Wednesday, October 21, 2009

Graduates Sharing about their Experiences - Part 1

October 9, 2009 was a powerful day for the lives of the residents who graduated from Water Street Mission! To learn more about the ceremony, and graduates, visit Lancaster Online to read the article called, Graduation offers a second chance at life: http://articles.lancasteronline.com/local/4/243346

RESIDENT REFLECTIONS - PART 1

Listen as the Water Street Mission graduates share about their experiences as they answer the question...

What were some of the challenges you faced working through the program?

Lonnie: Open accountability and knowing what the right thing to do was; what God wants me to be. I had to learn my own false beliefs. It is hard to stay on the path.

Leonard: It was time for a change. I had to stop running and experience brokenness. For me, the spirit of God is brokenness. I didn’t know that man, Jesus; and just going to church wasn’t working.

DC: What brought me here was dealing with the past and learning to yield to God. I knew there had to be something deeper; there is just something to make sense of all the adversity. Rejection, parents, and not being worthy to be in relationships.

Lonnie: God brought us here; the way we were living would just not have lasted.

Erik: [the hardest thing was] not wanting to change, clinging to, letting go; it was easy to self medicate.

Russell: I was Just scared; what am I going to do? I had no place to go, got thrown out, people gave me warnings, the police had to escort me off the property. They dropped me off at the Ephrata Hospital where I stayed for 3 days. A doctor recommended Water Street where they had a bed for me.

Russell: My counselor later asked me what I wanted and I said, “I want to find God again.” He responded, “You never lost him.”

Erik: I got completely stopped when I was trying to fast forward; I had to persevere through it, and not try to avoid it.

Leonard: This is not an overnight thing. It gets to a point where you have to want to change. For me, I changed when I got into relationships; that’s the key thing, when you know it’s not just you.

Russell: Most people can’t get what they are doing. I didn’t want to accept what the counselors were telling me.

Leonard: It’s important sometimes to be silent.

- Compiled by Jon, volunteer

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