Hope Today
Hope Today
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At home in Arkansas, Sheila Trotter had hit rock bottom. Her craving for crack had now impaired even the most reflexive of instincts: mother-love. Sheila’s need for another hit felt stronger than even the knowledge that she held a new life inside of her. J.T.*, her crack dealer, tried to dissuade her: “Girl, you know, you shouldn’t be doing this stuff. You got a baby inside you.” But Sheila wouldn’t take “no” for an answer.
A few months later, December of 2000, Sheila’s beautiful baby girl was born. Astonishingly the baby had no signs of cocaine damage or addiction. Sheila named the baby “Hope Tomorrow.”But Sheila still couldn’t kick her addiction. It took the police kicking down her door and taking Hope from her arms for her to get the message. Sheila’s probation officer, Jim Russell, saved her life. Jim said she would go to prison for seven years if she didn’t get treatment at Grace House, a drug and alcohol rehabilitation center. Having served time in a Minnesota prison, Sheila had no desire to go back and miss seeing her five children grow up.
At Grace House, Sheila finally wrestled her demons of drug addiction and came out victorious. She also, reestablished the relationship with Jesus Christ that she had begun when she was 18--before she allowed drugs to take hold of her life. One February afternoon while at Grace House, a praise song came on the radio. “You Are My Everything” melted her heart. Sheila knew Christ needed to be her everything; she knew there was no going back to drugs. “I began to realize God had called me since I was 18, and I realized there was work to be done. I needed to get better and get busy.”
Sheila did just that. She got back Hope and her four other children: Naomi, Joshua, Ruth, and Nehemiah. She also got married to Hope’s father, a man named Keith, whom God was working on at the same time to end his addiction and grow him in Christ. Both of them began to attend Agape Christian Center and to volunteer teaching Narcotics Anonymous and New Life Deliverance meetings.
Meanwhile across town, a Christian lady named Bobbi Pemberton had been earnestly praying. “For over a year I had been praying that God would raise up prison ministries in many churches in my area,” relates Bobbi.
She had heard about Operation Starting LineTM--Prison Fellowship’s in-prison evangelistic crusade--and knew that it would be presenting the Gospel in prisons across Arkansas in May. Bobbi contacted Operation Starting Line and went to work recruiting volunteers in her area through announcements on the local Christian radio station and a personal visit to a gathering of pastors in her area. Sheila’s pastor was just one of the many in attendance, and he, in turn, recruited Sheila and her husband.
