Grandma Linda's 'Extreme Home Makeover'

CBN.com - They call her Grandma Linda – a brave widow who adopted her three grandchildren Trinity, Joy, and little Joseph. Sadly, Linda Kiggen’s house was falling down around her.

“You’d walk in and it just felt depressing,” Linda said. “My husband passed away, and there were a lot of honey-do’s that never got done. It’s just I didn’t know how and didn’t have the strength.”

Bob Clifford is the outreach pastor at Canyon View Vineyard Church. While watching a home makeover show, he says God gave him an idea. 

“I just saw all the people in the town come to help,” Bob said. “And I was like ‘Gosh, that’s something we can do,’ and the Holy Spirit said ‘You can do this.’”

The church learned about Linda’s situation and decided to help.

“She wasn’t asking for a handout,” Terry said.  “She just wanted the leak stopped in her roof for starters. So I guess right away the compassion part just came in, and I was really sitting there thinking, you know, we could be the hands and feet of Jesus.”

A force of two hundred volunteers went to work.

“People started saying, ‘Well, I can help with the roof, I can pay for the fence,’ or ‘I can pay for this.’ We never asked for anything, and yet we had thousands of dollars given to us and skills we would have never been able to afford to hire.”

“God led me to do this,” said one volunteer.  Another volunteer said, “God’s been so good to me. We should share it with others.”

Volunteers did some much-needed repairs for Grandma Linda.

Pastor Bob said they put in new cabinets, dry wall, and flooring. The volunteers alsopatched up the gaping hole in the bathroom ceiling and repainted the house.  The finishing touches included new furniture and a jungle gym for the kids.

Finally it was time for Linda and the kids to see their new home.  In just four days, volunteers transformed their home.   When Linda walked into her kitchen she started crying from happiness.

“Oh, it was awesome. It was like walking into better homes and gardens,” Linda said. “You could walk in and feel the difference. I knew that a prayer had gone with every nail and every piece of tile.”

She continued, with tears in her eyes, “There’s no way to describe [how] this isn’t just a gift… because we live in our gift everyday, and we sleep in our gift every day.”