Samantha’s Story

God occasionally blesses us by allowing us to meet true heroes and using them to humble us, Samantha was just such a person. She is the mother of 3 with an ex-husband nowhere to be found. She lives in a trailer in a sad state of repair with barely enough to get by. But she finds joy in the faces of her children. Two of her children attend a Christian school the youngest was to start a special class for special children. You see Hanna is a very special, very happy and very excited 5-year-old whose entire body shuts down 3-5 times a night. When this happens, mom is awakened by an alarm and she must take drastic measures to bring Hanna back. And although mom is an advocate for other families with special needs, she could not find anyone to build her a ramp for Hanna’s wheelchair. You see the rules are if you can walk at all than there are no funds to build a ramp. And although Hanna can walk part of the time she must use a wheelchair to carry her and her oxygen tanks to school in the bus.

That’s where Freedom Builders came in, after an initial visit to the sight it was apparent this was exactly where the Lord wanted us. We could not find funding for the materials for the ramp but it did not take long to decide to go ahead with the project anyway. We gathered the materials and called a couple of volunteers. You might have thought a retired state police officer and a retired Army Cornell had seen it all. But the love and care the children demonstrated for each other was uncommon, and it certainly moved these men. I am sure that they never saw themselves as evangelists but they surely allowed this family to see a little of Jesus in them. They both demonstrated the statement of St. Francis “Preach always and use words when you must.”

You should have seen the joy in Hanna’s face when she went down the ramp and off to school the first time. I don’t who was happier mom, Hanna, the volunteers, or I because it was hard to see through the tears in everyone’s eyes.

But God Smiled.

It is my prayer that by being a Christian friend and demonstrating in a small way the love of Christ that we can make the Lord smile often.