My name is Victoria. I’m a senior at the University of New Hampshire and I have a very special story about a very special girl.

I met Hayley in acting class last spring. I was a junior; she was a freshman.  A gorgeous girl, with bright blue cat-like eyes, short blonde hair, spiked leather boots, and a phenomenal speaking voice, she had a smile that lit up her entire face and I couldn’t help but reflect it back at her.

I watched her for about a week or so, observing her drastically changed countenance from day to day. One day she would be animated. The next she would look fearful or bitter. Some days she’d grace the class with those eyes. Other days they’d be glued to the floor. And other days, one whole week in particular, she wasn’t there at all.

About a week later, after Hayley returned to class, the Lord told my heart, “Reach out to that girl.” I didn’t hesitate, despite the fact that I was intimidated by her inconsistency and edgy attitude, maybe because she reminded me of me.

The next Monday we went to the dining hall after class and enjoyed breakfast and coffee. After acknowledging her coldness I decided to share my testimony with her. The drugs, the relationships, the crimes, the lying, the pain, the anger, the shame, the guilt, she could relate with it all. She then opened up to me that the reason she wasn’t in class was because she was in the hospital after having tried to kill herself.

My heart sank and the Lord said almost tangibly, “Tell her about my Love.” I shared the gospel with her and invited her to Christian Impact, CRU’s weekly meeting at UNH. Without my reminding her, she came to every meeting.

I shared the gospel with Hayley that Monday and countless times after that. She came to my bible study with good questions, she called at night when she felt tempted or was hurting. Hayley loved hearing about God’s love but couldn’t believe that He could love someone like her. I’d read the Bible out loud to her in my dorm room and she would just sit and listen, letting the peace that surpasses all understanding consume her. “I wish we could just read the Bible forever,” she said. I saw Christ moving in her heart and I prayed with her every night we were together.

Hayley kept walking in her own ways though, doing life the way she always had. That lasted about 6 months, but this past winter before CRU’s winter conference she called me in tears and told me she couldn’t do it anymore. The Lord miraculously used me in revealing why she had to go to the conference, and one week later we were in Albany, New York together at the Epicenter Experience.

On the second day Hayley realized she had intellectually accepted Christ as her Savior the past semester, but she had never given Him Lordship over her life. She said she was ready.

I grabbed a Knowing God Personally booklet and Emily, a CRU staff member, with whom Hayley was also close. While sitting on the Holiday Inn’s red and gold patterned carpet at around 4pm the beginning of this January Hayley gave her life completely to Christ. She described it as a golden beam reaching down from the heavens connecting her heart to the God of the Universe! Tears of peace and broken bondage came tumbling out.

Two days later she was on stage before all 500 people at CRU’s conference sharing God’s story in her life. Afterward she sat with me. She was crying and smiling that beautiful smile as she looked at me and said, “He loves me!” My smile reflected hers once more, crying myself, as I replied, “Yes, He does!”