Johnnie Traded His Cold Hands for a Warm Heart

“I’d been homeless for quite a while. And for the most part I was living on the streets,” Johnnie shares. “I’d be hanging around, drinking, when Cole would come by with the group of Hope on the Streets volunteers. They’d see me and talk to me and invite me to join their Journey of Hope Recovery Program or come in for meals. At the time, I wasn’t ready. And I didn’t want to waste the staff ’s time if I wasn’t sure.”

Johnnie had been drinking since he was a young man—a child actually. Growing up in Mississippi, he’d had easy access to “moonshine” and “white lightning” since he was 10. “By the time I was 16, I was drinking too much. By the time I was 20, it was way too much,” Johnnie says. Then he added cocaine to the mix. He spent most of his adult life in and out of jobs, in and out of jail, and his substance abuse finally cost him his family and his home.

The last time Johnnie was released from jail—after a four-month sentence for public intoxication—the judge told him he would be sent to the penitentiary if he got arrested again. That was the wake-up call Johnnie needed . . . to trade his cold hands for a warm heart.

“I’d had enough of living on the streets, out where it’s dangerous … where it’s cold. I was tired of being homeless and I’d been praying,” Johnnie remembers. Because of the Hope on the Streets team, Johnnie was familiar with Hope Ministries. So when he was released from jail in November 2008—with nothing but a flimsy coat and not a dollar in his pocket—he came to our Bethel Mission emergency shelter.

As soon as he arrived, his heart was warmed with hope. “I had this feeling of relief. It felt good to be trying to change.”

Johnnie transitioned to our Door of Faith recovery center just in time for Christmas. Through our S.T.A.R. Program, he won his battle with addiction, gave his life to Christ and learned the skills he needed to live a stable and independent life. Today, he is employed full time and rebuilding his relationship with his ex-wife, children and grandchildren.

Johnnie remembers where he came from and knows he never wants to return to that kind of destruction in his life. “I’ll keep God in my life . . . I’ll pray that what I’ve learned here will keep me on the right course,” he says. “For a man who is homeless to have a base to work from, to focus on what he needs to do in life . . . that’s priceless.”