Editor’s note: This story was written about a local resident for a feature writing class.

 

However, this woman of immense faith bears a dark past marked by an overwhelming addiction that nearly led to the destruction of her life and family.

 

Abuinaaj’s troubles began soon after turning 15 years old. Amidst being part of what she called a “united family” that raised her in the Catholic religion, Abuinaaj abandoned her home in Texas and ran off with her boyfriend to pursue a life as a migrant worker.

 

Soon after Abuinaaj and her boyfriend were married, her alcoholic husband became physically abusive. For eight years, she endured the relationship. When she finally left him, one of her husband’s habits followed her.

 

“He was the one who was always drinking, and I used to make fun of him,” Abuinaaj said. “When I did leave him though, I started drinking.”

 

Abuinaaj’s life became immersed in promiscuity and partying. Friends drank, and she could not refuse the invitation to join them. Constant drinking eventually led to drug use.

 

Then religion came into her life. However, the religious convictions that caused her to give up drinking were not her own.

 

Soon after marrying a Muslim man from Jordan, Abuinaaj put down the bottle in order to please her deeply religious husband. For years she remained sober, until the marriage began to fall apart.

 

“He was a good man, but his customs were different than mine, and we chose to go different ways,” she said. “I started back up into the drinking again. That led to the drugs.”

 

Abuinaaj plummeted back into alcoholism and drug use. Drinking began to affect every aspect of her life, completely altering her personality.

 

“When you have an alcohol problem, you’re a totally different person,” she said. “Around the children you’re different. You get aggravated or angry more often.”

 

Finally, in 2005, at the age of 47, Abuinaaj reached a breaking point. Not knowing where to turn, she began to pray to a God that she did know but had heard of in her childhood.

 

“I got down on my knees and cried and told him, ‘Lord, I don’t want this life. Please help me,’” Abuinaaj said. “I was sick and tired, and I didn’t want my grandkids, my daughters, my sons to see me like that.”

 

According to Abuinaaj, the very next day God answered her prayer.

 

While driving to Wisconsin in order to bail one of her sons out of jail, Abuinaaj learned that a friend who was with her had brought cocaine into her car. Not knowing what to do, she called another friend to seek advice on how to handle the situation. That friend, who was a police informant, contacted the Wisconsin police and Abuinaaj was arrested soon after entering the state.

 

After 10 months of fighting her case, Abuinaaj was thrown in jail.

 

“I highly believe that God wanted my attention, and He got it,” she said. “I didn’t know He was going to separate me the way He did.”

 

After two years of prison time, Abuinaaj began to open up to a Christian prison ministry that often visited her.

 

“They said I would be in prison for a long, long time and that I wasn’t going to come out till I got on my knees and cried out to the Lord,” she said. “They asked me if I had ever accepted the Lord as my Savior, and they said it was easy, so I did.”

 

Suddenly, Abuinaaj’s entire demeanor changed.

 

“I was so happy in prison,” she said, laughing. “I knew God had a purpose for me.”

 

Eighteen days after accepting Christ, Abuinaaj was out of jail. Not knowing what to expect from her new found faith, Abuinaaj continued to pray that God would provide for her as she moved to Zeeland, Mich., to live with her daughter’s family. That was when she began to see God work in her life through answered prayers.

 

The first answer to prayer came in the form of a miraculous healing. While in jail, Abuinaaj was diagnosed with sickle-cell carcinoma cancer by two separate doctors. However, when doctors went in for surgery on Feb. 14, 2008, the cancer had disappeared and was instead merely an invasive mole.

 

“I believe the Lord healed me from my cancer,” Abuinaaj said.

 

The second answer to prayer came through the provision of a shelter. Abuinaaj, who was not working due to her surgery, could no longer be provided for by her daughter and she moved out on June 6. That was when she felt the Lord led her to the Holland Rescue Mission.

 

“I just love it here,” Abuinaaj, now 51, said of the mission. “I get a lot of peace in this place. It helped me a lot. I am so grateful.”

 

Amidst her harsh past, the woman who was once captive to her alcoholism is now captivated by the goodness of her Lord and Savior.

 

“The blessings are just one right after the other,” Abuinaaj said. “I do fall short every day, but I repent and ask my God for forgiveness because I just love Him so much. I can’t stop talking about Him.”