I met Melissa at church on a Sunday in February 2017. It was the day our groups catalog launched, and I was gearing up to lead my very first group. At our church we have leaders who host community groups during the week in homes, at church, coffee shops, even on hiking trails. Our 12 week Freedom groups are a curriculum based group that end each semester with a big two day conference, and a lot of life change! EVERYONE should be in a Freedom group at least once.

This was another one of those milestone moments for me, as this group of women would launch me into a gift and a calling I had no idea was on my life. Melissa was joining the group with her sweet mama, Grace. I was not even a little nervous about a mother/daughter dynamic in a Freedom group. I’m totally kidding. I was a WRECK. I had no idea what kind of relationship they had, or if I’d be playing referee every week to something that resembled a reality tv show. That first Wednesday my fears were put to rest, because they were both class acts. Grace would just beam with motherly pride when she talked about Melissa.

Melissa is sweet, soft spoken, and calm. If I could paint you a word picture of her, shes like a gentle breeze blowing in a quiet meadow. She is a great listener, introspective, unassuming, and MEEK. Her meekness is such a strength, and the quality she possesses that I covet most. Melissa truly is a life in the potters hand. Hers is a life changed by God’s love and leading, molded and shaped into something beautiful, and I have had the opportunity to have a front row seat to some of His best work in her. I’m honored to call her friend.

“I am so honored that my sweet friend Tina has asked me to share my testimony. My story is long and complicated, but I will try to sum it all up so you will get to know some of the the old me, and the new creation in Christ. Even now He is continuing to refine me.

   I grew up in a broken home after my parents divorced when my sister and I were five. From as early as I can remember, I was consumed with fear.  I was a quiet and shy girl who did my best to blend in, and not draw attention to myself. When I was 12 I received salvation, but I continued to be riddled with fear. When I was 15 I started to use alcohol and drugs. After my first stint in rehab I met my ex husband, and what followed was 12 years of drug abuse, domestic violence, and rape. I was a shell of a person, and truly hated myself. After trying to take my life, I left my ex husband and went back into rehab. After a family tragedy, I found myself back in a relationship with him. We moved to Florida thinking it would be an escape, but what we found was more of the same alcohol, drugs and abuse. One day I heard God’s still small voice say with absolute “go home”.

I called my dad, he purchased a bus ticket for me and I left Florida with two trash bags full of my things. I moved in with my sister, and soon after met Steve. It wasn’t long before I was head over heels in love. I put him on a pedestal, and thought of him as my angel. Steve and I started doing heroin together. Eventually he made the decision for himself to go to NA meetings, and broke it off with me. I didn’t want to quit using, but I also didn’t want to lose another relationship to my drug abuse. I went into rehab again and stayed for 9 days to detox. I started to attend meetings, and we both got involved in church. I got pregnant with our daughter Emily, and when she was born our lives were changed. I married Steve and God began to do a work in my heart. I didn’t fully surrender my life to Him yet, but He was drawing me closer.

During the next couple of years we had our daughter Sara, and while our family was complete I still had the feeling something was missing. I was home with toddlers, little adult interaction and lonely while Steve was at work. I made the decision to go to college. I loved the conversations with adults, and my studies began to change the voice in my head that told me I was stupid.

I started to feel like something was off in my marriage but couldn’t put my finger on what it was. Two years later Steve sat me down and confessed that he had been having an affair with an old girlfriend, and he was also using craigslist to hook up with people. I had a secret of my own that needed confessing, and so I admitted that I had been going to the liquor store and drinking pints of rum and vodka. My life felt like a lie, and all of the old coping mechanisms I had used in the past came rushing back in. I spiraled into a dark abyss, and the voice of the enemy began telling me how I would never be happy, I deserved to suffer, and that I should just get high.

     I made arrangements for childcare, and within hours I was floating in and out of reality. The first night Steve didn’t notice, but the next day my conscience led me to confess. While I was home alone, I finished what was left and got so sick. I had forgotten this low side of heroin. When my family came home and found me in that state, my kids scared and my husband crying, I knew I had totally messed things up.

      We sought counseling, made a fresh start in a new home and a new church. When we walked into Way of Life, now Freedom Church, I knew I was home. We joined our first Freedom group with Fred and Cindy, and it was the beginning of something extraordinary. I gained a new perspective of God as my Father, and Jesus as my best friend. I was learning what falling in love with Jesus meant. I was free. I was not free from my husband’s choices, but I had a different way to cope now and I no longer needed the old familiar ways. I was no longer alone. Never did He leave me, nor did He forsake me. I went on and did a women’s Freedom group. It was Tina and Joy’s group! These ladies are still in my life, and we are all always there to lift each other up, cry, pray, and laugh with each other. I now have a group of women that I fully trust, and I went on to co-lead a Freedom group with one of them!

     My husband did end up having another affair, and I lost my Dad in 2018. My marriage was troubled and I was grieving, but I gave it all to God and truly felt His presence in the midst of it all. We finally got the help we needed through The Underground, an intensive therapy workshop for betrayal trauma and sex addiction. It was life changing, and we are walking out that change together. And I am no longer a slave to fear.”

“For God has not given us a spirit of fear and timidity, but of power, and love, and self-discipline.” 2 Timothy 1:7 NLT

If you would like to know more about Melissa and her recovery, you can follow her at Life In Recovery recoverywithjesus.blog