Healing the Body and Soul
Twice a week, we pray for the addicted and for the opportunity to show them Christ’s love and help them out of their slavery to sin. This last Wednesday, after the mid-week service, Trevor stayed behind to talk with us about his addiction.
Trevor is 34 years old, homeless, unmarried, and father of two teenagers by different mothers. He has been a heroin addict for 9 years. Like most we see, he has no ID, which in days of Homeland Security make it virtually impossible to get help. He had a year of 'clean' in year 5 but went back. His mother died of a heroin overdose. His older brother struggle with addiction for 10 years and then spent 7 years in prison. That brother has been clean for 3 years since his release. A few days before we met Trevor, his brother had thrown him out of his apartment. Trevor doesn't grasp that his active addiction is life-threatening to his brother. Even sight of a needle is enough to trigger a relapse.
Trevor is proud that he never committed crimes to fund his addiction. Often, he would work under the table for various construction businesses and be paid in heroin. When unable to work, he sat at exit 45 on I-75 and relied on panhandling to pay for the two or three hits he required daily. That would be $30 -$40 per day. When Trevor came to see us, he was in crisis. His brother had driven by him at his pan handling spot, looked at him, and drove off without a word.
Another individual who also struggles with addiction and comes to
FOG regularly brought Trevor to us. Trevor came Monday and Tuesday gathering his courage and checking us out. He says he felt welcome and loved at FOG. That Wednesday, we spent hours talking to him, unraveling his story and determining his seriousness to change. Our plan was to attempt to save both his body and his soul.
Body: We offered to take him to Wyandotte hospital where through the ER gets men like him into Detox. We escorted him to the ER and he walked in determined. After three days (72 hours) he will be re-leased. Meanwhile we would be working on a rehab facility bed for him.
Soul: Our Bible mediation that service was on the Baptism of Christ. That led us to ask Trevor if he was baptized. He answered “no but I want to be”. We shifted into Catechesis followed by the Sacrament of Holy Baptism. Not the regular order of things, but we felt it critical that through the Sacrament, he would be given the anchor to move forward toward spiritual freedom. After Baptism, we could say to him “You are forgiven. You are free. You are Christ’s.”
Three days later Trevor contacted us and let us know he is in a rehab on the East side of Detroit. He wrote that he is thankful and wants to make FoG his home church when he gets out. The rest of Trevor’s story remains to be written.