Twelve years ago I had a child out of wedlock, and I did not have a stable job to support my newborn daughter. Today, I run a successful company that has a true mission of freeing people from debt. My testimony is one of the Lord, perseverance, and dedication.

My name is Eric Giles. I am the President and CEO of Harbour Credit Counseling Services Inc.

Part II (Continued from our Fall Newsletter)

A week after I graduated ODU I married my beautiful wife Natalie. A few months later I was offered a job at Harbour as a manager. I continued to be a client and employee at the same time. In July 2000 I made my last payment to Harbour as a client. Since then I went back to school to learn programming and had two more children. Upon graduating I worked as a programmer in Harbour’s IT department. In 2003 I was asked to be a Vice President to one of Harbour’s sister companies. I ran that company until 2005 when Harbour’s board of directors voted me to take the place of Ray E. Noftsinger as President and CEO. I have been truly blessed to serve Harbour and its clients.

Since 2005 I have tried to bless others, and I have been on three mission trips. The first was to New Orleans to help feed the victims of Katrina with Operation Blessing. The next two, I traveled to Peru to the Amazon River to help build churches on isolated pueblos. I continue to strive for personal goals and I am currently training for my fourth marathon in March.

I guess the whole point of this article is to communicate hope during your transition to become debt free. Once I broke the chains of debt I was able to achieve and help others more than I ever imagined. When I look at how my life has transformed in the last 10 years I know it started with God and how he lead me to Harbour.