Gene Hamman
My name is Gene Hamman, and this is the testimony of the grace of GOD and His love for me.
I started working for Chrysler Co. in 1976, two weeks before I graduated from high school. I don’t remember when I started smoking dope, smoking cigarettes, drinking and doing drugs – it just gradually got worse. By the end of 1986, I was hooked on Dilaudid. It didn’t take long before my whole paycheck was going toward drugs. I lost my job, apartment, and found myself living on the streets of Huntsville. I was frequently in and out of jail and in multiple treatment centers in both Tennessee and Alabama.
When I went to Outreach Ministries of Alabama, Inc. (OMA) in 1989, everything I owned was in a paper bag. My last cigarette was in the parking lot as I was walking to the door. It was a Sunday night church service. I had no friends, but I did have people that loved and prayed for me. I promised one of those people that I would try OMA for three months.
Two weeks into my stay at OMA, that person was found dead in the field due to a heart attack. My first thought was to leave, and that desire was strong. Jim Summers spent the next week carrying me back and forth to Athens. That gave me time to think–I had made a promise that I know now changed my life.
OMA gave me a safe place to stay and work through life-controlling issues. It was no longer about drugs and alcohol, but about what God could do in my life. My thirteen months there provided a place to learn and to get away from everything in the world. I prayed and asked God to help me to stay. That is what God did! For the first time in my life, I had hope that things could be better. I was encouraged. I had a new found joy, peace, and a desire to get started on my new life with God in it.
After graduating from OMA, I made myself accountable to Pastor George Sawyer at Calvary Assembly of God, weekly. I went to Argentina on a missions trip. God returned my driver’s license to me. The state of Alabama had said that I was “mentally and physically incapable of driving a motor vehicle.”
God restored relationships with my family and friends. I would marry the girl that God had for me, Alicia Shelton Hamman, who was a staff member at the women’s home.
Shortly after we were married on my birthday, my father died. That was a hard time for me, but I stood on the promise that the best birthday present for me was that my father was in the presence of God. Not only did God restore what the locust had eaten, but He healed my body of Hepatitis B, contracted from shooting up dope.
Many things have happened throughout the years in my life, but the biggest is my job, which became my ministry. The pastor of Mount-view Baptist Church, David Taylor, whom I lived near at the time, asked me to build a fence for his cows. God opened a door to travel to Japan and build three riding arenas for a private horse club. We were to be featured five or six times in the Progressive Farmer magazine.
God has restored seven-fold what Satan tried to steal from me. As the owner of “Quality Farm Fencing,” I have been blessed to share my testimony with people around the world while on the job. I always share how OMA gave me a place that allowed God to change my life. Thank you, OMA, for providing a place to hang out with people that love God.
Gene Hamman
My name is Gene Hamman, and this is the testimony of the grace of GOD and His love for me.
I started working for Chrysler Co. in 1976, two weeks before I graduated from high school. I don’t remember when I started smoking dope, smoking cigarettes, drinking and doing drugs – it just gradually got worse. By the end of 1986, I was hooked on Dilaudid. It didn’t take long before my whole paycheck was going toward drugs. I lost my job, apartment, and found myself living on the streets of Huntsville. I was frequently in and out of jail and in multiple treatment centers in both Tennessee and Alabama.
When I went to Outreach Ministries of Alabama, Inc. (OMA) in 1989, everything I owned was in a paper bag. My last cigarette was in the parking lot as I was walking to the door. It was a Sunday night church service. I had no friends, but I did have people that loved and prayed for me. I promised one of those people that I would try OMA for three months.
Two weeks into my stay at OMA, that person was found dead in the field due to a heart attack. My first thought was to leave, and that desire was strong. Jim Summers spent the next week carrying me back and forth to Athens. That gave me time to think–I had made a promise that I know now changed my life.
OMA gave me a safe place to stay and work through life-controlling issues. It was no longer about drugs and alcohol, but about what God could do in my life. My thirteen months there provided a place to learn and to get away from everything in the world. I prayed and asked God to help me to stay. That is what God did! For the first time in my life, I had hope that things could be better. I was encouraged. I had a new found joy, peace, and a desire to get started on my new life with God in it.
After graduating from OMA, I made myself accountable to Pastor George Sawyer at Calvary Assembly of God, weekly. I went to Argentina on a missions trip. God returned my driver’s license to me. The state of Alabama had said that I was “mentally and physically incapable of driving a motor vehicle.”
God restored relationships with my family and friends. I would marry the girl that God had for me, Alicia Shelton Hamman, who was a staff member at the women’s home.
Shortly after we were married on my birthday, my father died. That was a hard time for me, but I stood on the promise that the best birthday present for me was that my father was in the presence of God. Not only did God restore what the locust had eaten, but He healed my body of Hepatitis B, contracted from shooting up dope.
Many things have happened throughout the years in my life, but the biggest is my job, which became my ministry. The pastor of Mount-view Baptist Church, David Taylor, whom I lived near at the time, asked me to build a fence for his cows. God opened a door to travel to Japan and build three riding arenas for a private horse club. We were to be featured five or six times in the Progressive Farmer magazine.
God has restored seven-fold what Satan tried to steal from me. As the owner of “Quality Farm Fencing,” I have been blessed to share my testimony with people around the world while on the job. I always share how OMA gave me a place that allowed God to change my life. Thank you, OMA, for providing a place to hang out with people that love God.