Jackie Evans is a single mother living in Tulare, California with her seven children, ranging in age from four to eighteen. She lives near family members, works, is a member of a local chuch, and her kids are doing very well in school. Her main ambition, for now, is to get them through college. In fact, her eldest son has been accepted to MIT. She believes that God will give her a good life.

It was not always so. For the past 13 years, Jackie's husband has been in and out of jail on drug charges — he's in now — setting the stage for a life of upheaval. A drug bust, a lost job, an emergency shelter — that was the pattern. Twice between 2000 and 2002, the family was able to pull itself together long enough to secure stable permanent living conditions, and both opportunities were ravaged by the consequences of drug abuse.

Why, you might ask, did Jackie keep letting her husband do that to their family? Well, she thought she could cover for him by overlooking his repeated indiscretions, but finally realized that protecting her husband was in reality enabling him to bring further destruction to her and to her children. In December of 2002, Jackie was introduced to the Orange County Rescue Mission's Strong Beginnings Program. It was here that case manager Pamela Chapman introduced Jackie to the concept of self-sufficiency.

But self-sufficiency, as Pamela showed Jackie by her example, did not mean that she should try to go it alone. It meant that she should rely not on assistance programs, but on God. It meant that she was to stop trusting in people (especially a man with a drug problem) and start placing her trust in the Lord and in what He wanted her to do. It was during those days in 2003 that Jackie invited Jesus to be the Lord of her life.
Over the next 16 months, Jackie utilized OCRM resources such as the War on Hunger Food Assistance Program to get herself and her family back on their feet. In April of 2004, Jackie decided to make a fresh start in Tulare. She just loves her home, her children are thriving and she has a sense of expectation about her future. “I think the world of the Orange County Rescue Mission,” Jackie exclaims. “I wouldn't be where I am today without them.”