Dear Customers and Friends:
Taylor Purdy washes trucks and trailers for our company all day long. It’s not the most glamorous job, but people who know him say he’s the happiest person you’ll ever meet.
You’d never know that Taylor, who is 33 years old, once thought he had thrown away his life and future. He spent more than two years in jail and was homeless for a while, too.
He was 19 years old when his father died from a heart attack. Until then, Taylor lived a modest but good life, attended Chestatee High School in Gainesville, Ga., and enjoyed playing baseball and football. Taylor’s dad was his whole world, and it all came crashing down in 2010.
To numb the pain, Taylor turned to drugs. There was little family support since his mother became a drug user, too. Eventually, he turned to harder drugs and began selling them to support his addiction. All it did was land him in prison.
One night in his prison cell, Taylor dropped to his knees and prayed for help. As a child, Taylor attended church regularly with his grandmother. Now, he reached back to those happier days, desperate for a miracle.
God didn’t answer, or at least Taylor thought so. Because his life got even worse after his release from the Clayton County Correctional Institution south of Atlanta. He initially reached out to his mother, who had regularly written to him during his lonely incarceration. But as a convicted drug felon, she was not allowed to live with her son. Taylor found himself homeless, worse off than prison.
“As bad as prison was, my lowest point in life was after my release,” Taylor says. “I turned to a meth house for refuge and went right back to drugs.”
He had nothing. No job. No car. And no hope. That’s when God finally reached out, Taylor says. “I believe He was trying to help me all along, and finally I heard him.”
It was Facebook, of all places, where Taylor spotted the posting of a one-time fellow inmate, who had turned his life around. Now, he was a counselor at North Georgia Works, a ministry providing shelter and job training for homeless men.
Taylor reached out and was accepted into the program. That was nearly three years ago.
“You reap what you sow,” says Michael Giddens, CEO of North
Georgia Works, “but our program gave Taylor the chance to replant good things. It’s hard to do, but Taylor took the first step with a renewed heart and a strong desire to do better.”
Those steps led Taylor to hearing God much more clearly. Since his turnaround, he slipped up once and nearly lost his job at our company, Syfan Logistics. But Taylor is a fighter, and he’s back now. No one is prouder than my brother, Steve, who shares a morning devotional with Taylor to hold him accountable each day before work.
“Taylor often shares what God puts on his heart,” Steve says, “and that, in turn, is helping me. Through working at our company, he has become a true brother of mine, and I am very thankful.”
The next time life beats you down, I want you to think about Taylor. His story of faith is a testament that God is still out there – for those who will listen.
Blessed to be a Blessing,
Greg Syfan
President, Syfan Logistics
PS – Below is Taylor Purdy’s favorite verse. He can recite it by heart.
“He will cover you with His feathers, and under His wings you will find refuge; His faithfulness will be your shield and rampart.”
Psalms 91: 4