Marisol Carrero

From the first moment I met Marisol Carrero, I enjoyed her energetic personality and enthusiasm for life. But as she recently shared with me, she wasn't always that way.

Marisol had a moment with the Lord for the first time at the age of 11 when she visited a youth group at a little church in Puerto Rico. She had been raised by a single mom in a challenging home affected and exposed to drugs, abuse, alcohol, and emotional instability. At the age of 15 she ran away from home when she thought she had found love, but it went from bad to worse. She found herself in a very physically and emotionally abusive relationship for years, and in an environment that practiced Santeria. At this point in her life, Marisol thought her way of living was normal because she did not understand her worth, and she had not seen anything better. She did not have any mentors and she lacked the discipleship she needed to stay on the path with Christ.

When Marisol moved to New York, she became lost in money and looks, and found her identity in those things. "The only thing I knew about God was that he was a God of wrath", Marisol explained. She didn't think God wanted anything to do with her - and that's the way she lived for thirty-something years.

Many years later, Marisol married Franklin Carrero, and when Marisol had the first baby, she was hit with severe depression. Old wounds began to re-open and it was apart that she had struggled with depression her entire life. Marisol suffered in silence for two years and wrestled with shame because of it. She was dry, empty, filled with rage, and couldn't tell anyone what she was going through because she felt she needed to keep the perfect picture. But on the inside, Marisol felt the loneliness of being separated from God. She didn't know who she was, and for many years she allowed the enemy to rob her of a healthy home, a healthy mind, and a healthy opinion about herself. "I tried religion", Marisol said, "but it only took me deeper and deeper into the hole". Marisol had feelings of desperation and she experienced suicidal thoughts.

One day, Marisol's husband, Franklin, was at work when a colleague noticed something was wrong. She handed him some information about a church in Valley Stream, New York, and she asked Franklin if she could pray for him. Franklin agreed and she began to pray for his wife, specifically against depression and suicide. When Franklin returned home from work that day, he handed Marisol the information about the church, but it angered Marisol and she threw the paper away.

Soon after, Marisol attempted to end her life with an overdose of pills, but by God's grace, she woke up the next day. She knew she needed help, so she googled "churches near me" - and the first church listed in the search results was Bethlehem Assembly of God, the name of the same church that Franklin's colleague had written down on the paper that was thrown away. Franklin and Marisol visited Bethlehem and there Marisol felt a ray of hope because she learned one simple truth, "God loves me."

Marisol had an encounter with her Heavenly Father nine years ago. Today, Marisol is healed from depression and she now realizes that depression was the tool that God used to bring her and her family back to Him. Franklin is the Campus Pastor at Bethlehem's satellite campus in Rosedale, New York, with Marisol serving along side him. Marisol clearly sees the identity crisis so many people of all ages are going through in our world today - people who are just like she was at one time, allowing the world to define them. "That's what happens when you don't know who you are and whose you are. I claimed my identity and now I can walk forward", Marisol says. My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness (2 Corinthians 12:9).

Today Marisol exists to empower women to be all that God created them to be!