Journey of Hope…from Violence to Healing

The story we share here with you is a remarkable story.

Dealing with the pain of loss and the revenge feelings towards the murderers, this is a story of forgiveness and healing, of compassion and love.

It tells how his organization “ Journey of Hope…from Violence to Healing”, started and how the members want to share there extreme painful experiences, from either side of the fence….

I want to introduce you to a great man and a dear friend of mine, Bill Pelke

Journey of Hope…from Violence to Healing

By Bill Pelke

On May 14th, 1985 Paula, Karen, April and Denise, 9th grade students at Lew Wallace High School in Gary, Indiana, left the school grounds at lunch time.  They planned on ditching the rest of the day. They went to April’s house, where they drank some beer and wine and smoked some marijuana.  They began to talk about what they wanted to do for the rest of the day.

They decided they would like to go to the local arcade a few blocks away and play video games. They had one problem. They didn’t have any money.  After discussing ways to come up with some money, April told the other girls, “There is an old lady who lives across the alley from where I do. She teaches Bible lessons to neighborhood kids. She lives alone and I think she has money.”

April said, “If you three girls will go to her house and knock on her door and tell her you’d like to take her Bible lessons, I think she’ll let you into her house. If she lets you into her house you can rob her. I’ll stay back as a lookout since she would recognize me.”

The girls all agreed on that plan.  With April staying in the background, the other three girls went to my grandmother’s front door and knocked. We called my grandmother Nana.  When Nana answered the front door, one of the girls said, “Mrs. Pelke, we’d like to take your Bible lessons.”

Nana said, “Come on in.”

That is the way that Nana was.  Nana was a very religious woman and was actively involved in the various services of the local Baptist Church. On Sunday morning she attended Sunday school and then stayed for the worship service.  On Sunday evening she would attend the Bible Training hour and stay over for the evening service.  On Wednesday she attended prayer meeting and stayed over for choir practice.  She was a leader in the boys and girls clubs at the church and involve in the visitation and woman’s missionary program.  She was also very active in several programs outside the church called Child Evangelism and Five-Day Clubs. At these events she told flannel graph Bible stories. With the advent of video and such you don’t see this version of storytelling anymore.  I have to explain to high school kids what a flannel graph story is.

A board was set on an easel. It was about 2 feet high and about 3 feet wide and covered with felt material.  She had cut out pictures of Bible characters with a flannel material pasted on back. The pictures would stick on the board as she told the Bible stories, almost like Velcro.

I remember how as a child I loved to watch Nana telling the stories of “Daniel in the Lion’s Den”, “David and Goliath”, “Jonah and the Whale”, “Three men in the fiery furnace” and many others.  My personal favorite story was about “Joseph and his coat of many colors”. Joseph had received this beautiful colorful coat as a sign of love from his father.  Nana would put this colorful coat on the cutout picture of Joseph. His brothers were pictured off to the side in their long, plain drab brown robes.  She would tell how the brothers were so jealous and angry they sold him to some slave traders who came by one day while they were out working in the field.  I always liked it when Nana put that coat on Joseph.

When I got older and had children of my own, I had the privilege watching Nana teach my children and their friends these same Bible stories. This is what she loved to do. So when these girls told Nana they wanted to take her Bible lessons it was one more chance for her, at the age of 78, to share her faith with young people. She told them, “Come on in.”