You Are Loved | Jocelyn's Story

is to share people's incredible stories in the hopes of encouraging you to keep going no matter how hard it is and to show you how loved you are by your Heavenly Father. You are about to hear Jocelyn's story. Jocelyn died in a car accident when she was in high school. The paramedics were able to revive her but she spent months in the hospital in a coma. Eventually she woke up but she had to relearn who she was. Due to the nature of the accident, Jocelyn was given a settlement but it was too much money for someone so young and she ended up using it for the wrong things. A few years later Jocelyn found herself using drugs in a violent relationship and pregnant. She cried out to the Lord begging to be heard. Watch to see where she ended up. Tell me a little bit about yourself. My name is Jocelyn McDonald. I'm 29 years old and my childhood was great. I had a really good family and they were all connected and I hated school. I was never good at school and I had to go to like different classes to take tests and stuff because I was a lot slower than the other kids and so that gave me a complex. I went through grade school and then I got to high school. I hit it off my freshman year. I was doing okay. I grew up a lot my freshman year so getting friends was a lot easier. Then my sophomore year I had a car accident. I was on my way to school with my friends and the driver and his girlfriend got in a fight, got upset with each other and he said, I'll just kill us all and went up a hill and flipped it and caught on fire and I was dead for like a couple of seconds. Then they got me in the HVAC, the helicopter, and brought me back to life. I sat in the Siskins Rehabilitational Hospital for six months. I was in a coma and then I got out of a coma and I had to learn how to walk and talk and read and write and who I was. God brought me through that. Then I went back to school the second semester of my sophomore year. Wow. Was it different? Oh yeah. I didn't know nothing and so having to relearn who I was and how to eat and write, sing, the ABCs. They had to teach me math like grade school level all the way back up. They put me right back in my second semester of sophomore year and I didn't know anything. No, I struggled a lot so I went to school and I enjoyed my chorus classes, my music classes. That's what I went to school for because it wasn't hard to relearn that. Love for music never dies. That's right. Wow. So then you graduated. Oh yes, I graduated high school. I don't know if this is a good thing or a bad thing. They had the No Child Left Behind Act and I believe that's what saved me in school because I started partying instead of my junior year. I started living with my best friend at the time and drugs were always at her house so it was easy to get. So I didn't

really go to school a lot after my junior year. I started skipping school and doing what any teenager does I guess but I did graduate and I graduated with the Hope Scholarship. Okay, wow. So what happened after graduation? I met a boy and the first time I ever fell in love with anybody. He was a quad older than me and I loved him. I'd have done anything in the world for him and I got a house because my car accident. I got money, you know, from it and I was too young when I got my money and I blew it all but I met him and we got a place and yeah he broke my heart and I started using a lot and not caring about much of anything. How long did that last? For a long time. How did you, how long have you been clean? I've been clean for two years now. Congratulations. Yeah, thank you very much. Thank you. What happened that caused you to quit using and decide that you wanted to? Okay, I got in trouble in 2021. I got in trouble and I failed my drug test for probation and I had to turn myself in so I decided to run. I was unhappy but I loved the beach. I loved the weather and I missed my family. They weren't here and of course they always, they all knew my situation but, you know, they were having a daughter so they're gonna go back me up no matter what which is, I don't guess it's a good thing in some ways but so I got really unhappy and I ended up I was in a domestic assault with my boyfriend at the time and went to the hospital and I found out I was pregnant and I never thought I could get pregnant. I never wanted to be pregnant, you know, so I had not really known God, you know, but my life was getting rough and I started praying to him, hoping, you know, somebody actually heard me, you know, to save me or get me out of this life or I need some help and I found out I was pregnant and I changed my life and I moved back home to Tennessee and I turned myself in and I came to True Purpose Ministries. Wow, that's amazing. So tell me, you said you made the decision to change your life. How does your life look different today? Well, going on two years sober, I have my whole family back, you know, my sister and I didn't talk a lot when we were kids and now she's like my best friend, you know, and I get to be with my mom who got sick, so now I get to help take care of her and I have a six-month-old daughter.

Her name's Eliza James and she is my world. Wonderful. And you get to have her with you? Oh yes, she lives with me. I was pregnant in True Purpose, had her there and I've had her there the whole time, yeah, and all the way we get to keep the babies there. You know, God works miracles and I really didn't know that until I became one. I love that. What a challenge that would be, though, from going from such brokenness to just making that decision that you're going to do something about it and then recognizing that God stepped in and gave you the strength to make that decision. That was, I'm sure, a confusing hard time. Yeah, I really couldn't put it all together. That was before I was really into the program. I was like two months in and Emily Sarver and I was on the front porch of True Purpose Home having a conversation like this and I was telling her a little bit about myself and I kept saying, I don't know how all of this happened. In the perfect timing, it just all worked out perfectly and I didn't know that I was doing this, you know, and she just looked at me and she said, it wasn't you, honey. You know, and that was my first, but God moment, you know, and that's when I learned that He dances for you when you find Him. Makes you want to find Him all the time. It makes me want to find Him all the time. I love that. So because you've been there, you can speak to people who are still living in brokenness, in addiction, in the party scene, in being just lost and separate from God. What could you say to them? What advice would you give them? What hope could you offer for them? Don't give up.

Trust the process. Don't give up. It's so much better and, you know, someone asked me the other day, is God real? And I said, well, He's moved in my life, you know, and I see that tangibly. I see evidence of that every day and multiple women in my home, you know, they all have stories of their own, but I would hate to think that I die and, you know, and there was a God, you know, and to just think how you get to spend eternity somewhere else. It's not worth it to me. I want to see His face because I know He's real, and I know what He's done for me, and I know what He can do for them, and I know how He can restore families, and I believe wholeheartedly that without Him, you can't make it. Absolutely. I agree. I want to talk about love for a minute, okay? When you were living in the world and didn't know the love of God, I'm curious, what did you think love looked like? And now that you've experienced true love, how is it different? I didn't know love. I thought I did, you know? I guess it was lust mainly because the world is lust, you know? You want everything that you can't have, and when you get it, you don't want it anymore. You know, love was fairy-tale-ish to me because I hadn't really had it, but now I get to look at my daughter every day, and she is so beautiful, and I love her so much. And I get to thank God for miracles like that, you know. Love, love is tangible to me now. I can feel it, I can see it, I can hear it. No, I believe in it. I love it, I love your story and you're getting ready to graduate the program and I'm sure two years ago you didn't.

So you would have never found me in nothing like this two years ago, no way. I would have not, no. I didn't believe in rehabs, stuff like that. I just thought it was like, that's something you gotta do on your own. You can do it without a rehab, you know. But it makes it better. I do, I graduate May 2nd. And I'm excited, you know, to go out to do stuff again, get a job and be with my mother, you know. But I'm gonna miss this more than life. Yeah, yeah, truly. You get so close to these women and the family and the church and the CRs and the pastors and you grow to love them and love what they do. And you can feel it when the spirit lives in you, you know, you feel those things. And I'm just, I love it. That community is so important in your recovery, to have new people to talk to and encourage you and hold you accountable and all of that. It is such a beautiful piece of the recovery and the rehab facilities and the programs and churches and all of that. It's just knowing you're not alone. And that means the world, means the world. So that's why helping other people in my shoes, it's amazing, you know, and it takes a minute.

I guess for people to understand that God loves you, you know, because people lie all the time. But you get in that little honeymoon phase with him and he starts showing you that he's real and why you need to believe him. And this is real and this is happening and it's hard to go back. That's just amazing. And you said you wanna help people and your story will reach people. It will show others what life can be like, that it's not too late, that it doesn't matter what was in your past, like you can find this redeeming love. Yes, ma'am. And it's just awesome. So I'm so grateful that you came and shared that with us. I know that's not an easy thing to do, to open up and be vulnerable and talk about the mistakes that we've made and the things that we've done, but it will reach people and lives will be changed. If you don't get it out, you'll never get over, you'll never move on. It's good, you know? So it's better to talk about it and especially to people who need to hear it, you know, and that know what you're going through, it helps them and I hope I do. I have no doubt. I get the honor of teaching at the Women's Home

and I love those women, every single one of them so much. But I said the first day I met you, there's something really special about her. God's gonna use her in a really special way. And I hope he does. He's going to. I hope he does. And I plan to stay in ministry. I'm gonna get my Above and Beyond Award. And so I plan, I'll be at RCR every Thursday to support those women. Because I just feel like if I was to leave and never say nothing or never come around, you know, it would break hope in people, you know? So I'm gonna be there to support them the whole way. And I'll be at church and I'll be a part of everything I can be. I'm gonna start going to the C.R. Woodward Church of God in Athens on Tuesday nights. And hopefully I can start teaching there. Yeah, yeah. Amazing, like, it's just, you're in high school, you've forgotten everything. You have to relearn how to walk and talk, yet here you are, just not that many years later, like, going to be teaching people. And it's amazing what God can do. Yes it is, yes it is, it is. And my daughter gets to grow up in it. You know, instead of, like, sadness and fear

and anger and anxiety that you would get in a house full of bad, you know, every child in the home at True Purpose is happy and joyful, you know? And that's because we are happy and joyful, you know? The joy of the Lord is our strength, you know? And so we listen to praise and worship music every morning and all you see is them little kids running around praising God too, you know? And I'm excited for my daughter to do that, yeah. Well, congratulations and good job and thank you for everything that you're doing. Thank you for having me. Yeah, of course. Thank you so much for watching. Isn't it awesome how Jocelyn thought that love was just a fairy tale, but now she's experiencing her happy ending. The home that Jocelyn lives in is through an organization called True Purpose. I encourage you to check them out. They do an incredible job of helping men and women live sober lives while finding their God-given purposes. The other organization Jocelyn talked about was CR. That stands for Celebrate Recovery. If you need help recovering from any hurt, habit, or hangup, check out their website to find a location near you. Join us next week to hear another incredible story. Be sure to subscribe or follow

so you never miss an episode. Most importantly, I pray that you know no matter how far you have run from God, it is never too late. There is always hope because you are loved.