunteer opportunities. This relocation of our men’s recovery program from downtown to Next Step will significantly increase our
capacity for emergency care (meals, shelter, relationshipbuilding) with homeless men and women at the Burnside Shelter. And the suburban location of Next Step is better suited for effective recovery ministry. Join us for tours and refreshments this summer. Call 503-MISSION (647-7466) or email events@pdxmission.org for options.
More than a meal. More than a bed. GIVE HOPE.
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Teri’s role at the Mission’s Administration Office helps her get back into the workplace.
drinking during the day. I drank at work. I drank after work. In the middle of the night, I would wake up and have another drink.” Friends and co-workers were compassionate, but powerless, as they watched Teri’s life decline. After she tried to drink herself to death, Teri was finally ready to get help. Her roommate helped her find Shepherd’s Door, where women and children heal from the devastating effects of addiction. “I knew the minute I walked through the doors that this was a really special place,” Teri says.
“I felt the power of God everywhere around me.” As she walked down the sunlit halls, Teri whispered a prayer. “Bring me to you, God.” In our New Life Recovery Program, Teri began to heal from the deep wounds behind her addiction. She understood how the death of her father when she was just three years old profoundly affected her life. “At that point, my mother pretty much died with him.” Teri’s mother withdrew her affection and drowned her sorrow in alcohol. “I’ve always felt unworthy of anybody’s love.” (Continued from front cover)
One Last Drink When she woke from her alcohol-induced blackout, Teri had no idea how much time passed. She doesn’t recall driving herself to the hospital, where she spent four days in detox. That’s still a mystery, but she’ll never forget the utter desperation she felt, even after she returned home. From the time she was 21, alcohol was just a part of life for Teri. She hit the bar scene with girlfriends on the weekends. She’d often unwind on weekday evenings with a glass of wine. But she never drank during the day, and certainly never at work – at first. Teri had a good career for many years, and she fell in love. “I found a man I thought would really take care of me,” she remembers. “But the man I married drank heavily and often used drugs.” The divorce hit Teri hard. Teri dealt with the pain in the only way she knew how. “My drinking escalated so much that I started
God is restoring the broken and missing pieces in Teri’s heart. “I have my self-respect back. I am valued here.” She’s in contact with her grown children and her grandchildren, and she looks forward to healing those relationships. The day Teri found Portland Rescue Mission, she sensed God saying, “Let Me in. Let Me work.” Instead of giving up on life, she’s learning to surrender – to His love.
Women like Teri have a safe place to rest, heal and learn thanks to your compassionate support. Thank you.
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Watch Teri’s story and see her hope for the future. See more at www.PortlandRescueMission.org/Teri
The last person to leave Jeremy was his fiancée. She’d explained to him as they stood outside a church one day that she wanted to get her life together. Unless Jeremy was willing to get clean, their relationship was over. Devastated at losing the last of anything meaningful in his life, Jeremy cried out in anger at God. “Why is my life being ripped apart? Why am I homeless? Why am I struggling?” His anger turned to desperation, and he pled to God on his knees, “Show me what it is you want from me. God, show me.” At that very moment, several people walked out from the church to where Jeremy sat on the ground. They embraced him, listened to his story and offered to pray with him. Jeremy’s heart was changed.
Ready To Jump
Jeremy Finds Another Chance To Live
“All that pain – I can’t even explain it. God just took it from me. It was gone, and I was crying.” The people from the church happened to be volunteers at Portland Rescue Mission, and they helped Jeremy connect to our New Life Recovery Program.
Jeremy sat on the edge of the I-84 overpass. He stared as his feet dangling over the busy traffic below him, almost hypnotized, and felt the tug. Tears ran down his face as he worked up the courage to jump. “I couldn’t pull myself to do it that day. But I knew eventually I was going to. It was just a matter of time.”
In recovery, Jeremy has set aside the lies he’d come to believe since he was a child. “My dad was an alcoholic. I learned that I had to fend for myself. I thought I didn’t need people in my life.” For the first time, Jeremy has developed meaningful relationships – with staff, volunteers and other men in recovery.
How he’d become so desperate, Jeremy couldn’t grasp. He did pretty well for himself as a young adult – a steady job, a car and a place to live. Maybe life was just too dull, or maybe he was stressed. But when a coworker offered meth, Jeremy took it gladly. It was a decision that would rip his life apart.
Far from the despair that drove him toward jumping from a bridge, Jeremy is now filled with hope. “I can have a life again,” he says. “No matter what I did in the past, none of that matters. Now I have a future. God has given me another chance.”
“Everything became about doing meth,” Jeremy recalls. He was arrested for possession, lost his job and his apartment. To support the habit, he became a dealer. “I was committing crimes every day,” Jeremy says. “Stealing, robbing, hurting everybody around me, burning every bridge just so I could get high every day, all day.” Without a home, Jeremy slept at friends’ houses until he wore out his welcome. Sometimes he’d walk the streets all night long, in rain or snow, too afraid to sleep, vulnerable to the dangers around him. In the end, Jeremy lost it all. “I had no money, no way of getting drugs. Nobody would talk to me because I just did everybody wrong,” he says.
Your donation will help hurting people like Jeremy receive the guidance they need for healing. Thank you.
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Learn more about Jeremy’s journey from despair to hope. See more at www.PortlandRescueMission.org/Jeremy