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Bill Allen was the town drunk of Shreveport Louisiana
who God delivered from a thirty year long bout with alcoholism. For seven years Bill had a street ministry in downtown Durham, North Carolina among the alcoholics, drug addicts, and prostitutes.
Now he resides in Garfield, New Jersey where he does street ministry in New York City.
Bill is a member of Beth Israel Messianic Congregation.
"I LOVE YOU MOM WHEREVER YOU ARE" Personal Testimony of Bill Allen Garfield New Jersey
When I was about ten years old we moved to the country and Pop, that's what I called my father, built mom a stable on five acres of land. She would teach riding lessons and rent and board horses, and I grew up roaming the woods on my horse and hunting and fishing and stuff like that. It was a good life and I loved it.
When I was 13 my dad got the idea that I should go to military school. He was afraid that Mom would spoil me or I would grow up to be a sissy being around women all the time. Ha! Fat chance! I wish Pop would have kept his machismo ideas to himself. But I went. Two years, I've never been so homesick in my life.
When I was fourteen I talked mom in to letting me take flying lessons. The war was just over and flying lessons were cheap and you could solo at fourteen and get your private license at sixteen. They wrote me up in the paper, as the youngest pilot in the history of Shreveport. I've still got the picture. Then I got Mom interested in flying and we bought a plane. The news paper article was entitled Mother and Son Flying Team.
When I got high school age my dad got another of his machismo ideas. We should sell mom's stable and move to town and buy a fancy house in the best section of town, ostensibly so I could have a social life. Personally I believe that he manipulated mom into this just to gratify an ego trip. He had made money during the war and now he wanted to be a big shot. This turned out to be the worst mistake he ever made.
So we bought the big house and moved into town and I got the social life that dad wanted and a convertible. But secretly mom wasn't happy. But she kept it from me. She missed her stable and her horses and the big house and fine furniture didn't mean a thing to her. And besides, her little boy was growing up and she felt I didn't need her anymore. I guess she got depressed, but we didn't know what that was in those days.
One night about 2:00 a.m. my dad came into my room and woke me up. He said, "Son, prepare yourself for the most serious thing that ever happened to you!" I woke up with a start, "What?" I said. "Your Mother has just shot herself!" I ran into Mom's bedroom. She was unconscious. I laid her head in my lap and just held her. There was a bullet hole in her temple. She died in my arms. There are no words sufficient to describe the pain I felt. My heart literally broke inside me. It was if I had died too.
It was April Fools day.
I felt like a zombie. Walking around dead. I started drinking to kill the pain, but I couldn't cry it hurt too bad! I went through the next forty years of my life like that all dead inside but I still couldn't cry. Till finally one day I looked in the mirror. I didn't like the person I saw. I went to Alcoholics Anonymous and quit drinking.
One night a spirit came to me and held my hand. I felt that my mother's spirit was in the room. I talked to her and forgave her. Then it lifted. Something comforted me all that night. It must have been the Holy Ghost.
I won't go into all the details of all the suffering that Alcoholism cost me, about the bankruptcy or my marriage breaking up because it's not relative to this story. I just hung on to AA because it was all that I had at the time to go on.
Then one day God called me. He told me to move to Oklahoma City that I had a friend there that he wanted me to meet. I kept getting confirmations that I should move to Oklahoma City so I went. I loved it, Oklahoma City is a spiritual place. The big sky. I've never seen so many stars in my life. At night all you can see is stars from horizon to horizon. And the friend I was to meet turned out to be Jesus.
Jesus became everything I needed. My best friend, my Heavenly father and my mother. Words can't describe what it is like to get born again. It's like literally getting born again. Suddenly your brand new. All the old hurt and guilt of the past is gone and life is filled with hope and wonder. The sun shines brighter and the moon is bigger and the flowers smell sweeter and the birds sing prettier and suddenly life is wonderful. And miracles are an every day occurrence. Suddenly everybody is nicer to you than ever and you make friends everywhere you go.
I wouldn't trade anything in the world for my new life with Jesus. I've had every material thing that a man could want but it didn't mean a thing without him.
My mothers tragic death left it's mark on me. For twelve years I went around rescuing young women in their early thirties. Just the age my mother was when she died. My testimony has averted several suicides and I have been able to lead several young women to the Lord.
I spent seven years in the street ministry working with the prostitutes, feeding them, clothing them, and taking them in when necessary, nursing them when they were sick and visiting them when they were in Jail. They called me their pastor. It was one of the most beautiful experiences of my life.
Living for Jesus isn't easy but it is the most rewarding life that a person can have. Jesus is in a war. A war between good and evil, and he calls you to be a soldier in the army of God.
I hope my mother is in Heaven. She never talked to me about things like that. She kept too much to her self and it killed her. I love you Mom, wherever you are!
Bill Allen
I was a hopeless alcoholic for thirty years.
I lost $1,000,000.00, Two apartment projects, A commercial building, A construction company,
a stone quarry, a retail store, a beautiful wife after 28 years of marriage, a beautiful home worth over $500,000 today, my job, my credit and my car. And my rent was due the next day.
Today I have a wonderful life, live in a wonderful place, and spend my time helping others; and it feels so good. It is truly more blessed to give than to receive!
WHAT DID I DO? Finally after thirty years of chronic Alcoholism my whole world as I knew it fell apart until one day Miracles started to happen. I will focus on that day. After 30 years of alcoholism I hit an emotional bottom and Joined AA and quit drinking. Even though I was sober the wreckage of my past continued to follow me my first year of sobriety until one day I found myself in what I considered a hopeless situation. I had filed for bankruptcy, had no job, no income, hadn't looked for a job in 20 years and didn't know how to go about it. The starter on my car had burned out so I couldn't even get to an AA meeting and my rent was due the next day. I had exactly $150.00 between me and starvation and the street and I was absolutely terrified.
All I had was a phone so I picked it up and called my AA sponsor and asked her what to do.
She told me that my problem was that my will was so strong that I needed to get on my knees and
surrender control of my will and my life to God, then sit down and write a letter to God and tell him every thing that was wrong. Since I had no other option but to trust God for a miracle I followed her instructions to the letter and put all my trust and hope in her promise that God would perform a miracle and rescue me. I wrote the letter to God and told him that I needed a place to stay a way to eat a job and a car. All day I cringed in fear pleading for God to help me until about 10 o'clock that night the phone rang. It was a friend from AA who told me to pack my stuff they were coming to get me in the morning and move me into a half way house AA operated. This half way house had a waiting list a mile long but I got the only bed. Now I had a place to stay and good food to eat. But how was I going to support my self? I had no survival skill what ever and
needed transportation and a job. I still had the $150.00 and a man's diamond ring that was worth $500.00 wholesale. A friend of mine from AA admired the ring and just had to have it. He had just purchased a used mustang convertible for $1500.00 and offered it to me for the ring. I told him the ring was only worth $500 but he still wanted it so we traded. Now I had two cars counting the one with the burnt out starter. All I needed was a Job. The next day I got a call from my sponsor saying that she had arranged an interview for me at K-Mart. I climbed into the Mustang and drove to the interview. They hired me on the spot; it was like it had been prearranged! I barely had time to fill out the application before they put me to work. That afternoon when I got home my son called from Florida. "Dad he said, I'm buying Penny a new car and we want you to have her old one. I'm sending you a plane ticket to Florida and I will meet you at the airport."
When I got to the airport Penny's (my daughter in law's) old car was a year old Chevrolet Cavalier with 11,000 miles on it. I stayed a couple of days with my kids then drove the new car back to Louisiana praising God all the way.
Now I had three cars. Then one day at work out of the blue I got this overwhelming desire to move to Oklahoma City. I had never been there and had no connections there but it seemed that God was calling me to Oklahoma City. Everywhere I would go the people next to me were talking about what a great place Oklahoma City was to live: in the "break" room at work...at the next table at a restaurant; it was uncanny! I was getting confirmations everywhere that I should move to Oklahoma City. I went to the bank and borrowed $6500.00 on the new car took the $150.00 cash and replaced the starter on my old car and sold it and the Mustang and threw my clothes in the back of the Cavalier and moved to Oklahoma City. I found a great furnished apartment within the first two hours I was there. I went to work as a "telemarketer." The first day at work a woman came up to me and made friends. That night I bumped into her in at a restaurant and on the parking lot of the restaurant she led me to the Lord Jesus Christ. Oklahoma City has one million inhabitants yet I bumped in to her. This was by divine appointment.
I am a born again Christian. Jesus is alive and I have a personal relationship with him, I've been walking with him 12 years and every day it gets better. I cast all my cares upon him. Jesus is God and he had a divine appointment for me to keep in Oklahoma City to get saved.
Many people profess to be Christian but according to Billy Graham 80% of the professing Christians have not undergone a born again experience. In order to get saved the Bible tells
us we must be born again. (John 3:3-8)
Being born again is like the metamorphosis of a butterfly. God turns you into a whole new creature and gives you a new life. Religion won't save you, no church or no preacher can save you it is only when you make a sincere decision to surrender your will and your life to Jesus Christ and place all your trust in him. He will miraculously deliver you out of your present circumstances and you will never be the same. Only trust Him; He is your only option in this cruel world. If you follow what I tell you to the letter, you will get the miracle you need.
By the way I was unable to repay the sixty five hundred dollars I borrowed on the car but the bank went broke and I put 300,000 miles on the car and wore it out five years later.
DO YOU NEED COUNSELING?
If so I can probably help. Chances are I've been there and done that.
if you need help you can contact me at bigapplebill@optonline.net There is no charge for my services. It's a labor of Love.
Shalom, Bill
Please read my free book Window on Main Street which follows
It is the chronicle of my seven year long street ministry, You are welcome to download it free of charge
Fate has written a tragedy; its name is "The Human Heart."
The Theater is the House of Life, Woman the Mummer's part;
The Devil enters the prompter's box and the Play
is ready to start.
Robert Service (2)
What People Are Saying About This Book
What a fascinating and heart touching story! Isn't it fascinating, also, how the pains that we experience are just what The Father uses to pull us into a specific ministry?
Every time you have an impact on one of the ladies living in a
sinful, godless lifestyle...the need to have been able to impact your mother's life in
such a way as to prevent her tragedy then heals a little more, right? I praise God that you
did not allow your experience to keep you bitter, resentful and/or blaming The Father for your experiences. By the way, I am also aware of the devastating affects of alcohol. My mother died of alcoholism at the young age of 37 (I've out lived her already!) I was raised by various alcoholic families. What The Father has helped you to over
come is truly inspirational! Thank you for sharing. I completed reading your book last night. I found it excellent. I read it in one sitting -- what beautiful testimonies. Of course I do not completely agree with some of the ways you went about things, but your disclaimer
suggests that you agree that things may have been handled differently today. Overall, though it is excellent and will minister to people.
I've really been enjoying the book you sent. I'm not through it just yet, but wanted to sit down and tell you how exciting it was to read. An amazing story that I cant wait to finish. Thanks for sending it and for sharing your wonderful story of
the power of the Lord to seek and save His lost sheep.
I am amazed at Bill's passion for his ministry. After reading his book Window on Main Street, I felt compelled to go out and help the less fortunate. Bill is a wonderful evangelist and a
great writer.
A DOCUMENTARY OF THE STREET MINISTRY Copyright © Bill Allen 1995 Electronic Edition © 2002 All rights reserved WHAT KIND OF BOOK IS THIS?
Books are written in divers genres, there are novels, and documentaries, textbooks, and expository writing, books that explain things; some are meant to educate, and some just to entertain. If I were to try to
pin a label on this book, I would call it a Spiritual Book because it was written from the heart and not
the mind. In it are many spiritual ingredients, poetry, art, and pathos, it is a book written to touch the
soul, I hope it will play a tune on your heartstrings as it has mine. This is a book dedicated to
women, written for women, about women, not just any women but women who either have been, or
are now engaged in the worlds oldest profession. These women, though wise beyond their years,
were once children, as were we all. Down through history, there have always been such women.
Why we may ask? This is the age old question this book proposes to answer. Where has society
failed? Lost innocence and broken dreams can twist the path of life into a downward spiral until every
last vestige of hope is dim. It is to such women that this book is tenderly dedicated. Not to condemn,
but merely to comfort. Not to judge, but to plea for justice; hopefully to bring compassion and
understanding to the unfortunate victims of society's wrongs, for we all must share in the failure of
each succeeding generation. DEDICATION This book is lovingly dedicated to Pamela:
To Lesa, Angie, Mary, Francesca, Barbara, Bonnie, Tammy, Chris, Rebecca , Sabrina, Kim, and
all the rest of the working girls who bravely bear society's cross; and is a tribute to the memory of
Robert W. Service my favorite poet. I will not punish your daughters when they turn to prostitution or your daughters-in-law when
they commit adultery, because the men themselves consort with harlots." Hosea 4:14 I once heard a story about an evangelist who had a successful ministry among the prostitutes in New
York City. After a year's work it was said that he had over one hundred of them born again, baptized
in the Holy Spirit and speaking in tongues. When they asked him how he did it, his reply was that,
"He loved the Devil out of them!"
This book is the story of my efforts to, love the "Devil" out of the whores of Main Street.
My Madonna I HAILED me a woman from the street,
Shameless, but oh, so fair!
I bade her sit in the model's seat
And I painted her sitting there.
I hid all trace of her heart unclean;
I painted a babe at her breast;
I painted her as she might have been
If the Worst had been the Best.
She laughed at my picture and went away.
Then came, with a knowing nod,
A connoisseur, and I heard him say;
"Tis Mary, the Mother of God."
So I painted a halo round her hair,
and sold her and took my fee,
And she hangs in the church of Saint Hillaire,
Where you and all may see.
Robert Service
STRANGER THAN FICTION
What is this book about?
This book is a love story, I didn't know at the time that it was a classical love story because it
happened to me. The first written record of this story took place in the 8th century BC between the
Prophet Hosea and Gomer. Since then poems have been written about it, and even an Opera, "The
Man from LaMancha".
Long before I ever studied the Bible, or knew the Lord, I was very naive about spiritual things. I didn't
know for example that fortune telling was witchcraft. I thought that witches and magic and all that sort
of stuff was just the stuff that fairy tales were made of. As a matter of fact I didn't know that there
really was a devil. Perhaps that accounts for the thirty years that I spent as an alcoholic.
One night when I was living in Oklahoma City, a girl told my fortune and said that a dark headed
woman would break my heart. Strangely enough this happened eight years later 1200 miles away in
Durham North Carolina. This is the story of that event. This is the story of Hosea and Gomer , Don
Quixote and Aldonza, but more than that, this is my story and Pamela's.
In my life there have been only three women whom I truly loved. The first was my mother, Florence,
the second was my ex wife Oppie who gave me the best twenty eight years of her life and last but not
least there was Pamela, whose name in Greek means "all honey."
Fate has written a tragedy; its name is "The Human Heart."
The Theater is the House of Life, Woman the Mummer's part;
The Devil enters the prompter's box and the Play
is ready start. Lesa and I
How It All Began
I explained that Mary Magdalene was a friend of Jesus who was a prostitute. Her eyes lit up with
interest.
One day, about four years ago I had been praying for a friend who was lost. We prayed the sinners
prayer together, and he experienced a great release of guilt, fear and anger. Then I left his house,
climbed in my car and laid my Bible in the passenger seat.
Not two blocks away from the house I stopped at the stop sign at a main thoroughfare. Suddenly a
young girl came up and knocked at the window of my car. Crying, the tears streaming down her care-worn face, she asked if I would take her to the top of the hill. I opened the door on the passenger side
removing my Bible from the seat and placing it on the dash, "are you a minister?" she inquired. I thought
momentarily and replied "Yes".
The Bible says that we are all priests and ministers to one another, and that before the world was
formed he predestined good works for us to do.
We proceeded "up the hill" which turned out to be about a two mile drive. I inquired why she was
crying. She said that she had been with some men and they had put her out of their car where I found
her, not too gently I imagined. She went on to tell me that she was a heroin addict, then she added "and
you know what I do". "You're a prostitute," I replied, "yes" she said.
Then, always mindful of her occupation she propositioned me. Gently I refused, explaining that I could
not in clear conscience accept her offer. Soon we reached our destination, a little frame duplex in a bad
section of town frequented by winos, drug addicts and street-walkers. We stopped at the curb in front
of her house, and she called a couple of her girlfriends over to the car, obviously fellow prostitutes. "This
is my minister friend," she announced proudly! We sat in the car for a few minutes and talked. I prayed
for her. She put her arms around my neck and proceeded to kiss me all over my face, not seductively,
but affectionately, she seemed deeply touched by my compassion and sincere interest in her well being.
I asked if I could see her again and she told me that I knew where she lived and pointed out the corner
she frequented, and said I could find her there. Then I bade her goodbye and drove away.
On the way home, a block from where I had picked up Lesa, I encountered a strange sight; a man
carrying a cross as large and heavy as the cross Christ was crucified on. Little did I know this was an
omen, meant for me, but we'll come back to that part of the story later.
After that I drove by her house several times, hoping to get an opportunity to talk with her again. It
grieved my spirit to see a soul in such bondage when I knew full well, if she would only accept Jesus into
her heart, God would set her free from the hell her life must be and deliver her from addiction and give
her a brand new life. As an ex-alcoholic I knew full well what it felt like to be held prisoner by an
addiction. Furthermore God had a call on my life to set the captives free.
A couple of months later I was looking for a furnished room, when one of my friends told me
to go to a certain house where he believed I would find a vacancy. I found it adequate for my needs and
moved in, only to find that I had moved around the corner from Lesa. I would walk down her street
looking for her .
I saw her several times. One day she was in a truck with a man smoking something, probably
marijuana. I asked how she was and told her that I was still praying for her. She beamed a big smile
from ear to ear. I saw her riding by that afternoon, she stuck out her arm and waved at me
enthusiastically with the same broad smile.
I lived in this neighborhood for about a year. Each time that the Spirit would bring her to mind I would
lift her up to God in prayer and intercede for her salvation and her safety. Then I moved away.
THE HOSIERY MILL Where Did It All Began?
High over East Main Street, stands an impressive red brick edifice complete with bell tower, which
once was the site of a hosiery mill. This imposing structure, approximately two city blocks long, appears
to have been built around the turn of the century, and has since been converted into an apartment
complex.
It is from such a vantage point as this, some seventy feet above the street beneath, that I look out
the massive sixteen foot high clear-story windows of my apartment on the top floor, and survey the scene
below. Outside the neighborhood resembles Hell's kitchen. My loft apartment is an oasis of peace in a desert
of lost souls, it is an evangelist's dream come true, the perfect location for street ministry. But don't get
me wrong, I love this place and wouldn't be anywhere else. I feel that this is a safer than average place
to live, considering the environs, but any time you venture out at night on foot downtown, in any city in
America, you had better have angels watching over you.
It is in this locale that this book is written, alive on the scene as it occurs, in the mist of all the
junkies, hookers, winos, and hoodlums of Durham, North Carolina. The Hosiery Mill Apartments Almost three years after I first met Lesa, I moved into a large apartment project several miles from the
rooming house. One day I was walking to the grocery store just a couple of blocks away when I thought
I recognized Lisa.
Hi I said, "aren't you Lesa from Corporation street? Do you remember me? I used to live around the
corner from you". "Yes" she said and ran up and gave me a hug. "What are you doing here?" I
asked. "This is where I work, this is 'The Stroll,'" she said. Unbeknownst I had moved right into the middle
of the Red Light District.
The next time I needed something from the store I had done my homework. I had a pocket sized new
testament from the Gideons, which I had prepared for Lesa. On the dedication page I wrote "to Lesa from
your friend Bill, Jesus loves you." I gave her a page reference and asked her to read it. I placed the little
Bible in my pocket, and asked God to be with me and prayed that she would cross my path today. Two
blocks down the street here she came visibly upset.
It was a cold December day with a slow drizzling rain. She stopped when she got up to me, she had
been searching her purse feverishly as if looking for some money. "Hi Lesa", I said, "you don't look so
good, what's the matter." She started to cry, "I'm cold," she said. She was wearing a little paper-thin windbreaker and her hair was ringing wet. Tears mixed with rain drops were streaming down her face. I only had two dollars in my pocket. "I wish I had some money" I said. "I would take you across the street to the goodwill and buy you a
warm coat, but I'm broke." She came up and hugged me in a tight embrace trying to get warm, I hugged
her back, kissed her cheek and told her that I loved her.
" I have a gift for you," I said, and gave her the little Bible. She opened it and read what I had written
in the front. I asked her to read the pages I had marked. Then I told her that on these pages was the
story of Mary Magdalene and asked her if she knew who that was. "No" she replied. I explained that
Mary Magdalene was a friend of Jesus who was a prostitute. Her eyes lit up with interest. * See Luke
7:37-47.
She thanked me enthusiastically for the Bible and promised me faithfully that she would read the story.
On the way back from the store my conscious began to bother me. "Give her your coat" a little voice
said, "you have two." I went back to my apartment and began to cook. When I opened the box of brown
sugar that I had bought for the recipe I was preparing, it was as hard as concrete. I had to take it back
and exchange it. I went to my closet and selected one of my two warmest coats, and tucked it under my
arm.
On the way back to the store I said a little prayer that I would see Lesa again. Sure enough there she
was in front of the store. I waved at her and held up the coat and she came running over. She put it on
and thanked me and promised me that she would read her Bible.
A few days later I went to the store again. This time I did not see Lesa. Coming back however, she
came running across the street up to me. Again she looked distressed, "what's the matter sweetheart
I said," She started to cry. "I need eight dollars," she sobbed. I understood, she was starting to get sick,
she needed another fix. I had seen her many times this way before.
Again I had just spent my last two dollars at the store, or I would have probably given it to her. I told
her I wished that I had it and could give it to her. I asked her if she had read the story I asked her to.
"I read it and read and read it," she replied. I suggested she read the whole new testament. She opened
her purse and held up her Bible proudly, " I take my Bible with me everywhere I go!" she said. "Give me
a hug". I explained to her that Jesus didn't come to save the good people but the lost. " I'm lost" she
replied. I told her about Peggy, and how God had given her a brand new life, I discerned a glimmer of
hope in her eyes. We talked for a few more minutes then she went on her way.
This may seem a controversial approach to the newcomer to this work, helping a drug addict by giving
them money when you know what they are going to do with it. But these girls are going to get their drugs
one way or another, better charity than prostitution.
Something must be done to break the vicious cycle of drugs, prostitution, more drugs and more
prostitution. This is not the first time I have considered giving prostitutes money they needed for drugs,
where by doing so I could get them off the street and talk to them about how God would set them free
if they only asked him and meant it. And I will probably do it again as a last resort unless God tells me
different.
You have to leave the ninety-nine and go after the one little lost sheep. And if you can bring him in,
all the angels in heaven will rejoice more for the one that was lost than at the ninety-nine that weren't!
Some times in order to be a shepherd you have to be willing to get some sheep dip on you.
Life is like a giant chess game between God and the devil and sometimes it looks like we are just
pawns in the game, but if you persevere when Satan makes his move, God will checkmates him and get
the glory every time. But you must stand your ground. Your ability to persevere can make the difference
between life and death.
One thing I've noticed about God is that he uses everything and wastes nothing. The Old Testament
is full of stories where God has used evil to produce good. The scripture states that God created both
good and evil. Why?
The most evil act that was ever perpetrated against man was the crucifixion of Christ! Yet this one act
put into action God's plan for the salvation of the world!
I believe God even uses sin. Sin brings with it conviction, contrition, humility, and repentance. Truly
God works in mysterious ways. One day I went to the store for cigarettes. As soon as I got out on Main
Street, who did I see but Lesa. I waved at her, and she waved back and headed my way. She was upset
because someone had stolen her purse and her Bible was in it. She told me that a "trick" had driven off
with her purse in his car. She had replaced it with an old ragged paperback New Testament. She said,
"I treasured it because you gave it to me, and because of the inscription you had written in the front, "To
Lesa from your friend Bill, Jesus loves you."
It was a cold cloudy January day; she had on the warm coat I had given her. But she was cold and
"dope sick," as she put it. She asked me to button a button on her shirt because her little hands were
so cold she couldn't button it. She had been out in the cold standing on that corner for three hours trying
to turn a "trick".
When I had gotten the little Bible I gave Lesa, I had picked up two. God knew that Lesa would need
a replacement. I told Lesa that I had another Bible in my room exactly like the one that was stolen and
that I would duplicate the inscription.
This afternoon the Spirit moved me to go back out on the street and look for Lesa. I put the little Bible
in my pocket and told Peggy I would be back soon. Peggy was an ex-prostitute and a battered woman
and the first woman I had ministered to. I met Peggy and her two teenage son's, Garry and Jeremy, by
divine appointment in Oklahoma City in 1987. Peggy had been living with Larry a heroin addict and
alcoholic who had battered her for twenty years. He had taken the car and what money was in the house,
robbed the washateria where she worked and cost her, her job and left her with two kid and a hand full
of food stamps and run off to Florida. Two years later God had provided me with the opportunity to house
sit a large Log Cabin on sixty-five acres of land deep in the forests of North Carolina. One day I got a
phone call from Jeremy. Peggy was in the street in Oklahoma City. It was fall and the winters in
Oklahoma City are intense. I took up a collection at church and shipped Peggy and her two sons to
North Carolina and took them in. They were with me for a year then I was able to get Peggy on
disability and after I moved into the Hosiery Mill I helped Peggy get a two bed room apartment for her
and the boys. But that's a story in it's self . I would use Peggy to witness to the girls on the street what
God had done in her life.
Bear in mind that Lesa spends every available moment she can away somewhere carrying on the
world's oldest profession in order to support her one-hundred and twenty-five dollar a day heroin habit.
When she doesn't get her dope on time she gets sick. The only thing that Lesa gets out of a fix is relief
of the symptoms. There is no high any more and hasn't been in years, so she says.
Lesa charges twenty-five dollars for her services. So she has to turn five or more tricks a day to
support her habit. But The Lord knows exactly when she will be at her pick up spot. Sure enough she
was right were I expected to find her. She was sitting and talking with her "pimp ".
I gave Lesa the new little Bible and she gave me a warm hug. I asked Lesa If she would like to have the curse broken over her life, and told her that Jesus would do
it if she really wanted him to. "If he'll take the sickness away." She said.
I told Lesa that he would. The last time I told anyone something so bold it was a transvestite and God
delivered him from homosexuality. From this I learned that I was OK to promise someone that God
would do something as long as it agreed with his word.
I explained to Lesa that all she had to do was ask Jesus to forgive her for her sins and ask him to come
into her heart and be her personal Lord and Savior. Then I took her hand and prayed with her for Jesus
to save and deliver her and take the "sickness" away and give her a brand new life. Lesa hugged me
in the tightest embrace that she could for several minutes and wept on my shoulder then she kissed me
all over my face like a puppy dog and thanked me. All this took place less that six feet away from her
"pimp ". When we were through praying. She introduced me, "this is my boy friend" she said. He held
out his hand in a friendly manner and we shook hands I think he felt sorry for Lesa too.
Today it's been three or four days since I prayed with Lesa, I went to the store again, and there she
was. We talked for about thirty minutes this time. And she brought me up to date on what had been
going on with her.
God had definitely been working in her life, but not in the way I had expected. All of a sudden most
of her sources of supply were drying up. She was getting "ripped off every day".
People were selling her fake heroin. She OD'd last night. It was then two o'clock in the afternoon and
she hadn't had a "fix" since six, last night. she was in withdrawal, she couldn't remember who ripped her
off. She didn't know who she could trust and who she couldn't. Suddenly her luck had gone from bad
to worse.
She realized how badly strung out she was. She hated her life, she said she was losing her looks, that
she had scars and bumps all over her face. She wanted to be set free. We talked about another
prostitute that we both knew. Lesa told me that this girl had told her she had contracted HIV. Lesa said,
in spite of everything, she could see God working in her life. Twice she had been pronounced dead. She
had narrowly escaped death many times. So far she had not contracted any form of venereal disease.
She said she believed that God had a plan for her life. That some day she was going to be able to help
people like herself. That was her a vision. God was helping Lesa by closing doors in her face and
bringing her to her knees.
A couple of days later I went to the store. Lesa was sitting in a car with a friend. She got out of the car; she came running up the street to me!
"Hey Bill, buy me a fifty cent beer." We walked to the store together and she told me she had OD'd
again. I bought a pack of cigarettes and a beer for Lesa. She put it in a paper sack. After we got out of
the store we stood in the parking lot and talked while she drank her beer. Then it started to sprinkle.
"Can you loan me an umbrella? I'll return it," she said. "I'll take you up to my apartment and give you
mine and I'll buy another one," I said.
I asked her if she would like to read the story I had written about her. She said, "I don't know." "You'll
like it," I said. She sat down on my couch and read it. She was both fascinated and delighted with it. She
wanted a copy. I already had one printed up for her and handed it to her.
We talked for a while and she told me more about her life. I asked her what she did in the winter, or
when it was raining. "The same thing," she replied. She showed me her hand. It was split wide open
between two of her fingers from the cold. I dabbed some antibiotic ointment on it and gave her the rest
of the tube.
I asked her how she got started. She told me that she ran away from home when she was fourteen,
and got married. Her first husband was very cruel to her. He physically held her arm and shot her up with
methamphetamine. This is what got her started with drugs. Lesa's first husband committed suicide. She
has been married one time since. Lesa has two children. I told Lesa that I would like to write her life
story. She assured me she had quite a story.
She read some of the other things I had written. She particularly liked Miracle in the Forest that tells
the story of Peggy, an ex-prostitute that I had worked with for eight years. She said that some time when
she was not sick she would like to come up here and just read. This was the longest time I have ever
gotten her off of the street. She must have sat here and read for forty minutes.
Lesa is not your typical prostitute. She is not hard or cold, but very sweet and tender hearted. At least
she is to me. She believes in God and has some faith. I know that God likes her, and so do I.
Today I went to the store about five o'clock. There were several of the girls out, going home for the
night or trying to catch one last "trick" before dark. These girls don't like working after it gets dark these
days, because there have been two prostitutes murdered recently and the girls are all scared. Lesa saw
me and came running across the street. "Boy I'm mad," she said. "I'm gonna buy me some crack cocaine
and smoke it all up right in front of somebody." She was mad at her boy "friend." "He wanted me to buy
him a 'bump'". A "bump" is drug slang for a small hit of crack cocaine. "You know what a bump is?" she
asked. "Three dollars, that's what a bump is!" "He wanted me to sell my body for three dollars to buy him
a bump." Lesa was offended.
"I've got my story you wrote about me." She had it under the blue coat I gave her, right next to her
heart. When she left my apartment she couldn't wait to show the story to her boy "friend". I told her he
might be offended at my referring to him as her Pimp. She assured me that she would explain to him that
I didn't know the difference. Personally I didn't see the difference, She said she had a pimp once. He
broke her ribs.
I asked her if she had shown him the story. She had but he was not impressed. "Doesn't he write
beautiful?" she said. "He remembers every word I said." She loved the little story about her, she thought
it was "sweet". He told her that he could write better than that. I can't quote what she said next.
Obviously he was offended at my statement. But she didn't care, she was mad at him anyway. The
other day at eight o'clock in the morning it was very cold. I bundled up and went to the store. On the way
I met a little girl named Bonnie. "It 's cold, isn't it?" I said. She agreed. I asked her name and she told
me. I introduced myself. She didn't look to be much over twenty. "Do you know my friend Lesa?" She
said she did. "Lesa's a nice girl," I said. Bonnie agreed. I patted her on the shoulder and said "God
bless you Bonnie," "God Bless you too," she said. None of these poor girls seem to have warm coats,
except for Lesa who has mine.
When I got home I typed up the following tract for the Prostitutes:
Tract:
Jesus Christ came to earth to destroy the works of the Devil and to bring to mankind a simple message
which would set him free from all his fear and guilt. In the 22 chapter of Matthew the Pharisees asked
him which is the greatest commandment and Jesus replied . . ."Love the Lord your God with all your
heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the
second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself". All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two
commandments."
If we are to experience the abundant life that God wants all his children to have, it is essential that we
understand the simple message of the Gospel (good news). Jesus Christ bought and paid for God's
forgiveness of Man's sins with his own blood. Jesus was the last and final sacrifice required by God. Man
is forgiven!
Unfortunately, egocentric Man seeks complicated answers and makes himself miserable trying to get
perfect in order to satisfy the requirements of God which were satisfied on a cross at Calvary some two
thousand years ago. The last words of Christ were "It is Finished." which means exactly what it says.
In order to find the happiness which we all seek, it is essential that we accept Jesus and his simple
message that we are already forgiven through the shedding of his sacred blood for us. Jesus died so
that you and I could be happy and have assurance that we will someday go to Heaven to live with God.
This is what the New Testament means when it says that Jesus is the one and only way. Believing any
other belief except that Jesus is the Savior of the world is merely mankind's tendency to perfect himself.
It is ludicrous to believe something other than the truth about an event that has already happened.
The single pivotal event in recorded history was the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ. No other event
rivals this in its importance to mankind's present and future. Accept the free gift of your salvation. Other
wise Jesus died in vain; acknowledge Jesus as your Savior. Let him live within your heart today so that
you can experience joy and freedom from guilt, fear, and shame! When you pray, pray in His Name; he
is your advocate with the Father. Jesus said, " What ever you ask in my Name it shall be given you by
my Father who is in Heaven." Don't allow religious people to confuse you with complicated theology.
Remember the words of the simple little song that you learned as a child.
"Jesus loves me this I know, cause the Bible tells me so." Do you know that your problem is the result of a 6,000-year-old curse which can be broken?
Do you know that drug addiction goes all the way back to the ancient Egyptians?
Do you know that Mary Magdalene was a prostitute and that she was one of Jesus' closest friends?
Do you know that when Jesus came back from the dead that the first person he appeared to was Mary
Magdalene?
Do you know that Rahab the prostitute was the only person saved when the city of Jericho was destroyed?
Do you know that Jesus Christ was a direct descendent of Rahab the prostitute? (See Matthew 1:5)
Do you know that Jesus is today breaking curses and healing all manner of dread diseases, including
AIDS?
Do you know that prayer changes things?
Do you know that these facts are true and can be proven?
Would you like to be used of God to help others like yourself, as these famous women were?
Would you believe that God needs and wants your help?
Would you like to meet others like yourself that God has set free?
Would you like the curse broken over your life?
November 19, 1993
While living at my loft apartment in the old converted Durham Hosiery Mill, I started writing this book.
I began on November 19, 1993; it is now July 29, 1995, and I'm editing the final draft. In the midst of
writing, a new gift manifested: poetry. I had never written poetry before, but I found it to be an effective
evangelistic tool, since poetry is the language of the soul.
The prostitutes all loved my poetry and identified with it strongly, it seemed to touch them right where
they lived. The following poem was written about Lesa. THE HOOKER
Underneath the street light on a dark and lonely night,
the hooker stands and waits, doing what she hates.
Looking for a trick, She hope's to find one quick,
'Cause she's hurting for some dope, and starting to get sick.
She powders up her nose, and straightens up her hose,
she sees somebody walking, and now she'll do some talking. And with a serpents guile, she
fakes a little smile:
"Come here a minute honey, have you got some money.
give me twenty dollars and I'll make it worth your while."
The stranger turns her down; her hopes fall to the ground. I wonder what she's thinking. I'll bet
she's done some drinking. In her mini-skirt, she's probably feeling hurt, who knows deep
down inside her heart, perhaps she feels like dirt.
I've been out here all night; I'll bet I look a sight, she ponders in her thoughts. I don't know
wrong from right. There's got to be a life, aside from all this strife, I could have been
somebody's wife, but yet I risk my life
Just for a bag of dope; there's got to be some hope. I'm drowning in this cesspool; will someone
throw a rope. Perhaps I'll find a man, who'll lend a helping hand, and love me for myself alone, and
not for what I am.
But she can't forget the day that she up and ran away, from all her home and family, 'cause they
wouldn't let her play. And now she plays for keeps, and sits alone and weeps, wishing to turn back
the clock, her thoughts won't let her sleep.
She didn't finish school, she really played the fool, and now she finds herself obliged to be the devil's
tool.
But she only thinks she's trapped, because of time elapsed, but the past is not the future and her
strength is not yet tapped.
So in the rain or snow, a whoring she must go, because she is in bondage, to the pusher don't you
know.
But if she only understood that Jesus loves her so, perhaps it might be different, if only she could
know.
That somewhere up in Heaven God extends a helping hand, and sends his Son to save the lost and
heal the ills of man.
Poem by Author POOR LITTLE LESA
Then God sent his angel with instructions to
bring him back the two most precious things in the town.
Of all the girls on the street the one I have the most compassion for is Lesa. The plight of Lesa's sad
life has tugged at my heartstrings for over four years. One of the most beautiful stories I ever read was
a fairy-tale written by Oscar Wilde entitled, The Happy Prince. The Happy Prince was a beautiful
statue gilded with gold and set with precious stones. From his pedestal high over the town he looked out
on the misery of the poor, which made him very sad. One day a little swallow, in migration to Egypt,
paused to rest for the night and lit on the shoulder of The Happy Prince.
Soon they became fast friends and The Happy Prince would have the swallow do his bidding and
pluck off a leaf of his gold gilding, or pluck out a precious stone and carry in to some poor soul whose
plight had touched his great heart. With the approach of winter, the swallow needed to leave, but the
Happy Prince pleaded with him, " Swallow, swallow, little swallow, won't you stay with me but one more
day?" The little swallow could not resist the wishes of his friend, so pathetic were his entreaties. For the
little swallow had a great heart too.
Finally all the prince's gold and jewels were gone, but one ruby eye remained. When the Prince spied
the poor little match girl, nursing her sick mother, with no money for food or medicine.
So he bid the swallow pluck out his ruby eye and take it to the girl, which he did. The next morning the
townspeople looked up only to see the shabby condition of the statue with a little dead bird lying frozen
at his feet. So the statue was taken down and hauled away to the dump to be melted down, but the
leaden heart of the Prince would not melt.
Then God sent his angel with instructions to bring him back the two most precious things in the town
and the angel returned with the little dead bird and the leaden heart of The Happy Prince.
"Dear little swallow, you tell me of marvelous
things, but more marvelous than anything
is the suffering of men and women. There
is no mystery so great as misery. Fly over
my city little swallow and tell me what you see there! (1)
THE HAPPY PRINCE?
From my window high over Main Street I see a scene such as the Happy Prince must have seen. But
more than anyone else I see Lesa, and this story comes to mind. Perhaps Lesa is my little match girl.
Lesa has stayed too long at the fair, each day it becomes harder and harder to make the money she
needs to support her habit. But I know in my heart of hearts that God in his infinite mercy has a plan for
Lesa and God willing he will let me have a part in it.
"Whom the son sets free is free indeed"
John 8:36
I met "Angie" the day after a second prostitute was murdered in the North East Central section
of downtown Durham, North Carolina.
This is the high crime area of Durham. Gunshots can be heard here almost nightly. Drug dealers are
everywhere and prostitution is wide open. The atmosphere is strictly Wild West, and on New Year's Eve
it sounds like World War III. Everything from pistols to machine guns could be heard going off outside
my bedroom window. Angie was fed up, frightened and homeless, and just wanted out. Angie, then in
her thirties, had been involved in drugs, like most of the girls, since she was a teenager.
Angie was the second girl I met named Angela, Angie for short. She was the most sincere girl so far
about wanting to turn her life around. She had been on the street sixteen years. Drugs were losing their
grip over her and sex had long since lost its appeal. The street was just where she lived and drugs were
just what street people did in order to try to cope with their sordid lives and prostitution was just how she
made her living.
Angie was a five foot-two ball of fire with beautiful flaming natural auburn hair who hailed from
Kentucky and referred to herself as a hillbilly. A moonshiner's daughter, hail and hearty and with the
constitution of a junk-yard dog, Angie almost ate me out of house and home during her stay with me.
We became warm friends. Working with Angie was a very gratifying experience because of her
sincerity. Soon everybody from the manager to the maintenance man was eager to help Angie. Even
some of the tenants in the building, who shunned, even feared the prostitutes, were captivated by
Angie's hillbilly charm. She was like a character in a John Steinbeck novel, perhaps my most
unforgettable character.
Angie was addicted to cocaine, usually "crack", but had done all sorts of drugs and considered herself
both a drug addict and alcoholic.
I was concerned about the killings, which had the same M.O. and all the prostitutes on Main Street
were afraid that they were the acts of a serial killer, ala Jack the Ripper, who was after the prostitutes.
Since Angie was homeless, I told her she could spend the night on my couch. Angie and I talked a lot
about Christianity. She was a backslidden Baptist girl, raised in the church. Angie stayed with me two
days at first then went back on the streets.
While Angie was gone I met another girl, Mary who was also homeless, so I took her in for a few days.
The following is a chronicle of the events of the next several days, then I will get back to my story of
Angie:
JESUS AND MARY
Of all the girls on the street, I think the one I miss the most is Mary. There was never any thing
between Mary and I except we were just friends. Real friends. We adored each other's company and
Mary for some reason seemed to cherish our friendship. She called me her best friend. I guess Mary
didn't really have many real friends among the street people. You couldn't depend on her. She would
make all kinds of rash promises and never keep them. If she said she was coming over in thirty minutes,
she might show up two days later. She'd borrow something and never return it. But that didn't matter. I
liked her anyway and she knew it. That was Mary. There were two things I could be sure of when it
came to Mary, however: she was unpredictable and consistently unpredictable. But when ever she got
in trouble, or perhaps just got lonely in the middle of the night, she would call me.
Mary went to jail a lot. Whenever she got in jail, the phone would ring ten times a day, collect. "Help,
help! this is Mary, I'm in jail! Call my bondsman." Sometimes Mary would have me call one of her favorite
tricks to bond her out. They would bring me the money and I would call her bondsman and he would get
her out. She would usually come over and take a bath and eat and we would visit for awhile. Then she
would hit the street again and I may not hear from her for a week or two. Not until she got tired and
needed to crash then she'd call. "Hi, this is Mary, can I come up and visit?" "Sure," I would say, "I'll come
down and let you in."
Usually she had been high for two or three days around the clock and hadn't been to sleep in two or
three days. Usually she was hungry. Id have to hurry to get her something to eat because I knew from
experience that Mary wasn't long for this world.
Her favorite place to crash was on the love seat by the window. Five minutes after she stretched out
with her long legs dangling off the end of the love seat, she would be out like a light. She was good for
the next eighteen hours and you could be assured that you wouldn't hear a peep out of Mary, till the
middle of the next afternoon. Well that was Mary, good old likeable, unpredictable Mary. It's the forth
of July (Independence Day) and for some reason I was thinking about Mary and just how much I miss
her.
There's something really special about true friendship: nobody ever gets hurt. Friendship is non-threatening and sometimes more rewarding than a love affair. But friends really love each other,
maybe more so than lovers do. I think there's something about friendship, when someone really likes
you and you know it, that validates a person. That's the kind of friendship Mary and I had. and I miss
her. God bless you Mary, where ever you are. "You'll die tonight, Bitch!"
I was walking to the store about 8:00 a.m. the other morning, when I saw a pretty blonde prostitute
named Mary, standing just around the corner. I had befriended several of the local girls who worked
the streets in my neighborhood, so I stopped and visited with her. Right away I discerned that she
had a sweet spirit. She had obviously been up all night and was tired. She asked if I had a car,
because she was hungry and wanted to go get some breakfast. I told her that I didn't have a car, but
I lived right across the street and would be glad to fix her breakfast if she would like to come up.
Then I gave her my phone number and went on to the store.
About 10:30 AM I received a call, It was Mary, so I went down to meet her. We went up to my
apartment where I fixed breakfast. Mary had been up for two days and nights and didn't have a place
to stay. After she ate, she asked if she could take a bath. I told her that she could and I drew her a
tub of warm water. She bathed and shampooed her hair and just relaxed in the tub to unwind from
the tension of a hard night on the streets. I have a heart for girls like Mary, because I too had been
enslaved by an addiction for thirty years and identify with their pain.
All these girls were addicted to heroin or crack cocaine and had to work the streets as prostitutes to
support their habit. In spite of the fact that they make pretty good money, it took every cent that they got
their hands on just to support their habit, leaving them destitute. They seldom ate, sometimes went for
three days or more without sleep, had inadequate clothing and most of them had no place to live. After
they had been addicted for a while, they had nothing to show for their habit but bondage, withdrawal
symptoms and their lives are in constant danger.
Lately, I had encountered one or two of the girls who had been three or four days without food and
hadn't slept in a week.
I know from personal experience that Jesus Christ will save anyone who asks and is willing to let him
help them.
We are all spirits and constantly seeking a spiritual experience. Drug addiction is nothing more
than a counterfeit spiritual experience from the devil, and a form of idolatry. Once someone has had a real spiritual experience with God , they can see the difference between the genuine and the unreal
and can be set free, but only if they want to be.
Unfortunately, the majority of hard core drug addicts consider themselves hopeless cases, and they fear the idea of getting clean. In spite of the fact that they are painfully aware of the drawbacks, it is hard
for them to conceive of coping with life without drugs. Once I was sharing with a heroin addicted
Catholic girl, after an AA meeting, and she gave me a tract on Saint Jude, the patron saint of hopeless
cases.
After Mary had her bath she just lounged around the apartment and relaxed. We visited and she
talked about her life and about God. Refreshed, by about 4:30 in the afternoon, Thursday, February
17, she went back out on the streets to ply her trade.
The prostitutes had recently been terrorized by a killer who had burtally murdered two of the girls, shooting them twice in the belly. Unbeknownst to Mary, God had ordained that Friday night that
she was to be saved. The devil knew of God's plan for Mary's life and had scheduled her to be the
killer's third victim. About five a.m., I received a frantic call from her from a pay phone about fifteen
blocks away.
She had been picked up on Main Street by a black man; he had held her hostage three hours on a wild ride from Durham to Raleigh and back. He tried to get her to smoke crack with him, but she refused. He demanded that she perform certain sex acts on him, and he told her if she refused: "You'll die tonight Bitch!"
Finally, she had enough and demanded to be taken back to Main Street, he pulled out a gun from
between the seats and she jumped from the car, ran to a pay phone and dialed 911. Then the man
drove away.
At 5:00 am I received a collect call from a pay phone. It was Mary. She was way down Angier
Ave, in one of the worst parts of town. She was terrified. Mary had just jumped out of the car and fled
from the man who had pulled a gun on her. She said she was sure it was the killer, who had picked
her up at her usual place under the street light. She asked me to meet her, so I quickly dressed and walked down Angier Ave as fast as I could. Before
I could get a block away from the apartment, a police car drove up with Mary. I took her up to my
apartment and tried to calm her down. Then she passed out from exhaustion on my couch and slept all
day, then Peggy, an ex-prostitute and a born-again Christian, whom I had helped in the past, came up
and witnessed to her.
When I first got to Durham, about seven years earlier, I heard that Paul Yonge Cho, pastor of the
largest Christian congregation in the world in Soul Korea, prophesied that the next great move of God
would take place in a place called, Raleigh-Durham.
In November of 1993 true revival broke out in the Cary Church of God, in a suburb of Raleigh, under
the ministry of Terence Rose, an evangelist from England. From day one, signs, wonders and miracles
started occurring. A blind girl, a deaf mute, a demon possessed girl, and a man crippled since World War
II were healed and delivered. By March, the Revival had spread to Durham to the larger facilities of
Living Waters Church which had a building that will seat around two thousand people. It is now the
middle of March and since January there has been 517 people saved.
That evening Mary said that God had told her to go to the revival that was currently in Durham.
When she saw the evangelist, she went up and spoke to him. He received a word of knowledge and told
her she was a prostitute. This amazed her because she had never seen spiritual gifts operate before.
She loved the service, particularly the praise and worship music. Mary, also a backslidden Baptist like
Angie, had never experienced a Pentecostal service. When the evangelist asked for anyone who wanted
to accept Jesus to raise their hand, Mary's was the first hand up. When he asked people to come
forward, she was the first one on her feet. God touched her and she was slain in the spirit. On the way
home she felt brand new. She said that the power of God was much better than cocaine.
In spite of the fact that she had a spiritual experience she continued to go back out on the street. One
day while Mary was out, I ran into Angie and took her back in. The next morning it was cold and raining
when I received a call from Mary. I went downstairs and let her in dripping wet and catching a cold. Now
both girls were staying at my place. Mary on one couch and Angie on the other. My apartment was fast
beginning to resemble a half-way house. Unbeknownst to me Mary had been wearing Angie's clothes,
which Angie had just washed. This made Angie mad, and I had a little difficulty keeping the peace
between the two girls.
A day or two after the revival, Mary was approached by a lonely middle-aged man who offered to let her live with him in a nice house out in the country; he said he would furnish her with a car, so she could get a job, go to church, and get off the streets. I had been told that this was a nice man who was not on drugs, and that he had taken in a couple of the girls before and had been kind to them.
It turned out that Angie had been one of the girls he had taken in. Since Mary had an open door and
I had been believing God would work a miracle and get her off the streets, and I was hoping that this might be it. Since this was an open door and Angie had no place to go and the killer was roaming the
streets I told Mary to take the opportunity and try it out. I had received a good report about this man and
could not help but think that God may have opened this door. At any rate it was a substantial
improvement from Mary's present situation, since I could only have her stay with me a few days, since
there is a clause in my lease that said I could have house guests a total of fourteen days out of the year.
Since Angie had no place to go and needed help most I concentrated my efforts on helping her.
I contacted Living Waters and arranged for their van to pick me up nightly for the revival. I encouraged
Angie to go. On the third attempt I was able to take Angie with me. She, like Mary, was the first one to
answer the alter call, rededicated her life to Christ and got gloriously delivered from drugs. She returned
home on fire for God. She crushed her crack-pipe under her foot, dumped her condoms down the trash
chute and told all her tricks that she had quit hooking because she was now a Christian.
Angie asked me to type up the story of Mary Magdalene and make six copies, she rolled up a prayer
cloth from the revival in each one and made a little scroll and tied it with a ribbon and took them to the
street to the other girls.
She started attending a Bible study in the building and Doug the maintenance man and his wife took
her on a church retreat. Things were looking so good that we took up a collection and paid a months rent
for a room for her at a rooming house. Angie stayed clean for over a year, then backslid.
This time I was able to got her into the homeless shelter and she got a job at McDonalds. When I get
an opportunity to work with someone, I keep in touch with them and try to disciple them until they get on
their feet. Anything less than that is a waste of time with an addict. The Charismatics are naive about
addicts and just expect God to zap them clean, but that is not the case, because they seldom repent.
BONNIE AND THE BIBLE
"It's a Miracle!" all the prostitutes exclaimed, " the Bible did it! the Bible did it!"
One day Lesa came running up to me complaining that Bonnie had her Bible I had given her, which
she treasured, and asked me to get it back for her if I saw Bonnie. I asked her how Bonnie got her Bible,
and she said that she had loaned it to her. Lesa had been reading Scripture to her and they had been
praying together.
The next time I saw Bonnie I asked her if she wanted a Bible of her own. "Please," she said, "get me
a Bible, any Bible, just get me a Bible." I told her that I had a paper back New Testament in my room,
and I would be back in ten minutes. She said she would wait. I rushed up to my room, got the Bible and
hurried back to Main Street.
When I got back, Lesa came running up to me yelling hurry, they're taking Bonnie to jail right now!'
Lesa ran ahead of me and detained the Police car until I could get there with the Bible. As I handed
Bonnie the Bible the cop said, "That will give you something to read in jail." Inside of fifteen minutes they
released Bonnie and she was back on the streets. "It's a miracle!" all the prostitutes said, "The Bible did
it, the Bible did it!"
Bonnie was sitting in a car on the parking lot shaking like a frightened rabbit. I held her hand and
prayed for her and she calmed down. The next day I was walking down the street when I heard someone
yell my name. I looked and a car was passing by and Bonnie was hanging out the window to her waist,
yelling, "God bless you, Bill."
You may notice in my writings, I seldom refer to these poor girls as whores. I don't like that word. It
has an ugly connotation to me. I refer to the them as prostitutes, and some times hookers. They are just
poor unfortunate girls, whom God loves, and I love them too.
PAMELA
What a waste, I thought, Pamela , a rose among thorns, was beginning to fade and wilt.
Of all the girls I've met on the streets, the one who is dearest to my heart is Pamela, whose name in
Greek means all honey. Pamela, Pam for short, is a beautiful, half-white, half-Cherokee Indian , five-foot
seven inches tall, slender, and statuesque. With her raven black hair and great big coal black eyes, she
was totally out of character on Main Street. I remember the first night I saw Pam, on the street, stylishly
yet seductively dressed, and freshly coiffeured..She stood out head and shoulders over all the other girls
on the street. She was standing on the corner talking to Mary. Immediately, I discerned that she was new
on the street and Mary was showing her the ropes, so to speak, telling her things to watch, and watch
out for, on Main Street.
For the next several weeks I saw Pam, only occasionally, on the street, always freshly dressed and
coffered. With her natural good looks, she was usually picked up almost immediately. Several weeks,
even months went by, then one night I saw her on the steps that the hooker's frequented sitting with
Lesa, wearing a long tan leather skirt, bare-footed, the bottoms of her feet dusty from the dirt of the
street, hair unkempt and looking somewhat weary and haggard. Immediately I knew that the drugs,
heroin in particular, were bringing her down to the level of the other girls on the street.
What a waste, I thought, Pamela, a rose among thorns, was beginning to fade and wilt. "I wish there
was someplace I could go to take a bath," she said. I was tempted to invite her up to my apartment to
freshen up and relax. This, I thought, would be my golden opportunity to minister to her, but I refrained
from inviting her because I had just been sternly reprimanded by the management for bringing
prostitutes up to my apartment in spite of the fact that the manager, a good Christian, knew of my
ministry , to the drug addicted prostitutes, and had even come up to my apartment and prayed for two
of the girls, and offered her friendship.
Then one day I saw Pam on the street. I had never seen her looking so bad and I knew somehow she
was bottoming out, reaching that state of spiritual bankruptcy that we all must reach just before the Lord
works a miracle in our life.
In spite of the warning, I couldn't in clear conscious put my personal security ahead of Pam's whose
life seemed in dire jeopardy, so I invited her to come up to my apartment and she did. She was sitting
on the steps, afraid, almost in tears. She welcomed the chance to get off the street and fall back and
regroup. She was dope sick and in withdrawal from heroin for the first time. Pam was seriously
concerned about her health. She asked if I ever let anybody spend the night and I told her yes.
In the morning I started to minister to her. I found out that she had somewhat of a mixed conception
of God, since she had been taught some Jehovah's Witness beliefs by some of her family members, who
embraced that religion.
She had been on the streets only ten months, she was an accomplished hairstylist, she had lost her
home, two cars and the custody of her children to drugs. She has two beautiful children she loves very much.
Her Life started on a downhill slide, when at age thirteen she returned home from school to find her
mother dead from alcoholism, drowned in her own vomit! It was at this point in Pamela's life, that she began to experiment with drugs. She moved in with her
grandparents and lived with them until one day, her grandfather, a recovering alcoholic, severely
depressed by his daughter's tragic death, relapsed into his alcoholism and committed suicide.
At fourteen and a half, she was emancipated by the courts and went on her own. She worked at
McDonalds, full time, and lived in a home for girls. One day she met a boy at school, the son of a
prostitute, and ran away with him. They went to his house where there were a lot of drugs, crystal meth, cocaine, marijuana and alcohol. While she was there, a man named Tom, abducted her at gunpoint, shot
her up full of drugs and forced her to do all sorts of things. She ran away, but each time she did he found
her. He held her captive for three weeks, broke her nose and terrorized her, playing mind-games with
her. Finally she was rescued by the police and the man was arrested and charged with white-slavery,
kidnapping and drugs. His crimes against Pam were so extreme they gave him 85 years in the
penitentiary But by then, as a result of this tragic incident, Pamela was hooked on the needle.
Life continued its downhill slide for Pam and her drug habit increased, shooting up, snorting and
smoking. She married twice, had one child, a daughter, but both marriages failed. She got mixed up with
a biker gang, and did a three year stint in prison. At age nineteen she worked in a "cat house".
Then she became involved with a biker and had a child by him, this time a little boy, now four years old.
Then the biker went to prison. Still trying to get her life together, she enrolled in beauty school and
became a hairdresser. Finally, Pam obtained a home and a car, but her cocaine addiction continued to
worsen, until finally she lost the house, the car, and voluntarily gave up custody of her small son, whom
she adores. She became a street prostitute, to support her ever-increasing drug habit.
Until about ten months later she started shooting heroin.
With the advent of heroin addiction, things got progressively worse. Now she had a two fold-drug
problem. Between heroin shots, she would smoke crack cocaine.
She needed money for her four bag one hundred dollar a day, heroin habit to avoid the awful "dope
sickness" of withdrawal but, her financial dilemma was compounded by her obsession for cocaine. One
habit competed against the other.
"If the purse comes back, then I'll believe!"
It was at this period in her life that she and I met, and I took her in. I was impressed with Pam 's
sincere desire to get her life together. In spite of all her problems, she had a lot going for her. She liked
herself, had a relatively healthy self-esteem, and wanted recovery and was willing to fight for it. She
had the best chances I had seen and I was dedicated to her recovery.
I would go to any lengths to see her hopes and dreams come true. She was a candidate for a miracle
and I wanted to be a part of it. Slowly at first I began to share the gospel with her at her own pace as,
she became able to comprehend it. She was a highly intelligent, delightful companion. She was a
perfectionist, fastidiously clean both in her personal habits and her housekeeping. Altogether, she was
a great little gal and I was extremely fond of her.
I shared with her how God loves her and was concerned about her present circumstances, about the
grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and just what it meant to be a Christian. We discussed the difference
between Christianity and Religion. I explained my theories on drug addiction and it's consequences. She
asked if she could stay with me several days because she wanted, "all of this that she could get."
She stayed with me four days, that time. During that period we detoxed her from heroin, with the aid
of lots of sleep, intercessory prayer, frequent foot massage and an abundance of T.L.C. (tender loving
care), She managed to get through the rigors of drug withdrawal.
Most heroin addicts have a horror of kicking heroin cold-turkey, but Pamela, who is very courageous,
fared better than average. On the third day she wanted to go to the hospital and get checked out.
Altogether we were at the hospital seven and one-half hours. They checked her from stem to stern and
gave her a clean bill of health, with the exception of a kidney infection, a skin infection, caused by
impurities in the heroin she was shooting, and a slight female problem, coupled with exhaustion, hunger
and drug withdrawal symptoms, Pamela was A-okay!
After waiting an hour and one-half for a prescription to be filled, we called a cab, only to be told there
would be a one-hour wait. So we hailed a ride in the parking lot and paid a man eight dollars to take us
back home.
When we returned home she discovered that she had left her purse in the strangers car. Now she had
lost every thing. Her clothes were somewhere, her beauty supplies somewhere else, now she had lost
the few things she had left. Other than the shirt on her back, she had nothing . The few little treasures
she had remaining, such as her baby's pictures, were now gone, even the antibiotics, for which we had waited an
hour and one-half, were in her purse.
This was the crowning blow, she burst into tears. Altogether she had cried for the majority of her stay.
Each passing day I became more and more convinced of the sincerity of her repentance and more
compassionate of her predicament. I told her of God's miraculous healing power and his ability to deliver
people. I shared stories with her of the miracles I had personally witnessed, such as two people healed
of AIDS. At that point she did not have the faith she has today and it was difficult for her to believe some
of the things I told her which seemed entirely too good to be true.
Meanwhile a warm friendship began to develop. During the course of her stay we discussed enrolling
her in Teen Challenge, a 12-month Christian drug rehabilitation program. We also discussed other
options for getting her off the street. Finally out of desperation I called one of my intercessor friends and
asked her to pray for Pam. Pamela thought to herself, if the purse comes back, then I'll believe. You
guessed it, inside of an hour the purse miraculously returned.
Pamela was ecstatic! Then, rested and feeling well, and three days clean from drugs, boredom drove
her back to the street. Not too long afterwards I saw Pam again on the street. She looked great, she was
the picture of health. I was amazed at the transformation that had taken place during her brief stay.
I decided that if I ever had a chance to help someone get off heroin it would be Pam, so I invited her
back. She was glad to return to the peace and security of my little apartment. So, I moved her in, lock,
stock and barrel. Right then I made a commitment to stick with Pam through thick and thin, until she
could get her life back in order. I threw caution to the wind, despite the wrath of the tenants, the devil
be damned, Pam would recover if I had anything to do about it.
Soon another girl, a friend of Pam's started coming up. Then we had an altercation with one of the
other tenants, a self-righteous, ex-hooker which centered around Pam's friend. So I asked her not to
come back. Nevertheless, Pam continued to invite her friends up to visit. This complicated things even
further.
Then I received a letter from the management threatening me with eviction unless I curtailed my
activities with the drug addicts altogether. To put it bluntly I was forbidden to help them, allow them to
visit, or conduct my ministry, from my apartment, in any way shape or form. I was adamant. Pam and
I made a pact to stick together regardless of consequences, pool our resources, and tough it out. United
we would stand or fall depending on the grace of God. I recalled the Scripture that "No weapon
fashioned against us would prosper," and stood on it.
Then there were a couple of alarming incidents in the street. One morning Pam came in early and
announced that someone had fired at her with a shotgun from a passing car. "I was walking down the
street, when I noticed a van driving by. As I turned and looked, a shotgun barrel protruded from the
window, then everything went into slow motion. I hit the ground, heard the blast, then I could hear the
pellets rattling through the bushes behind me."
Another time someone threatened her with a knife and attempted to abduct her.
Each time she left the apartment after dark I was severely concerned for her safety. I began to spend
more and more time in prayer for Pam's safety. One night deep in thought, the Holy Spirit told me to pray
the 91st Psalm, for Pam. I typed it up on my computer, inserting Pam's name where appropriate, printed
it up on parchment , framed it and hung it on the wall. Now every night I prayed this for her when she
went out.
Then one day, Pam underwent a beautiful born again experience. Even Peggy, my worst critic was
impressed. Pam was going around the apartment singing "Amazing Grace." Peggy, was insanely
jealous of my relationship with Pam, and had become a source of constant trouble. I strongly suspected
that Peggy was responsible for much of the gossip going around, as well as part of the problem I had
with the management, as she was quite a tale-bearer.
Now I sleep better at nights trusting the Lord to watch over Pam while she's away. Pam enrolled in the
Methadone Maintenance Program and started going to classes at Substance Abuse. She was excited
about her impending recovery. Pam was offered her old job back at the beauty salon beginning the first
of the month. She was planning to enroll in school. Things were looking up for Pam. I cautioned her to
proceed more slowly and not to over-tax herself. I assured her that Rome wasn't built in a day. She had
been staying with me, two months. She was basically down from four bags to one bag of heroin a day,
but it was still tough for her. Things were up and down. She had her good days and her bad ones.
I wrote this poem about Pamela while she was in jail and she read it through the glass in the visitors booth.
Apparently it soaked into her spirit because it turned out to be prophetic and came true. See last page. THE WHEEL OF MISFORTUNE
My name is Pam and I don't give a damn bout the things that keep happening to me. I'm pretty and
sweet and each man that I meet can't help but feel sorry for me.
I stroll round this town and each day I go down, deeper and deeper you see, somehow I don't fit in
this bottomless pit that my life has turned out to be.
I'm under a curse and it keeps getting worse, cause I put my dependence on dope. There's never a
day goes by I don't pray God will send me some reason to hope.
Don't ask me why I keep living this lie, cause I can't even tell you myself.
I'm stuck in a prison with no rhyme or reason for the things that I do to myself.
I'm trapped on a wheel like a hamster, that keeps turning faster and then; I roll round and round, all
over this town, in a circle that has no end.
Somehow I keep trying, cause I'm too young for dying and too old to keep living this way; God help
me off of this Wheel of Misfortune, deliver me today.
But I've got a Savior in Heaven who never gives up on me;
Although it's so sad I can't stop being bad, he loves unconditionally.
And he has forgiven the evil in me, but it's hard to forgive myself,
But all my grief and my sin and my shame he crucified in himself.
But one day I'll have a miracle. And God will deliver me. Cause he has his own time schedule and we
never know when it will be. And I shall be free from this bondage and I'll dance in the streets with
glee and people will say what a wonderful day cause Pamela's finally free.
And I'll praise my Jesus in Heaven, and I'll be a witness for him;
For he who is forgiven the most, loves the most, and sets and example for men.
The harder a ball hits the pavement, the higher it bounces and then. And one day you will see what my
God does for me cause I've been born again.
The Author
On one of Pam's frequent visits to jail she wrote this poem about me .
It was written in long hand on lined manila paper. I scanned it and made a printout of it and framed it
and hung it on my wall. It is one of my most cherished possessions.
This Poem is dedicated to my best friend: Bill Allen.
My Best Friend
There only comes one, once in your life.
One who is genuine and real in spite of all you've done, good + bad, one who will stick with you, no
matter happy or sad. . . The person who I'm talking about really takes my breath, He's so loving so deep,
so good, he's the street minister of my hood.
This man is King of Kings, and to me does no wrong, I really could not describe him in one day long.
He's been around, all over town, spreading the Holy Spirit and never looking down.I love him with all
my heart and hope we never part.
He's my best friend and I really hope nothing happens To my best friend Dearest Bill Allen.
He wrote a book about me and told my story, he reassured me there was no reason to worry. He said
that I was a chosen girl, that all I had to do was ask my God and he'd give me the world.
He's helped so many in his life, he so blessed, so holy so strong, that God has blessed him for his life
long.
Although he has a pony tail and rides a motor bike, he still has goals and rules and never goes astray.
He helps many people along his merry way. He's better and best.
He's good to the end. The one I'm talking about is my best friend. William Allen
By Pamela
1997
I love you Bill ThankX One day Pam announced that the Lord had told her in a dream that she would get the victory over
heroin before long. As a truly informed Christian might expect, my ministry was fraught with spiritual
warfare. The devil, hopping mad that someone named Bill, whose name means Determined Guardian,
had appointed himself guardian angel of the hookers. Nevertheless, aware of the risks involved and
armed with a word from the Lord, that "no weapon fashioned against me shall prosper", I persevered.
And then the attack came. To begin with I had been indiscreet and openly exposed my ministry. As
the majority of the tenants professed to be Christians, I expected their cooperation. This, however, was
not the case. Soon stories and gossip were going around about me and my activities. I had been
careless and ignored the Biblical admonition, "not to let your left hand know what your right hand was
doing". I soon found that the building was populated by religious, self-righteous hypocrites, many of them
emotionally disturbed patients from the local mental health agency. Soon, I was portrayed as a whore-monger or a pimp or both.
At that point, Pam and I had been living together for four months. At the start of our relationship we
agreed on a course of action that we felt would ultimately set Pam free.
There is a Biblical principal that God drives out our enemies, one at a time and not all at once in order
that we will not be overwhelmed. Our first and greatest foe was the heroin, then the cocaine, then the
prostitution.
The quickest way to get Pam off of heroin was the methadone maintenance program. Methadone is
a synthetic heroin which was administered orally by the local substance abuse facility. This method of
treatment has been around for years and is the quickest way to phase someone off of heroin, the needle,
and the ensuing criminal activity that accompanies drug addiction, in Pam's case, prostitution.
For some reason, in Durham, there was a waiting list for this treatment. Pamela had to wait two months
before receiving methadone. Now by the grace of God Pam was receiving her medication and off of
heroin and intravenous drug use. When I met Pam she was shooting four bags of heroin a day and
smoking crack-cocaine around the clock. Finally she was off heroin altogether and only using cocaine
once or twice a day.
But the battle was not without its consequences. We had been forced to leave the apartment and as
a result my living expenses doubled. As Pam's drug use declined so did the necessity for prostitution.
Pam was faced with the dilemma of a sudden decline in her income. I was unable to carry the entire
financial burden alone because I had retired a couple of years ago in order to pursue my career as a
writer, which was just beginning to get off the ground.
Now an opportunity presented itself for Pam to move in with her cousin and her husband, until she
could find a job, so she took it. Also her cousin had been attending regular AA meetings and Pam
agreed to go with her.
It was with a sincere sense of personal loss that I had
to accept that Pam and I would no longer be living together, but it was best for the both of us under the
circumstances. Of all the women I've met in my life Pamela, was the most delightful, and our friendship
will endure in spite of circumstances. I plan to move in with a friend who operates a half way house.
while I fall back and regroup.
I have kept the promise I made to Pam at the beginning, that regardless of consequences, I would
go through the fire with her. Hopefully when Pam is further along in her recovery and after I get back on
my feet financially, we may be able to pick up where we left off, God willing. In the meantime Pamela's
welfare is paramount. Sometimes, if you really love someone, you have to let them go.
Is it possible to love an unfaithful woman? Yes, absolutely. Hosea did it, and so have I. The Bible
teaches us of God's undying love for Israel
despite her infidelity. Modern society can not easily accept this type of philosophy, but as a rule
modern society has too much pride for it's own good and does not understand unconditional love. The
average man is far too egotistical and macho to accept such a relationship. He is wrapped up in the
opinions of others, what other people think of him is of paramount importance to him. In general he sees
himself as better than he really is.
Pam was a lot of things, she was drug addict and a prostitute but she had a heart of gold, and a sweet
disposition and was one of the most adorable young women I've ever Known. The dichotomy of Pam's
life defied understanding, she was not a Jekyll and Hyde
type of person, but the same every day, I never saw her mad or never heard a cross word out of her,
except for the sin in her life she was the perfect companion. Drugs and prostitution was the only life she
knew and I'll always love Pam in spite of her dark side because my love for her was and always will be
unconditional.
She was true to her name, Pamela, which in Greek means "all honey".
Today Pamela has been off drugs for over three years. She is
married, has a new baby and lives out in the country
in North Carolina. Pam helps her husband with his business. She is going to college studying to be a substance abuse counselor. She is on the honor roll.
She is a soloist in the choir at the local Baptist Church. She has her own prison ministry in the women’s prison at Raleigh, NC . She has her drivers licence, her own car, her own computer and we are still in touch both by phone and email.
Glory be to God!
This is the ending of the poem I wrote about Pamela the last time I visited her in jail which
turned out to be prophetic.
But one day I'll have a miracle. And God will deliver me. 'Cause He has his own time schedule and
we never know when it will be. And I shall be free from this bondage and I'll dance in the streets with
glee and people will say what a wonderful day cause Pamela's finally free.
Always in Him!
Donna Jenaka
Tsimshian Indian Alaska
Pastor Joe LoSardo
--Duncan Long
Chelsey Romano
Age 12
