I started getting really nervous
for a second, and I had to realize this isn't about me. This is
to show everybody here how God can use a complete, utterly depraved,
dirty sinner to glorify His kingdom. And that's what I hope I can
do with the short amount of time I have with you. So, growing
up as a kid, I was kind of privileged, honest, as a young kid. Both
my parents were together. We lived in a nice little suburb
home by the lake. I went to a nice school. I played
sports. But somewhere along the way,
when my parents got divorced, things started to change in my
life. I didn't see them now, but I
can look back and see that that was a huge effect on my life.
I tried to put on a smile at school and be the funny kid,
you know, class clown. but it just kept affecting me
more and more, seeing what my parents were going through, chaos. It went from peace in my home
to constant chaos when I was home. I had both my parents,
and then it got to the point when they were split up, my dad
was busting in my mom's door and physically taking me off
the couch and running out of the house with me. And those
were things that were normal to me. I wasn't scared. It wasn't
weird. That's just dad, you know? That's
just him. Um, so growing up, chaos started
to become normal to me. Nothing was out of bounds. Nothing
was out of line. Um, my family liked to party
a lot. Um, so slowly going into high
school, uh, is when I started smoking weed. I started drinking
a lot. Um, and I started kind of straying
away from the friends I was playing sports with and started hanging
out with, you know, the cool kids. We all know the cool kids.
Um, And I just can't forget, I just didn't know who I was. I hit an identity crisis in my
life where I'd never felt like I belonged. I was always trying
to be somebody I wasn't and trying to fit in in a place that I was
not comfortable at all times. I got kicked off the football
team freshman year because of my grades shortly after I got
expelled. I was 15 years old, got recorded
on the phone about a gun I first charged. I'm 15 years old. I
didn't know what I was doing. But instead of being scared by
all those things, the people I was hanging out with, that
was almost confidence to keep living that life. It was like
the cool points. So I just kept following my dad
after the divorce because he let me do what I wanted to do.
Smoke, drink, party, not go to school. And he was an addict,
an alcoholic himself, and it slowly started taking a toll
aggressively on his life. We went from moving from house
to house, to moving from motel to motel, to me eventually having
to move in with a girlfriend and my dad moving in with his
uncle. and us not being together anymore. I always had a fallback
plan, and that's why I never knew any better. I was enabled
to the fullest. I didn't have a job. I dropped
out of high school. I didn't think I needed a job.
I didn't think I needed a diploma. I was just enabled. My dad would
give me all his money whenever he had it, and that was about
all I ever started getting a hold of him for. My dad passed away a short time
after we got split. He overdosed and that took a
really big toll on my mental health. I didn't know how to
handle that. And I also was alone again because by this time my
mom had started her own family. She had gotten remarried. They
had two more kids, my little sisters, and they were doing
very well in school. They had to focus on them more
than the kid that's growing up and messing up and making his
own horrible decisions. So I kind of got left in the
dark on that end. She reached out to me a few times,
tried to move me up there, but the life I was used to living,
it was boring being up there. I didn't want to go back to school.
I didn't want to do the right thing. I was selfish. My whole
downfall, I can't blame anybody but myself. I always used my
dad as an excuse. I always used my family as an
excuse, but it's because I was selfish. I did what I wanted
to do at all times. I used everybody around me to
get what I wanted, and then I moved on to the next thing. I was only
a teenager when my cousin introduced me to crack, and that was pretty
much the end of everything. After my dad dying and me being
exposed to that drug, I had never felt so out of control of my
own life. I just would chase and chase
and chase it until the wheels fell off. I mean, if we're being
metaphorical or serious, chase it until my truck broke down
and then sold my truck because it broke down and kept going. So, Haley, my wife, she was my
pretty much middle school, high school sweetheart. She moved
away for a long time during this period of my life. When she had
came back, we were about 20, 21, and I was still in active
addiction, but I was really good at playing it off that I didn't
have a problem. I kept it secret. I'd mess up
pretty bad, but I'd bounce back and I'd pretty much keep it a
secret from everybody around me. I got her pregnant shortly
after she came back to Michigan. And that was when I had to put
my big boy pants on, but I was doing it because it's what I
thought everyone wanted me to do. Not because I was having
an internal change. I thought I had control. I always
did. I always did. And after we had
my daughter, we got a place together, and I straightened up for a little
bit. I did what you're supposed to do, get a job, provide for
your kid. That didn't last very long, probably short-lived, less
than six months. And the mask came off. I folded under pressure. I took
off on her. And then in between today and
that day, that had happened probably a thousand times. I'd come back
in her life, and I'd leave. I had gotten her pregnant with
our twin boys. For anybody that doesn't know,
we have four kids. So I'm really good at repeating my mistakes
as far as not being a father. I was there for them, and then
I'd leave. I was there for them, and then
I'd leave. All I cared about was myself.
I didn't think I had anybody to answer to. I went to rehabs,
rehabs, rehabs, jail, rehab. And that was only because I had
nowhere else to go, not because I wanted to change. I always
told her, I always told everybody in my family, I'm going to rehab,
I'm going to get fine this time, I'm going to be fine. That was
because I wanted them to think I was fine, not because I wanted
to change. The last time around was the
worst. I started getting a house with
our tax money. We got a vehicle. We had a house
on land contract that I was supposed to be fixing up for me, her,
and our family, and our son that was on the way. And I completely
cracked under pressure once again. That's all I knew was to run
back to drugs and run back to drugs. I'd hide in my shame. I'd shut my phone off, and I'd
just keep running. I wasn't good at making a mistake
and then coming back and bouncing back real quick from it. I would
run and run as far as I could for as long as I could. And she
was always there for me, wanting me to come home, asking me to
come home. And it's a blessing that I still have her sitting
right here at all to even hear me speak. So once again, this last time
out was just terrifying. It got to the point where You
know, this kid coming from a nice home with opportunities is now
choosing to be behind dumpsters with people and being in broken
down houses, just walking around. At one point, I tried to sell
my shoes. I was completely enslaved to the drugs I was on, completely
enslaved and in bondage. And I didn't know any better
or didn't think anything of it. It's just what I grew up and
saw. But it was time to stop making excuses and stop blaming
my dad, stop blaming my family, and look in the mirror and realize,
I'm doing this now. My kids now don't have a father
because of what I'm doing, not because of what somebody did
to me. That was short-lived. My really good friend turned
to Christ during all this mess, and I saw what it was doing to
his life and for his family. And I kind of wanted a piece
of that, but I didn't want to do anything. I didn't want to
make the change. I thought I'd say a prayer and
God would fix me. I'd be all good, get a job, stay
clean forever. I never wanted to obey Him. I wanted Him as my Savior, but
I didn't want Him as my Lord. That's really what it came down
to, is I wanted a Savior, but I didn't want a Lord because
I was in control. And here in a little bit of my
story, you can see where that got me. So at one point, I knew
I needed a long-term Christ-based program. because I couldn't do
it myself. There was no way possible on
this earth that I could do it myself because I tried time and
time again. I got this, I got this. I didn't
have anything but a big mess and a bigger mess that I was
creating. So I heard the Grace Centers of Hope. I went away
and a little bit of it was selfish leaving my family, but I knew
the 30, 60, 90 day programs never worked for me. That was just
time to sit down and get my brain back together, get some food
in my stomach before I ran back out again. And coming here has
been the most biggest, hugest change in our life as a family,
as a person. I remember sitting in the dorm
and I used to talk to Dustin all the time and He was always
preaching the gospel to me. And I was on fire when I first
came in, because I was in that, you know, go hard, ready mode
to change. About two weeks straight, we'd
work out all the time. He'd preach the gospel to me.
We'd listen to Christian music. I'd be like, yeah, yeah. And
then I hit that wall where I realized I have to put forth an effort.
And I totally just became... arrogant and started pushing
him away a little bit. But that's when I realized how
selfish and conceited I was being. I had to sit down in my bunk
and think about my children out there with her and her doing
this all by herself. And I just completely broke down.
And I just remember saying a prayer, telling him that I just, I needed
him more than anything in my life. And he came. I mean, he came in that dorm,
35 East Huron, top bunk. He came and he showed himself. I remember going to case manager
meetings shortly after. I was telling my case manager,
I just feel so selfish, you know, I have no control over my kids
right now, because I wanted control. Ironically, about an hour or
two later after having that conversation, she had ran into some trouble
where I had to take the kids, all four of them, in the mission. Another time, I realized how
selfish I was as a person because it's what I was asking for and
what I wanted, but when it was happening, I was the most scared
man you could have seen Those kids walked through those doors.
I was so grateful to see them, not under the circumstance, but
I was so grateful to see them. And then I always prayed for
patience. Big mistake. I always prayed
for patience. And I thought I'd just wake up
and be patient, you know? Lord, please give me patience.
I was waiting for that day to just wake up and be like, wow,
here it is, I'm patient. So he said, here's four kids
in a single room in your shelter. And it never struck me until
about a week or two in, this chaos is what I was doing to
her. Me taking off and me leaving
is what I was doing to her. Poor me, poor me, I got these
four kids acting like I had nothing to be grateful for because it
was so chaotic. And that's exactly what I did
to her time and time and time again. And realizing things like
that is when I realized that God has really blessed me with
a powerful discernment about seeing the silver lining in things,
going through the trial and leveling up from it, going through the
storm and becoming stronger in faith through it. And I believe
in my life that's what I had to do was go through storm, storm,
and storm again until I had no one to look to but God and give
it all to Him. So when I went to go graduate,
they offered me a job for volunteer coordinator. And we're working
on getting us a house. During that time, Haley knew
that she needed some help, and she came through the program. I remember in my head, you know,
we're not going to rush things. We're not going to rush things.
That's the love of my life. I don't know who I was fooling.
We're not going to rush things. We're not going to rush things
two or three months after we're married. I love that girl to death. So I guess really the big picture
is coming through Grace Centers of Hope. seeing the work that
God's doing here completely saved my life. And I had to depend
on something that was bigger than me. And I think if anybody
here is going through anything that they can't control, that's
the biggest thing you need to realize is you can't control
it. God can, and you need to give it to him. And no matter
how hard it gets, you're gonna come out stronger in faith and
in will on the other side of that storm. That's all I have.