Testimonies

D.L.

My testimony isn't much different from many of my culture. I am a Bay Area born and bread Puerto Rican girl who was sent to the Assembly of God church every Sunday. Rebellion set in at age 11 and I began a life of drugs and addiction which continued until age 34, at that age my world was turned upside down. I was the cause of my husband and I to become one of America's most Wanted, I committed a crime that became worldwide news.

In 1989 we were on the run, we hid out in a small town in Washington. In July of 1990 we were spotted on television by a citizen which led to our arrest. We had to leave our three small children and rely on virtual strangers to care for them until they could be returned to family members in California.

In the County jail in this small town I became suicidal and found I was claustrophobic. I was able to attend Christian meetings in the jail and met an Aglow woman who told me Jesus could change my life and wanted to give me a new life. I knew I needed something and was willing to do anything to change the circumstances. I accepted Jesus Christ and my husband followed a few months later.

We were facing 10 years in prison and we were sentenced 3 years (by Gods grace & Mercy) In that time I was sent to nearly every women's facility in Northern California. In each of the facilities I found a Women's Aglow Prison Ministry and caring women who would love me and encourage me that I could make it. After 2 years I was released and reunited with my children and now saved husband. God began restoring what the canker worm had eaten all those years in our life.

We completed parole in 13 months with great reports and found ourselves members in a small community church and within one year we bought our first home. Two years later we became leadership and now we both have become ordained ministers and serve as Associate Pastors in a rapidly growing church. We both have accepted the call to prison ministry and currently are ministering in the same county jail of our arrest. I serve as Vice President at our local Aglow Lighthouse Fellowship and have been blessed to train and will soon become Facility Chairman and Leader for our Aglow Neighborhood Lighthouse Prison Ministry. God is truly merciful and redemptive.

I am a sinner saved by grace with a hunger for God that cannot be satisfied. To whom much is given much is required and I know God has given me much and requires much from me. For once in my life I have purpose, love, and a reason to get up in the morning and it's all because of a loving Savior and the obedient women of Aglow Prison Ministry....

D.L.