At Teen Challenge we know all too well the effects of addiction. They are devastating; everyday that your loved one is "out there" is filled with pain, fear, anger and confusion. Over the holidays we hear mothers, fathers, siblings and wives talk about their many blessings, but still, "if only we could have this one prayer answered, we would be forever grateful."  We plant Christ's seed hoping for immediate results but knowing that it could be years before those crops flourish.  Men come into this program with all life drained from their faces. They come in off the streets, out of jail and having lost all that was dear to them. They come in with families who are anxiously waiting for the transformation that will give them back the man that they once knew and loved before bad decisions and addiction turned them into a person they didn't want to know anymore.  

Although many Thanksgivings have come and gone, there is no amount of time that can dull the effects of a life long transformation. We are still as blessed today as we were ten, fifteen years ago to witness the joy, the relief, and the hope on the faces of our students and their families as they come together this season. There is no statute of limitations on the exhilaration of hope.