Guided by Grace: One Preacher’s Journey through Active Addiction into Healing and Hope

Preacher finds Purpose and Becomes Better – that’s the journey I had to travel after enjoying ten years of recovery but subsequently relapsing back into a life of alcohol and drug addiction. I was a budding preacher in a small community known as York, PA. My parents were preachers, I was a preacher, scholar, wife and mother. Yet, when I made the fateful decision to return to a life of active addiction, I lost my professional reputation, compromised the relationships I had with my children and threw myself into a life of homelessness, poverty and despair. Maybe if I had managed my mental health disorders during those ten years of recovery, I could have avoided the embarrassment and humiliation of jail and other institutions. Yet, like the biblical character Joseph, I had to live in the pit and be thrown in prison before finding a peaceful place in God’s Palace. As you read this book, for yourself or to gain insight about a loved one, I hope you connect with the confusion and courage necessary for one person to find their inner strength. The life of an alcoholic and/or addict causes great harm, but first and foremost, the harm is done to themselves. Maybe this book will help you hold them up in prayer, extend tough love while daily practicing tending to your own self-care.