 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
Nick - New Life Graduate |
Nick recalls the day when he reached the end of his alcoholic rope, waking up in a hospital, blind in one eye, and thoroughly confused. He had lain comatose for eight hours. Just the day before, he had been released from a rural county jail in south central Colorado, and immediately he went from the jail to get drunk. The nearly fatal auto accident that next morning put his life in perspective. "It hit me right then that I wasn't going as far as God wanted me to." The course of Nick's life has not been a straight line. He was angry with God for two failed marriages, which went hand-in-hand with the demise of a successful custom roofing business, and the loss of a horse ranch in Montana. Despite numerous attempts to quit drinking, he seemed to look only in the wrong directions. "In retrospect, I was so consumed with being mad that I didn't see how much worse it could have been. God was right there, lifting me up." Although he had been in another rehabilitation program several years before, he discovered that the New Life program was radically different from his expectations. When he thinks of how he found his way to Harvest Farm, he concludes, "I just got tired of not being able to quit drinking." The New Life program has helped him to sort out his mistakes. "All my life, it's just like I was going through a funnel," he reflects. "I try to do things my way and I hit the side here and the side there, and I'm finally narrowing down to where God put me on this Earth to be." "I don't believe God just waves His magic wand and it's all over with. I thought He would, but I had to quit drinking. He had to get me here." Harvest Farm's distinctly rural setting has been a key factor in Nick's recovery. He found his best inspiration from God on his morning walks or bicycle rides to the dining hall, which reminded him of childhood times spent alone in the woods. "That's my way of praying," he explains. "I see so many miracles here." Nick can count his steps to recovery since coming to Harvest Farm. In his time here, he gained a job at a local nursing home where he discovered an unexpected talent in caring for elderly people. His employers were so impressed that they provided training for him to become a Certified Nursing Assistant. "That's something I never really thought about doing. I've been in the construction business for 23 years. This was off the wall. I have a phobia about old people and getting old," he says. "I went in and I was actually good at it. They told me they wanted to hire me, to come in any time, they'd work with me because I had a knack for actually communicating with the people, especially [those patients] that they couldn't get through to. Basically what I'd do is just hold their hands and pray with them. That really sounds weird, but that's what I did. I'd pray to Jesus: 'Just come through and reach that part of their mind that could still think and reason and let them know You're there.' People who were slapping and talking gibberish, I was able to calm them down, dress them and feed them." This experience has led him to consider a new career direction. "All the while I was working I was talking to God. Instead of just telling Him what I wanted to do I would just ask Him to guide me." The program's educational tools have helped him to drastically improve basic math and language skills, prerequisites for the college psychology courses he aspires to. "I came here to learn and there are plenty of opportunities to learn," he says, referring to the on-site Literacy and Education Center (LEC), where he was initiated in the use of computers. "Now it's my turn to see where God takes me. I know the Nursing certification is step one and then there are opportunities for further education." Despite the troubles of his past, Nick has reached a point of reconciliation with himself and his children. Of the five children he raised mostly by himself, Nick speaks with a certain pride. He looks forward to joining his youngest son to work on the restoration of a 1965 Chevrolet truck--a project that returns him to his own youth, when, at age nineteen, he owned a custom auto body shop. "It's one of my passions," he remembers. The finished truck will be the sixteen-year-old boy's first car. As a Harvest Farm graduate, Nick attended his last morning devotion and earnestly shared his message of hope and faith in a final farewell to program friends and staff. "I hope that I become so obsessed with being full of joy that it's going to come out of me," he told them. "If I could walk into a room and make people smile, that would be so cool." A group of well-wishers came forward afterwards to pray and cheer him on. Glowing with confidence, he says he realizes that life still holds in store formidable challenges, but he adds, "I've got a Bible and I've got a lot of peace in my life that I didn't have when I came here." Click
to donate and start "Changing Lives in the Name of Christ" |
   |
|
Resource Center
|
