A Gift of Hope

Alphonso Dailey is in a hurry. A resident in Raleigh Rescue Mission’s Life Plan Program since December 2006, he manages a shipping store, is pursuing a career in law enforcement and must also meet the requirements of our recovery program.

But 4-year-old Miles is waiting to see his daddy in the Mission’s W.E. Mangum Children’s Development Center and that tops Alphonso’s to-do list. “I see him almost every day and every weekend,” he says.

“That has been a blessing.” Alphonso, 39, came to Raleigh with his family. Later, when he and Miles’ mother broke up, Miles stayed with his mother, but Alphonso came to the Mission for shelter. The day he arrived, Alphonso confided to the intake counselor he felt trapped in a vicious cycle that included marijuana, women and keeping a job.

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Gather ’Round Our Table

“Mama was religious and dad was a drunk,” Steve Lane, 57, says flatly. “My dad beat me all the time. There was always liquor in the house and I started drinking when I was 11.”

Steve was seldom in school after that. At the time, parents could be jailed when their children were truant, so Steve left home when he dropped out of school at 15. “My mama gave me a five dollar bill and I left. That way she wouldn’t get in trouble,” he explains.

A “wild child,” Steve took jobs where he could find them as he wandered coast to coast. The only constant in his life was alcohol, and he says, “Liquor made me mean.”

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A Life Changed at RRM

James met a lot of incredible people in his 12-year marketing career.  But when a failed business deal cost him millions, his marriage ended and his occasional use of cocaine evolved into binging.

“I went through rehabs, but nothing really worked because I was missing the love of the Lord Jesus Christ in my heart,” he says today.

In late spring, as he was coming off a binge, the Lord led James to a man named Brian who shared the Gospel, along with his own testimony.  As the two prayed, James felt the Holy Spirit’s power.  Two days later, when Brian offered to take him to Raleigh Rescue Mission, James quickly accepted. 

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God's Love in Me

Jerry Bridges dragged his 98-pound frame out of his chair and tottered across the floor.  Three steps later he collapsed from exhaustion.  Frightened, he called a friend who took him to the hospital.  Later, a doctor told him, “God must really love you.  You had about three more days to live.”

Jerry’s emaciated body had taken a beating from years of drug abuse.  “They’d taken control of me and I didn’t want to live anymore,” he says.  “But then and there, God gave me a vision.  He asked me if I wanted to live.  When I said yes, He said, ‘Then I will restore you, but I want you to go into the world and glorify My Name.’”

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A Day in My Life

Pamela is a soft-spoken, 45-year-old gentlewoman who is determined to prevail.  “I don’t give up, I keep pressing forward, and I pray,” she says firmly.

After moving to Zebulon from New York in 2002, Pamela had a job, a car and lived in an apartment with her college-age son.  In 2005, she gained custody of her newborn granddaughter (her daughter’s child), then soon after she lost her job.  “I lived on savings, my income tax refund and unemployment,” she explains.  Pamela found other jobs, but she couldn’t take them because of child care and car problems.  “I was in dire straits,” she recalls. 

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A Day in My Life

Cedric was living a life most of us know only from the movies.  Transported by two vehicles—cocaine and freight trains—for three-and-a-half years, Cedric traveled the United States with little more than the clothing on his back.

“There really was no structure to my days living on the streets or in camps,” he recalls.  “My first thought of the day was how I could get high.  I didn’t have much responsibility; it was all about me and what I wanted.”

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Welcome, Pardon, Cleanse, Relieve

It starts in such a simple way.  A drink or two, an experiment with this drug and that.  Then suddenly the years have passed—youth is gone and so are family, friends and the trust they once had in you.

At 49, Haywood Douglas looked back sadly on two failed marriages and estrangement from his family.  The street had been his only home for two years and he recalls, “I wanted to commit suicide; I was in a deep, dark hole.”

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A Christmas Like No Other

Carrie’s 10-year relationship with the father of her children had become unbearable.  At 29, she had left him several times, but loneliness and codependence drove her back again and again.

“I didn’t have a relationship with Christ then,” she says.  “My relationship with my children’s father was the only one I had.  I’ve had a lot of rejection in my life.  The seeds were sown that I had no value.”

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Food for Thought

“When I was four, my dad left the house.  I was only 11 or 12 when he died,” Henley recounts.  From then on, he says, “Bad decisions became the focus of my story.” 

Henley was a relatively functional drug abuser until his mother died.  “I was trying to take care of her when she was dying and I ended up taking her painkillers.  I couldn’t cope with trying to work and take care of her.  Finally, my brother made me leave and rightly so.”

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Open the Door and Let the Future In!

If “children are our future,” what are we doing to help homeless kids become confident, productive and moral adults?  That’s a question we ask a lot at Raleigh Rescue Mission.  And the answers guide us as we develop ministries such as our Children’s Development Center.

When our staff asked Tanya and DeNiece what they wanted to be when they grew up, their answers sounded a lot like most preschool girls!

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Hope's Bright Promise

Andy Carlson always knew he wanted to be a millionaire.  In 1994, he sold his motorcycle for $15,000 and launched Handy Andy’s Buildings and Truck Accessories.  Six years later, at the age of 35, he realized his dream when sales reached well over $1,000,000.

On top of the world, Andy left his wife, began using cocaine and became involved with another woman.  Soon his drug habit reached $1,000 to $1,500 a day, his business began to flounder and his girlfriend said goodbye.

“When I left my wife, I told her I wanted a different life by the time I was 40,” Andy admits.  “Well, I woke up at 40 in the Wake County Jail.”

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You Helped Me Learn the Basics!

Sharry sat in the midst of her family, breathing in the smell of her new grandbaby.  The conversation revolved around her sister’s teaching, her brother’s writing, her son’s growing family.  As Sharry listened, she prayed silently, “Help me God or let me die.”

Like her family, Sharry had a college education and had worked in corporate environments.  Nearing her fortieth birthday, she transferred to a position with her company in Atlanta.  There she took up a new habit — smoking reefer.  “From there I started smoking cocaine and then I was introduced to crack,” she recalls.

The next 10 years were a blur of good jobs lost, and estrangement from family and friends.  Then last July 4, still hungover from the previous night’s high, Sharry found herself surrounded by family and longing to be a doting grandmother to the baby in her arms.

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You Welcomed Me

Chris Gilland hops from pipe to ledge as he shows off his old digs under a Raleigh bridge.  Cheerfully, he tells of surviving freezing temperatures, doing odd jobs for food and drugs, staying upbeat in anything but upbeat circumstances.

For four months, he’d waited for a bed at Raleigh Rescue Mission, but space simply wasn’t available.  Then April 12, 2005, intake supervisor Rev. Duane Cook asked Chris the question he’d waited so long to hear: “Do you have a toothbrush and toothpaste?”  Chris knew he was staying the night!

“I’d heard about the Mission from a resident there,” Chris recalls. “He had a sparkle in his eye that said, I’m going somewhere.  I wanted to feel that way, too.”

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Warmed With His Love

Teka waited nervously by her mother’s mailbox at the edge of the yard—the closest she was allowed to come toward the house. Perhaps she’d get a glimpse of her children today! On the other hand, seeing her children would only remind her of how much she’d lost to her drug addiction.

This experience was one of many that had covered Teka in shame for the past five years. She’d served time in prison, tried several drug rehabs, lost her children and been diagnosed with a seizure disorder.

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Anthony Burrows and his wife had been through a lot in 27 years. They'd raised a daughter and son, held each other through family deaths and traveled the country together. But the couple also shared a drug addiction that eventually tore them apart.

When his wife asked for a divorce, Anthony fell into a deep depression and checked into a hospital psychiatric ward. "She'd been under my arm 27 years," Anthony recalls tearfully. "It just about killed me."

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