My dad got a tumor removed. I walked in and he had no idea who I was. It ripped me apart. I was thinking; “God this is not right” because I had seen what a good man he was. Contrary to what I should have done was lean in on the time when I went into his bedroom and stole money out of his wallet to go get pills because I needed such a fix so bad.
I was super young and rebellious. I grew up in church and if you know anything about preachers kids, they get to see the behind-the-scenes of how the church works and all of that.
So, before I know it, I’m going through a divorce. I was going through all of these things and I had a pain pill problem that is out of control.
I had a group of friends that were burglarizing. I want to say robbing but it wasn’t that macho. It wasn’t like we went in and took stuff from people. We did it while they were not there or sleeping. So it was pretty lame or whatever but we were fulfilling... we were trying to get our fix.
I think I had twelve felonies in three different counties. I ended up getting seven years in state prison.
Me and this girl had a relationship. She came and brought her kids to see me. They loved me too. Of course, I have three brothers that tried and tried. I don’t know if I’m getting how addicted that I was because if I knew you, I had stolen from you on more than one occasion because people love conning the people that love them the most because they believe them. I had wronged everybody that knew me. I had wronged everybody in the church. I had wronged everybody but this one girl, this one woman saw something in me that I did not see. She saw past the sarcasm. She saw past the disbelief and seen something in me and I imagine that’s a lot like Jesus. That was important for me because I am a guy. I have to see things. I have to know it and Jesus really let me know through my wife. She wasn’t my wife at the time but when I got out, we got married two days later.
I have been sober for a little over four years. I just celebrated four years sober.
My brother, I’m going to his church next Saturday to speak at a men's conference. My second brother, the oldest brother, Pastor Kelly and I’m the Associate Pastor there. I’m hoping that they kind of like me.
My mom was gravely sick. The hospice nurse gave us the key to her lockbox that had her drugs in it, her pain medicine. I had to administer them to her. I overcame the temptation. I had the key. I had to give it to her three or four times a day. I thought woe God, I didn’t think of it until now but that is so crazy how that came full circle from my dad on his death bed and me stealing his money to them giving me the key to my moms' lockbox to administer her medicine.
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