Love story: He got cancer. She became his care-giver

For 13 months, Isaiah Trujillo was vomiting every day, as he battled stage 4 cancer with chemotherapy. Sometimes all his wife could do was rub his back – and stay by his side.

“It was worth it. It’s what God had for us. I knew that God had more for us,” Amanda Trujillo says.

This is a different Valentine’s Day story. At a time when marriage is grounds for divorce, some Christian couples – like the Trujillos – still hold marriage as sacred. Their vows “to death do us part,” they take seriously.

Meanwhile worldly marriages are built on the proverbial sand that the flood waters buffet and break down.

“We definitely questioned why we were going through that,” says Amanda. The two-year ordeal is finally over. Isaiah just was declared cancer-free and the port in his chest is being removed. “You have this idea that if you serve God and do what’s right and do the will of God that you live in a bubble and nothing will touch you and you’re safe. That’s just not true.”

Theirs was the church kids who did everything right fairy tale love story. Their first kiss was on their wedding day.

Then one night, Isaiah, who is pastor in Fort Collins, Colorado, got acute stomach pain. Even though he thought it was due to bad tacos, he went to the emergency room.

After checking him over, the doctor off-handedly ordered a CAT scan, thinking it was probably not necessary, but might turn up something.

Isaiah, who naturally is doctor-averse, ordinarily would have declined. But for some strange reason, he got the scan. It turned out there was a small spot in his intestines that the doctor thought might be diverticulosis, not a serious condition.

After further studies, however, 36-year-old Isaiah was diagnosed with advanced cancer. He could die, leaving his young bride with four kids to fend for themselves. It was a trial of the size of Job’s. Read the rest: a love story of marriage

He hung up on his buddy at 4 a.m. His buddy committed suicide.

Adam Gunton hung up on his buddy when he called at 4:47 a.m.

“Why are you calling me this late?” he snapped.

“I was just calling to say hi,” Chuck responded, timidly.

“Don’t call me this late again!” Adam, a freshman in college in 2008, barked and slammed the phone down.

That’s the point when Adam’s partying changed and he became a hopeless addict.

“Before that moment I was using drugs and alcohol to party and have fun,” he says on a Logan Mayberry video. “But after that I was consciously using drugs to mask the way I feel, mask my emotions, mask my thoughts and cope with life around me. I bottled it down deeper and deeper with drugs and alcohol.”

As a result of his addiction, his weight dwindled down to 147 pounds from 210.

Adam grew up in Littleton, Colorado. He played football and wrestled at Columbine High School, which gained notoriety through tragedy. Mostly, he was able to hide his drug habit. He started drinking at age 11, after someone shared cocaine and weed with him.

“Throughout my high school career, I just thought it was fun,” he says. “I had no idea that it was going to lead me to a homeless shelter and not being able to stop the worst drugs on the planet 10 years later.”

On Nov. 6, 2015, Adam took a heroin hit that initially he thought was bunk. He got in his car and drove off. Cops found him in his car on the side of the road OD’d. Three months later, the body cam video was shown in court and he was charged with felony drug possession.

“Even that moment and those experiences weren’t enough to get me clean and sober,” he remarks.

He worked for Direct TV and became a top salesperson regardless of his drug abuse. At his desk, he had his computer and a drawer full of drugs.

One day, alone in his bedroom, he cried out to a God he didn’t know.

“This drug I was unable to stop using but it was taking everything from me,” he says. Read the rest: Causes of addiction, Adam Gunton.

How much more beautiful will Heaven be?