SAFE-HOUSE AND SERVICES FOR BATTERED WOMEN & CHILDREN

About Shepherd’s Rest Ministries, Inc.
Battered Women's Shelter, Family Violence Crisis Center located in Paulding County, Georgia    

     Shepherd's Rest is a family violence crisis center which provides a 24-hour crisis line, emergency housing, emergency transportation, legal advocacy, food, clothing, counseling, resource referrals, and financial assistance to the community-at-large located in Paulding County, Georgia.  We concentrate our efforts on enabling and empowering abused and homeless women in becoming self-sufficient and gainfully employed by providing them with skills in problem resolution, coping, parenting, and practical job market/ job retention skills in an effort to break the cycle of domestic violence.

     Shepherd’s Rest Ministries, Inc. was founded by Dr. Kathryn D. Melton in June of 1997.  With a handful of volunteers and approximately $1,700 raised at a gospel singing fundraiser, Dr. Melton opened the shelter to its first two families in December 1997.  The battered women’s shelter has since housed over 980 women and children.

     Prior to establishing the shelter, Dr. Melton, who received her Ph.D. in Counseling Psychology from Cornerstone University, was the Founder and Executive Director of Dallas Family Counseling Center, Inc. in Dallas, GA, where she provided individual, group and family counseling, specializing in issues of domestic violence, sexual abuse recovery, & anxiety disorder.  She concentrated her counseling efforts on healing and restoration, and felt God’s calling upon her life to open a battered women’s shelter after witnessing the results of domestic violence in her own sister’s life.

     The first shelter was a “handyman’s special” rental house located in Hiram, GA.  With the carpentry talents of her husband and a few others, along with generous donations of furniture and supplies from the community-at-large, the facility was quickly turned into a functioning shelter.  With God’s provision, by the year 2000, Shepherd’s Rest Ministries, Inc. purchased its own facility, able to house up to 19 people.  (paid in full!)

     Over the years, the umbrella of Shepherd's Rest Ministries' Safe-House and Services for Battered Women & Children, has expanded to include three vital areas of service: 1) Emergency Shelter for female victims of domestic violence and their children, 2) Legal Advocacy, and 3) Financial Assistance.  Many ingredients go together to provide each of these services to the community, but the policy for each service is basically the same --- to provide safe housing to any alleged victim of domestic violence in need of emergency shelter and unbiased services to the community-at-large without regard to race, religion, social or economic background. Our goal is to ensure that victims/clients obtain safety, stability, and can eventually move toward maximum self-sufficiency.  All services are offered free-of-charge to the client.

     On the drawing board for 2008 are plans to purchase a transitional house for qualified women and children exiting the emergency shelter, who are in need of more time to establish life patterns conducive to successful independent living apart from the cycle of domestic violence.  A transitional house will help provide hope for a better future for family violence victims. It takes time to break the cycle of violence and start afresh.  It takes time to make life changes following the toll that domestic violence takes on self-esteem, coping, and parenting skills. It takes time to finish an education or learn an employable trade.  It takes time to learn how to support yourself and your young children on one salary.  God is moving Shepherd’s Rest Ministries, Inc. into a new realm of services for these battered women and children, all in an effort to give healing, restoration, and regeneration to a hurting and dying world.