April 20, 2024
JONESBORO, Ga. – Debbie Verrelli is among an army of Georgia Baptist Disaster Relief volunteers who help survivors reclaim their lives and restore their homes after tornadoes touch down.
It’s one of the ways the 33-year-old Jonesboro woman serves the Lord who delivered her from a life of drugs, witchcraft, and satanism.
“I had been through 16 years of addiction, and I came out with a clean bill of health and able-bodied,” Verrelli said. “I was stronger than I had ever been. I thought, what better way to give back than to use my able body for good.”
Verrelli’s testimony is one of radical transformation from a woman who “never met a drug she didn’t like” to an enthusiastic Christian totally sold out to Jesus.
“The first time I met Debbie was at our OneWay ministry,” said Richie Howard, local ministries and missions pastor at First Baptist Church in Jonesboro. “She had dark makeup, dark hair, dark nails, and satanic tattoos on her hands.”
After becoming a follower of Christ, Verrelli’s underwent an unmistakable change – on the outside and on the inside.
“Each time I saw Debbie after that she was blossoming as a new creation in Christ,” Howard said. “Someone even helped her get the tattoos removed. Today, she is a co-laborer for Christ with myself and my wife Melissa. She faithfully serves daily in full-time ministry, helping women just like she was, and going on mission to wherever God leads.”
After a tornado struck the city of Griffin late last year, Verrelli saw Georgia Baptist volunteers swoop in to help with the cleanup. She was so impressed that she went through Disaster Relief training the following weekend so she could be a part of the ministry that brings help, hope and healing to people smacked down by nature’s fury.
“It’s just an honor to be able to be part of this work,” she said.
Verrelli also serves as a counselor in the same First Baptist Jonesboro ministry that helped her get her life on track.
Ricky Thrasher, who oversees chaplaincy training for the Georgia Baptist Mission Board, called Verrelli’s life change a testament to the saving power of Jesus.
“No one is beyond His reach,” Thrasher said. “Hers is an amazing story.”
Verrelli had begun using drugs as a 14-year-old, starting with cocaine and ecstasy and moving on to opioids, meth and heroin by the time she got clean at age 29.
“I didn’t grow up in church,” she said. “I had always just been very sad and very dark. I had felt drawn to the occult, and I started self-harming at a young age.”
At 15, Verrelli, living a life of rebellion, left home and got involved in witchcraft and satanism. As things spiraled downward, she said she truly wanted to die.
“My mind was really deteriorating,” she said. “I was making a lot of bad decisions.”
She ended up all alone, living on the streets. At her lowest, she said, she didn’t even own a pair of shoes.
“I thought, I’m almost 30, what am I doing with my life,” she said. “Up until this point, I never believed in God. I knew the dark spiritual things of this world were real because I had encountered them, but I had never encountered God. I was just really lost and confused.”
With no place to live, Verrelli surrendered to police on outstanding warrants and went to jail. She was put in solitary confinement where she took inventory of her life.
“It was like I had this major epiphany that my life was the sum total of every single choice I had ever made,” she said. “I had never been arrested for anything I didn’t do. I was not a victim. I was making all these choices. It was my fault. That just really humbled me.”
Verrelli asked permission to go to a worship service in the jail, not because she was interested in church but because she was desperate to escape the boredom of solitary, if only briefly.
“This woman starts singing this song that said, ‘Lord break these chains,’” she remembered. “I began to just sob. I really didn’t understand why I was crying, but I could not stop. Everybody is just staring at me. This voice was saying you should get saved, but I didn’t even know what that meant. This woman leading this worship service gives me a hug and tells me that one day I’ll thank God every day that I’m alive. I said, ‘Every day?’ She said, ‘Every day.’”
In solitary, Verrelli wasn't allowed to have any possessions except a Bible.
“So I asked for a Bible, and they gave it to me,” she said.
Verrelli said she was amazed that she was finding answers to her deepest questions in that Bible.
When she was finally released from jail, Verrelli got involved with a discipleship group, even though she said she still had her doubts about God. The lady who led the discipleship helped guide her journey to Christ.
“I told her my soul was tired, that I was willing to try anything at this point, because I had tried everything else,” Verrelli said. “Sure enough, God started revealing Himself to me. I started asking Him to give me a heart of flesh instead of a heart of stone.”
After much prayer and Bible study, Verrelli said she finally came to a place of understanding.
“I understood that I had a sin problem and that Jesus was the solution to that problem,” she said. “I gave my life to Jesus, and nothing has been the same since.”
