Elisha has survived 38 years 0f drug abuse which led her to places of hopelessness and desperation until she had an encounter with Jesus in 2013
Here she tells her story
“I was a broken, lost little girl in an adult’s body.
I’d grown up on the outskirts of London as a middle child with an older and younger brother, and never felt I really belonged.
I always felt that my dad favoured my older brother and that my mum preferred her youngest, so as a kid, growing up, I started to seek negative attention to get noticed and was very naughty.
My memories of life at home are also of my mum having mediums and clairvoyants around the family home and I’d listen to my name mentioned during readings. It was spooky and I’d be scared to go to sleep without the light on.
Around age nine I was thrown out of the Brownies for nicking Brown Owl’s purse!
From a young age, though, this sparked a curiosity about the supernatural and witchcraft fascinated me. Even in primary school, a friend and I visited a clairvoyant.
I also began to steal; around age nine I was thrown out of the Brownies for nicking Brown Owl’s purse!
By the age of 11 I was also angry and started drinking and smoking. I was excited to start secondary school and looking forward to a different environment with new friends. I liked learning, too.
But once in secondary school, I started gravitating towards people who were rebellious. I started mixing with the girls who were getting into trouble ad before I knew it I was expelled at 13 for stealing from teachers.
My friends and I took it in turns to wait till the teacher went to the other end of the classroom, then keep watch while one of us ‘dipped’ the teacher’s bag.
Sent to a remedial school, I was thrown in with lots of other rebellious kids and my behaviour escalated. I was chaotic; I couldn’t stop lying and stealing and was expelled within a year.
No school would accept me after that and I was put in an assessment centre, then sometimes sent back home, but I always ran away from home and stayed with friends. The police always brought me back.
I embarked on a completely lawless lifestyle – burgling houses and nicking cars.
I started dabbling in drugs – I’d sniffed glue at school, and this progressed to amphetamines and sleeping tablets.
By 18 I’d had my first child and been evicted from my first flat in Penge, London. I continued on my downward journey, ending up in Holloway, where I spent my 21st birthday.
Coming out of prison, I longed to be able to change; I was full of self-hatred, with no self-worth, hopeless and desperate, but I couldn’t break the cycles of destructive behaviour.
A lot more happened which would fill a book; I was a petty thief to pay for my drugs and there were times I’ve eaten out of bins and planned to rob takeaway drivers. At home there was no gas or electricity and I lived in squalor.
There were several overdoses – one was deliberate, the rest accidental – and once I was dead on arrival at hospital. I was a walking dead person; I looked dead and was spiritually dead. I had no hope, no direction and didn’t know who I was.
At times I’d be in the police station or in court and I’d be crying out to God, praying. I remember being on my hands and knees in a police cell, imploring God, “I won’t do this again if I can get out of here.”
I had no hope, no direction and didn’t know who I was
My last spell in prison was in 1997 for drug and driving offences. Meanwhile I’d also had two more children who were being looked after by my family.
In April 2000 I had my fourth child, a little girl, but social services issued an ultimatum that if I didn’t go into rehab and successfully complete it, my daughter would go to the adoptive family that they had already set up.
So I came down to a rehab in Hove to try to get clean, hoping to become a good mother and keep my child.
That was not to be.
Within two weeks of rehab, I relapsed and had to sign a declaration that if I used drugs again, my daughter would be adopted. Even knowing I’d lose my baby, I was powerless to resist the drugs.
I couldn’t put the Bible down – I was so hungry for the truth
I ended up losing her, which broke my heart – and was thrown out of the rehab.
I stayed in the Brighton and Hove area, continually wanting to get clean but never succceeding, despite being in and out of 12-step fellowships like AA (Alcoholics Anonymous) and NA (Narcotics Anonymous).
Finally, in 2013, my life dramatically changed. I’d been in an unhappy, dependent relationship with a drug dealer for two years. When I finally managed to leave, I really was at the end of myself. I was taking so many drugs – heroin, crack cocaine, plus lots of tablets and was drinking alcohol, too.
After a long wait, I got a place in a specialist hospital unit and had the most horrendous detox. I was in awful pain, but knew I had to get through it.
Towards the end of the rehab, a friend suggested doing the Alpha course that was about to start at St Peter’s Church, Brighton. Although I was now off drugs, I couldn’t see how I’d cope; I’d never worked legally or had my own place. I knew that if God didn’t step in, I wouldn’t make it.
During the course, I had lots of questions about Jesus. A lady in the group advised me to take a Bible home and read the Gospels.
Once home, I couldn’t put the Bible down – I was so hungry for the truth. Through reading the Gospel of Mark and how Jesus healed people, raising them from the dead and casting out demons, light bulbs went off in my head.
Everything started to fall into place – I could see the source of the demonic stuff I’d wrestled with all my life. The Scripture that sealed the deal was how Jesus went to the Cross and overcame the power of Satan by the work he accomplished at Calvary.
This was confirmed in a powerful encounter when I was walking to a meeting one day. I heard an audible voice telling me over and over again, “You know the truth now”. I knew this was Jesus and surrendered my life to Him.
I was going to church regularly and was supported practically and in prayer by the vicar’s wife, Sam Coates. After leaving rehab, I went to live with Sam and her husband Archie.
In church, I used to think, “I don’t want to be a Sunday Christian, I want to know Jesus personally.”
Another friend at church had booked for us to go on holiday to Portugal together. Beforehand, she told me about Ellel Ministries which was putting on courses and these caught my attention. I ended up cancelling the holiday and putting myself on a ten-day course at Ellel called ‘Micronets’.
It was probably the best thing I’d ever done. My spirit was ‘fed’ by the wonderful teaching there on forgiveness and getting to the roots of problems, and I felt the Holy Spirit nudge me to do their year-long course of discipleship and prayer ministry.
I had no money to pay the fees, but stepped out in faith and went for the course interview.
On my 50th birthday I was accepted on to the course. One of the leaders interviewing me said, “We’d love to have you on the course – and by the way, an anonymous donor has paid half your tuition fees!”
So I left the Coates’ home for Ellel Ministries in Surrey, where I spent a year of learning and receiving intensive prayer. The prayer ministers were led to pray into the roots of some of the issues that had kept me bound for years, which were chiefly occult practices, addiction, rejection and unforgiveness. I received incredible freedom and went from knowing about the Lord to knowing him personally – his goodness, grace, mercy, protection and provision.
Since then I feel I’ve been raised back to life. I’m not the same person; I know who I am now, and, more importantly, WHOSE I am. I’ve never had a desire to stick a needle in my arm or drink again.
I don’t battle cycles of destructive behaviour or wake up wanting to die.
After the course ended, I started working for Ellel Ministries on reception and after a year was asked to be the PA to the previous director, Jill Southern. I worked for Jill for three years, travelling round the world with her on her teaching ministry.
In 2018 I felt called back to Brighton to work for St Peter’s. My role was to help set up a night shelter which ran for three years until lockdown in 2020. It was mind-blowing to find myself helping others, rather than as someone in need of help!
It’s a miracle I’m still alive,serving God
God has turned my life around and given me purpose and brought extensive healing and deliverance. With my past, people have asked me for years if I’d ever considered prison ministry. It wasn’t something I wanted to do, until a couple of years ago when I visited a young man in prison. When I saw the other prisoners looking so hopeless, I felt God breaking my heart, just as his was breaking for these guys. Soon after, I was invited to a young offenders institution to help with the baptisms of young men who had just surrendered their lives to Jesus on the Alpha course.
After the baptisms I met the chaplain, which led to me being able to go into the prison to support the young lads in their faith.
Being with these guys in the prisons and seeing them growing in their faith brings me a lot of joy and I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else.
To say God has turned my life around is an understatement. It’s a miracle I’m still alive, serving him.
Throughout my life I’d been in relationships, but since 2012 I haven’t felt the need for any relationship except with God. I try to stay close to Jesus; I read my Bible daily, pray and surrender afresh to him so I can stay on the “narrow path”, where I know the Lord’s strength and protection.
Every day I thank God for Jesus’ shed blood which has redeemed me from the years of darkness that I existed in.”