Jake's Story
Growing up, I was in a good house with good parents and two siblings as a blended family, my dad worked and my mom for the most part stayed home, we typically had whatever we needed or even wanted. I grew up playing sports and always had a new pair of shoes.
Things were good on the outside but inside I was a mess. Early on I burned my house down playing with a lighter in our basement and a few years after that I was sexually abused by another male. For years in school I kept my true feelings of fear, depression, suicide and ultimately a complete failure to myself, even though I had everything it wasn’t enough.
Before I entered high school I found drugs and alcohol and at that point my life spun out of control doing all I could to simply live for myself. Periods of time came and went as I would spend time sleeping in alleys, parking garages, stairwells and in jail. It wasn’t until a man named Walter continued to pour into my life that I was able to accept my past and turn my life to Christ.
Walter would come and visit me with a Bible in his hand and prayer on his lips. I am not defined by my past I am defined by Christ. Just because I have been through trauma doesn’t mean I have to be traumatized. Where I am weak He is strong and I choose to turn to Christ in times of need. The Niagara Dream Centre is serving the areas most in need but not limited to just food. Jesus is the center of the ministry believing the soil is being tilled so the seeds can take root. Today I’m alive, clean and sober since July 31, 2016. A healthy family, a job, a wife and a roof over my head. Today I know my purpose in life I am not ashamed, All the Glory goes to God!