Before the sun came up on November 14, Angelina Rodriguez sensed something wasn’t right. She grabbed her phone to look at the video from the cameras installed outside her family’s mobile home in Lockhart. A heavy fog covered the lens. She looked again. What she thought was fog was smoke!
Angelina called out to her husband, Randy. He picked up their five-year-old son Ezekiel while Angelina went from room to room, gathering as much as she could save. Randy
ran outside and grabbed a hose to extinguish the flames, but the fire moved too fast.
He and Angelina got out of the house with the few things they could carry. Once outside, Angelina made two calls: the first to the fire department and the second to her mother, Rosemary, who was at work.
When the sun finally came up, the bedroom that Angelina, her husband, and their son shared was destroyed, along with the belongings they had left behind. Only the back of the home remained standing. Soot and ashes were everywhere.
“The fire was a blow. The mobile home belonged to my brother who passed away. He was my best friend, and I just wanted to keep it in the family,” Ruiz said.
Without fire insurance, the family reached out to ADRN for help where they met Cheryl Wettlaufer, one of our trained intake volunteers.
As Rosemary and Angelina talked to Wettlaufer about the family’s challenges, Wettlaufer sensed that they were looking for more than just material help.
“I asked them if they wanted a relationship with the Lord, to have Him in their lives and guide them through everything they were going through. That’s when they accepted Jesus as their Lord and Savior,” Cheryl said.
The family still has a long journey ahead of them, but it’s now guided by hope.
We’re looking forward to the day when the Ruiz and Rodriguez families recover from this tragedy. That is, after all, the hope we celebrate this Christmas Season. When the world had no hope, Jesus Christ’s birth restored us to the Father. Because of that great redemption, nothing is impossible for those with faith.
The mobile home belonged to my brother who passed away. He was my best friend, and I just wanted to keep it in the family.”
