SALT LAKE CITY — Eric and Kari Rudd were living the American dream.
He worked for a publishing company in Los Angeles, and she was a bank manager.
"We had a house and all the toys, but we still didn't feel fulfilled," Eric Rudd said.
So a year ago, the couple quit their jobs and sold their house and cars, deciding they had been "saved to serve" in the Salvation Army.
"You cannot serve both God and money," said Kari Rudd, who as a baby was left on the steps of an orphanage in Seoul, South Korea. "That is what I have come to learn."
The Rudds were among a group of seven Salvation Army cadets training in Southern California who spent Holy Week in Utah doing service projects. The cadets led the Salt Lake City Salvation Army congregation in worship on Easter Sunday.
Roughly half of the congregation is drawn from the Salvation Army's state-licensed 180-day drug and alcohol rehabilitation program, according to Richard Greene, a captain in the organization.
"We try to give men the skills and tools necessary to live free and clean for the rest of their lives," Greene said. "When they really get set free from drugs and alcohol, they bring their wives and families (to Sunday services). It's a good refresher for them."
The visiting cadets volunteered last week at a rehab program for women in Ogden. The Rudds know they could be sent anywhere in the West in the coming years to help people like the woman they saw graduate from that program or the homeless people they served at a dinner later on Sunday.
To them, that's part of the adventure of their calling and the first step to its fulfillment.
"You can't preach to someone while they're hungry," Eric Rudd said.
Another cadet, Connie Shorts, told the congregation at the Easter service that just a few months ago, her spirits were at a low ebb even as she was preparing to get married.
"I've had a lot of drama in my life," she said. "My family puts the fun back in dysfunction."
Shorts was attending the cadet training school, but she "felt really broken, really alone in a room full of people."
Then one night, she dreamed about being shown a "broken-down church" on a hill with boarded-up windows, torn carpets and peeling paint. Her assignment was to rebuild the church — with just $200 and a Bible.
After seeing the job done in her dream, Shorts became convinced it was a metaphor for her life: she was the church, the hill represented her struggles in life and the people who did the repairs were the ones who had led her to the Lord.
Shorts said the dream helped her rededicate herself to serving others through the Salvation Army.
"You don't believe God does miracles?" she asked the congregation. "He speaks to me in my dreams."
e-mail: pkoepp@desnews.com