Tommy’s Story

2009

For many years I was a drug addict and for the last eleven years it was mainly heroin. As a child I remember unhappy times including the separation of my parents. Like many young people I tried to be ‘one of the boys’ resulting in weekly expulsions from primary school. During my time at the Academy School I started drinking and taking drugs.

Eventually my life was out of control. I tried, in vain, to beat my addiction by going to a private clinic, a drug rehab centre and the USA nine times. When I returned from the USA in November 2007, I was again homeless in Ayr but often managed to find someone’s couch to sleep on; I had been barred from the homeless units in Ayr.

On one occasion in March 2008 I was in a friend’s house having a hit of heroin when there was a knock at the door. A man from the local Church of God in Ayr had come to visit my friend; my friend had been attending a ‘Christianity Explored’ course at this church. My friend tried to get rid of the man but I asked the visitor if I could go with him to church. The church was only a short walk from where I had grown up but I had never noticed it before. It was at this church where I experienced ‘being rescued’. I felt accepted by the people; there were no judgemental looks. It seemed to me that these people had a hope in their eyes and I wanted it too. Over the next few weeks I learned that I needed a saviour to rescue me and that person was Jesus.

About six weeks later I was at a ‘Broken Chains’ meeting in Ayr where I heard a man tell how Jesus Christ had rescued him. At that meeting I went to the leaders for prayer and accepted Jesus as my Lord and Saviour. One week later I entered The Haven Kilmacolm drug rehab programme. During my 18 months there I learned about the love that God has for me and what it took to save me from my sin filled life. Through The Haven, God has restored many things to me such has physical health, relationships and life itself. My mother no longer has worries of the police coming to tell her that I’ve been found dead. My baptism took place in the river near to The Haven.

Today I am a trainee support worker at The Haven, helping those whose shoes I have walked in. I now live independently in Greenock and attend James Watt College to gain the necessary qualifications for this kind of work. I attend the Church of God in Greenock and work on the Teen Challenge ‘outreach’ bus in Greenock too. As each month passes I realise that I am being renewed; new ways of thinking and behaving and enjoying life.

I have so much going on in my exciting life and have to pinch myself sometimes. I have so many people to thank; so many people have made a positive impact in my life over the last 21 months – to each one I am very grateful.

In the Bible, Jesus tells us he will be a solid foundation of rock for our lives:

“He is like a man building a house, who dug down deep and laid the foundation on rock. When a flood came, the torrent struck that house but could not shake it, because it was well built.”     Luke 6v48

Without Christ as my foundation I know I would crumble at the first sign of trouble.