A Christmas Like No Other - Dinial Williams
In years past, Christmas was a depressing day for Dinial Williams. Her children and grandchildren wanted nothing to do with her on Christmas - or any other day of the year -- because she was usually strung out on drugs.
"It was lonely, so I would get high to end the loneliness," Dinial remembers, thinking of Christmases past. "Getting high was my way of suppressing everything - all the emotions and all the baggage."
Dinial had a lot of emotional baggage she wanted to avoid -- she’d been abused all her life and suffered the loss of a child. Desperate to be restored to her family, Dinial finally kicked her habit. But her resolve was tested when her relationship with her boyfriend turned sour. Crushed by heartache, Dinial picked up the phone to call her drug dealer. Instead, she called out to God.
A few days later, she arrived at City Union Mission to join our New Life Program, just as her daughter Sharlene had done a few months before. Sharlene was transformed here, and Dinial wanted God to work a similar miracle in her own life.
"Today, I’m not the same person I was when I came in," Dinial says with great joy. "I’m closer to God now."
Christmas this year will be dramatically different for Dinial. For the first time in years, she’ll celebrate Christ’s birth surrounded by her family. "I’m starting over with my kids and grandkids. I’m showing them I love them enough to change," she says. "This year, it will be a merry Christmas."
