Valiant Living Podcast
Welcome to the Valiant Living Podcast where we educate, encourage, and empower you towards a life of peace and freedom.
Valiant Living has been restoring lives and families since 2017 by providing multiple levels of care for men and their families. Fully accredited by The Joint Commission, Valiant Living has earned a national reputation as a premier treatment program, offering IOP, PHP, and recovery housing programs for men ages 26 and older. Founder and CEO MIchael Dinneen is a nationally recognized therapeutic expert, speaker, and thought leader in the behavioral health field.
On this podcast you’ll hear from the Valiant team as well as stories of alumni who are living in recovery. If you or someone you love is struggling to overcome addiction or trauma, please call us at (720)-756-7941 or email admissions@valiantliving.com We’d love to have a conversation with you!
Valiant Living Podcast
Grace and Healing: A Father-Son Journey Through Faith and Recovery with Gary Powell
What if the key to healing family wounds lies in the simple act of conversation? Join us for an emotionally charged episode as I sit down with my dad, Gary, to explore the transformative power of fatherhood. With a rich background as a pastor and a deep connection to Southern gospel music, Gary shares his wisdom on the importance of grace and understanding in father-child relationships. Together, we open up about our own experiences, highlighting how fathers can profoundly shape their children's lives.
In a candid discussion, we navigate the deeply emotional terrain of family wounds and reconciliation. Reflecting on my childhood, including the pain of church splits and my driven nature leading to burnout, we delve into the significant impact these experiences had on my personal and professional life. My dad offers his heartfelt perspective on witnessing my struggles, especially during my disqualification from ministry and rehabilitation. Through our conversation, we underscore the importance of honest and open communication in the healing process.
Our dialogue also turns to the role of faith and community in recovery. We scrutinize the shortcomings of modern evangelical churches in addressing issues of brokenness and addiction, contrasting them with the supportive environments found in 12-step programs. Gary and I discuss the necessity of unconditional love, patience, and prayer in supporting a loved one through recovery. By sharing our journey, we hope to inspire a vision for a church that fully embraces brokenness and offers a pathway to healing, breaking harmful cycles and fostering healthier patterns for future generations.
I'm really happy to introduce you. My dad, gary, is here from I don't know where you live now. Are you an Indian? I heard you earlier claim Indianapolis.
Speaker 2:I'm trying to be a snowbird.
Speaker 1:Okay, so Florida.
Speaker 2:I've got the Stewart thing lined up and working on Indianapolis things.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so Palm Beach some of the time and Indianapolis some of the time, so really glad that you're here. I want to start out by saying this um, tonight we're going to talk we started in our, in our check-in with alumni just talking about our dads, um, and I think for us guys, um, it's really a big deal, like we were talking about earlier, maybe one of the most important, if not the most important relationship in our lives, as far as what forms us and shapes us has a lot to do with our dad, who our dad is, and I understand that in this room, um, there's going to be a wide spectrum of feelings and thoughts when it comes to fatherhood. Even if you're, you are a dad, that's going to, you know, shape a lot. And so I want to just start out by saying this is a really safe place and I actually kind of like the size of the room tonight because I think we can just have more of a conversation about this and continue that. But I've been fortunate because I have a dad and I'm going to do my best not to get emotional tonight, but no promises, right, but I have a dad who's been a very safe place for me to process what I was going through. This goes back a long time. This goes back to even we actually pastored together for a while, dad. I grew up as a pastor's kid, so I grew up in the church. A lot of my wounding in my life that I've had to work through has come at the hands of the church the church that he was leading and so I've had to go back and do a lot of work on that. I've had to go back and do a lot of work on that. I've had to go back and do work on, you know, going through those stages of like man, if dad would have done this, that or the other, that wouldn't have happened and I wouldn't experience that pain, you know, and having to process that. But having a dad that I've been able to like have these conversations with, I remember one time where you might remember this better than me, but I went to you and I was just like we were pastoring. This might have been the first time we were working together when I was doing music and I was just like. I didn't want to.
Speaker 1:I've always wanted to make dad happy and proud. That was a big deal. I played basketball, played sports come through, dad's a great athlete and he was at every game. He was coaching the games and at the games whatever. And he was at every game. He was coaching the games and at the games whatever. But probably the most fun game I ever played was the one game he didn't show up because pressure was off. Now he just asked me yesterday in the truck and this is the kind of dad he is. He said hey, did I ever make you feel like you had to perform to win my approval and my affection? Which what a hell of a question for a dad to ask? And the truth was no. He didn't put that pressure on me, but I felt as the oldest. I wanted dad to be proud. I wanted dad to be proud, so I wanted to play. Well, so when he didn't show up, I was like, hey, pressure's off, let's just go have fun. Dad's not here. But I wanted to have this conversation because doing my work here at Valiant, um, you know reparenting.
Speaker 1:Going back into childhood, in the interview I did with Michael Sims, he quoted uh Freud. That said no one, no one gets out of childhood unscathed. Um, so whether you've had an awesome dad or your dad was the worst, there's going to be wounds that we've all experienced. I mean, my kids are going to have wounds that hopefully that they go and and and are able to get treated for and help for. It's like it doesn't matter how good you are.
Speaker 1:So I think you and I'm talking a lot here in the beginning I'm turning it over to you, but I think part of the healing process is going through all the stages of, like, anger and all the different things and then me getting to the place where it was like dad, nobody talked about this man, mom and dad in my case, we're doing the very best they could with what they were given. You know like this was and I hope my kids give me that same grace Like, hey, dad wasn't perfect, but he did the very best he could. And I've I've told my older daughters now hey, I want to help you and even pay for your therapy to go get the other things that I wasn't able to. I wasn't meant to fill all the voids and all the holes in your life, all those things. So, anyway, I just want to kind of put that disclaimer out front that if anything rises up in you about, like during this conversation, oh man, I I wish I could have had this conversation with my dad or what like that. This is a safe place to have those feelings and even process those feelings, and I want to leave leave some space here at the end for just conversation or even questions for him. Dad's would be the first to tell you he's not a therapist.
Speaker 1:He has been a pastor for what? 120 years. That was a 58, 58 years. Um, mostly in music. I'll brag on a little bit. He's I don't know how many Southern gospel fans we have here, but the best of the best was Bill Gaither. Bill Gaither is known as the guy in that. Dad and Bill were business partners back in the day. Dad was his first guitar player. We went on the on the road as kidsithers, so he's kind of a legend and a stud in the music arena. But, dad, welcome, thank you. Just kick us off. Tell us a little bit where you grew up, how you grew up. What was your family like growing up?
Speaker 2:I have an unusual situation in the fact that you've heard of husbands and wives that pastor together. My mom and dad pastored separate churches At the same time.
Speaker 2:At the same time and I never have heard of that before People used to ask me well, what church did you go to? I said my dad's church was my Sunday morning church, but at nighttime, when I was six foot tall, when I was in high school, I would be my mother's protector. I'd go to her church on Sunday nights and that was my responsibility on Sunday nights and that was my responsibility. But it is unusual. You hear how pastor's kids turn out bad so often. I can explain that to you after a while if you've got time. But it's something that you learn to deal with.
Speaker 2:And even what we learned with Drew was very painful to me because I didn't realize the hardest thing for a pastor is when someone will leave the church. And, interesting, if you ever leave a church, would you mind just telling the pastor why you're going? Don't just disappear? And so we were a very relational church, but I didn't realize what it was doing to him. I was just trying to survive the thing and I was, you know, I just I thought, well, I never thought about the kids. I just didn't think this is, you're losing your friends, they're, they're gone to another church, they're not speaking to it, never, and that that's been very hurtful to me because I feel so bad about that. Nothing I can do about it now. But I was not. I guess I was just trying to survive, trying to get through it.
Speaker 1:Well, and even me hearing you say that even now is healing, because I think you are doing something about it, which is you're showing up for me in these moments where I'm. I've had a lot of trouble going back in my history and talking about childhood wounds, because I feel like I've had great parents. So I've been in my therapy very defensive of my, specifically of you, my dad, because I'm like he didn't do anything, but it's very bad, right. So I like I'm in that camp and I know not all of us are in that camp, right, but but I think being able to have these conversations has been really healing and really helpful. Of, like man, I just I didn't know, I didn't see that. I mean, even me hearing that now is it brings, brings healing, a little context to our family.
Speaker 1:So we had a church for a couple hundred people wasn't a very big church but, like dad said, very relational and then also a really large homeschool community and so, um, we went through several really massive church splits where a good chunk of the church left at one time. Now for you, you might say what's the big deal? For us, this was like the family business. This is what we poured our life into and we were homeschooled. These were our friends, these were all of our relationships. And as a kid, when overnight, half of your friends, for no reason, just leave and you're walking in a grocery store and they turn and go the other way for no reason, and that happens enough, the narrative that I begin to believe is that people leave you if you don't perform well enough for them. And so for us as a church, because we were always really involved, playing music and everything else if we'd have done a better job, they would not have left. Or, specifically, if dad would have done a better job, these people wouldn't have left.
Speaker 1:So I grew up saying, well, I'm going to be the leader of all leaders, I'm going to chain smoke every leadership book Because no one is going to leave me because of my poor leadership. That's never going to happen. Well, guess what? It happened over and over and over again and I'm left with this identity of like I don't know who the hell I am, I don't know what's going on, and it was always performance, performance, performance. So I would get up on Sundays and preach to thousands of people when my inner life behind the scenes was just crumbling, but I could put on a show. I we knew how to do this. We knew how to get up and perform, but over time my soul just got so detached because it wasn't who I was and I'm trying to win approval. So a little background and context to what what dad was saying.
Speaker 1:I want to you have a amazing story. I'd love to just I'd love to be able to take a few hours and just talk about your music and, you know, pastoring, all that kind of stuff. But I want to, for the sake of tonight, I want to just fast forward and jump to the summer of 2022. Summer of 2022. Um, I'm working at this big church in Nashville and I really sensed dad's um pride in what I was doing. Uh, if I would ever preach and he'd get the video, he would be a typical dad. People would come over for dinner and he'd put on the video of me preaching. And I'm like dad, they don't want to watch this video they had to watch it.
Speaker 1:Look at what my son, look at what you know they're in my house they're gonna watch it right, right.
Speaker 1:I'm like no one wants to see me preaching on this thing. So when my world implodes and I'm found out to be, you know at that time to be a fraud, the word that was used is disqualified from ministry. So they get up on stage and tell the whole church he's been disqualified. And that was the last they heard from me. There's an intervention. They get me on a plane to Denver. One of the hardest things was for me to face dad and say dad, I blew it, like I'm not, I'm not there anymore. I was fired. I was sent to rehab. Here's what happened. I was having an affair and I had to sit down. I had to tell him all these things. Man, I was just like, and he was very gracious in his response. But I'm curious like take us back to summer of 2022 from a father's standpoint. You hear all this.
Speaker 2:This happens well, I think to start with it was. It was such a crazy, crazy blindside because I mean this guy did everything right, made the right decisions, was worked at church, never complained I gotta play guitar. I mean never complained, I got to play guitar. I mean, how many years did he play guitar Every Sunday, didn't have a choice to miss, because that's your job, you know, and it just I mean, even the first night he came home from the hospital he slept all night. But that blind side was like I just couldn't hardly believe it was real, because he had just made the right choices and did the right thing.
Speaker 2:And I think that the pain for me was for you. It wasn't like I was, it was like he's worked this hard to get to where he is and unfortunately, the church is so unforgiving, unfortunately don't let me get on that subject but it's over. He doesn't have a job now and he'll never be able to go back to that and he'll be. And you know, I know this sounds like a dad, but the man is a good communicator. I can't carry his Bible to the pulpit, I mean, he is a good communicator. But that's not a possibility now because the church you can't make a mistake at church. I don't know what your church is like, but if you make a mistake out, you're out, get out. We don't even want to know about it, you know.
Speaker 2:But my, my pain was at that point and I and I think that I was, I was just trying to think about the you know how, where do you, where do you go from here? We didn't know anything about at that point, valiant or anything else, and I, I, I didn't know a lot of places where there'd been a lot of success and I and I, my, my fear was can he, can he get past us? Can he overcome it? Can he? I mean, I, that was. That was such a real fear and I think for some of you I mentioned the higher power the only way I could get through that for you was to say, hey, is this real or not? I've given my life to this. Can you do something in this case? And my thought was, yes, he can. And that's what I held on to, because when I would go to the other side and think about the fearful side of it would take me down. I mean, when I say take me down, I'm not a, I don't deal with depression, but that would take me out.
Speaker 1:There's one on my first couple weeks here and I don't know if anybody else relates to this, but for me my first couple weeks of PHP was just brutal. I was fortunate Fletch was with me during that really happy that you get to meet dad tonight, fletch, because Fletch and I journeyed through a lot of stuff together. But I was in this constant state of what am I doing here? I don't have contact with my family, with my wife. For all I know. I've lost my family. I've lost my wife, my kids I may not ever talk to again. I mean all these stories I'm writing. I've lost my church community. I've got nothing. I don't even have a career. We were raised in this. I don't know what I even do. I don't even know what I'm good at besides this. This is what I.
Speaker 1:So now I'm like I'm just hitting a total reset and I remember, you know, learning through some of the IFS stuff and the parts work that they teach us here and all this stuff and and uh, at that time I don't know if it's still happening, but Dano was doing an ACA group. We do it on the back porch there Really helpful group for me. I'm glad I see some of you shaking your head. I'm glad it's still going because I had no context for any of this. I actually had no context for addiction. I didn't know I had anxiety and I didn't know I was an addict before I came here. I just would have told you I'm just future focused. I, I'm just future focused, I'm a leader, I'm a go getter, I'm a whatever. And I got here Do you have anxiety? I'm like no, I'll take this assessment. And I was like off the charts for anxiety and all this stuff. So we're doing the ACA and I'm learning about just childhood wounding and all this kind of stuff.
Speaker 1:And there was a moment and I want you to share what it was like being on the other side of this phone call, because I call mom and dad and I'm pacing in the field at Foxfield and I'm weeping and I'm like I can't do this. I just can't stay here. I got to get out of here. I just cannot do it anymore. And in that moment it was so beautiful because here I am, 40, 41 years old, 40 years old at the time and mom and dad parented me in that moment like I needed to be parent.
Speaker 1:It was not Drew, it was young Andrew who was crying out for help, quite literally needing parents to show up. Fortunately, I had him. I called him and I remember mom was doing, I think, most of the talking, and mom was just saying, hey, you're in the right place, and I was so grateful she didn't say leave, because I would have been gone. If mom would have said, hey, just come home, we'll take care of you. I would have been out. Mom, you're doing the right thing, you're where you need to be. Remember why you're doing this All of a sudden, just really just parented me. You were on the phone too, and mom and dad have reached that age. I don't know what age you get to, but when you call one of them, you get both of them all the time I don't know what age that is, but I don't know why they have two phones.
Speaker 1:Just call one of them and you're going to have both of them on the phone.
Speaker 2:I don't even know why we have two cars. Yeah, it's a joint thing. Now what? Because I couldn't give you any percentage of, I didn't think 10% you could stay. I mean you were just so far down and your emotions were gone, Everything. It just seemed like. And I was kind of glad you're talking to your mom, because she, moms just have more compassion. Is that okay to say? I mean, they just can kind of get in there. But I was pacing the floor as well and just thinking in my mind. I was thinking he can't leave. If he leaves, it's over. I mean, his life is over, he's not going to turn, it can't be turned around here. I just didn't think it could be turned around and that was the fearful part for me, again to realize that. And I'm thinking we're going to get on a plane in the morning, I'm going, I guess we're going to Denver because we're going to, I'm serious, we're going to go to Denver and he's going to stay. Whatever we got to have to try to do, you know.
Speaker 1:But I think I was just looking for someone to permission me to to leave, and you guys kind of held that line. Uh, for me I'm curious, as I was processing through things and having to go back into my childhood, especially going back into some old woundings and some old things that we as a family were part of. What did that bring up for you? What did that do for you? Um, how did you feel when I'm having I'm having to challenge things that are kind of hardwired into the dna of our family fabric?
Speaker 2:yeah it. Um, I guess I guess the fact that I just felt pretty guilty that I was so unaware, so unaware that it was so hard on you. At that point in time I really didn't know how to deal with that. I guess I was dealing with my own issue, but I just never realized that it was taking such a toll and continued to do that. And you know, after he's come back, a few times we've talked, and it from a pastor's standpoint. I think every pastor should have to go through training to understand addiction, because I mean, he's told me so much stuff that I just totally not aware of. And and I think that because, let's face it, it's, it's everywhere out there, I mean, whether the people who omit it or not, it's, it's everywhere every or to see how that all connected. Here again, you can't go back and fix it now, Sure, and I wouldn't want to.
Speaker 1:I mean, I think it's part of shaping who we've become and all those things. So I don't even think I have the desire to go back and fix any of those things. I'm grateful for what I've learned and all those.
Speaker 2:And you know, fix any of those things I'm grateful for what I've learned and all those. One thing you said I think he was I can remember this so very plain because there was a family in the church that we had rented them a house and it was a single mom with three kids and we had put them in the house and took furniture from our house and put it in their house. And the week that they left the church I think you were somewhere around maybe 12 or 13. And he said to me Dad, why is it the people that you help so much always poop on you? And he used the word poop because we didn't pretty legalistic in our house, we didn't use the cuss words then.
Speaker 5:We use them a little bit now, on occasion.
Speaker 2:We feel freedom If it helps make our point. But he says why do the people you help the most poop on you? And you know what? I should have picked up on that, because that was you were hurting for me at that point to say, gosh, my dad did all this stuff and they're blown down.
Speaker 1:Well, and I'm glad you said that, because a lot of my hurt was I will never let myself go through what I've seen my dad go through, even going into ministry. It was like like I'll keep people at a distance and but I'm not gonna let anybody in close enough or care deep enough because they're all the. The narrative that I have is everyone is gonna leave you at some point. It's not, you know if it's when, it's just a matter of when it's gonna happen. And so you go into everything, every relationship, every. It's not. You know, if it's when, it's just a matter of when it's going to happen. And so you go into everything, every relationship, every business deal, everything I have. Even you know, this week we joke because there was something I was going into to have a conversation with a client and I was. I couldn't sleep the night before I was writing all these stories and it turned out to be the exact opposite of what I thought was going to happen. But I still have this hard wire of they're going to leave they, of what I thought was going to happen, but I still have this hard wire of they're going to leave, they're going to. That's what they do. The people that you help the most, and so and there's a lot we can say about that I think in doing work you realize that that's not why you do it. I mean there's a lot of things we can go down that road, but yeah, that that narrative was shaped pretty early on. So I think a lot of times we do pick up hurt on behalf of of the people that we love and then that's what ends up shaping us, because it wasn't really done directly to me, it was done to you or our family, or maybe not even done to us, but it just happened. It just happened, um, spiritually speaking. So in this room, I don't know ever, I don't know everyone's, you know religious affiliation background, but I, you know something that part of our program is very much. So it starts out step one talking about this higher power right that we need a power beyond ourselves.
Speaker 1:A big part of our family's history has all been about we've been in the business, if you will, of spirituality and faith. I mean I've always seen it as a very personal thing for you. I never. One thing I've always seen in you is a consistency between the stage and off stage, more so than what I had. It was very much you were, your faith was real to you. It wasn't like a performance on Sunday and that kind of helped me stay in the game spiritually for a long time because I was like this is real for dad. This isn't a show or a game or whatever. But I'm curious and we haven't talked about this specifically but over the last few years with what our families walk through, are there anything? Is there anything you see different now?
Speaker 1:Because, like I go through this deconstruction process, very similar thing. I'm laying in the bed in Foxfield, I'm looking up at the ceiling and I'm saying God, I don't know if this whole thing was bullshit or not, but if it's real and you're real, then we're hit the reset button, start over, because what I've been doing up to this point has not been working. So I never got mad at God and whenever was like out on God. I definitely had my anger towards institutional churches, but God and I always stayed cool. But we had to really do a you know, redefine the relationship conversation and we had to rebuild. So and what I've rebuilt is some things are very similar and some things are very different from what I've rebuilt from you know what we grew up in you we joked a little bit about legalism. I mean the legalism that existed in your family growing up. What movie was it?
Speaker 2:hey, that's nothing to joke about the legalism. Uh, I would. We're coming home from school and we went coming up by the movie theater and this will put some age on me but Bambi had just come out and the kids were going to see and I called my dad and said hey, dad, everyone's going to see Bambi, and I got my own money. And he said Well, dad, everyone's going to see Bambi, and I got my own money. And he said well, I don't know, I guess I'll probably have to change jobs because our church doesn't believe in movies. I said, oh, you don't need to change jobs, I don't need to see it. Hang up, okay.
Speaker 2:Talk about shaping somebody there's something you can carry for a while yeah, 78 years. But yeah.
Speaker 1:Got to resign my ministry job if you go see Bambi. You know, and I wouldn't.
Speaker 2:Man, my dad and I had a great. I mean, you know that's not going to happen. Yeah, you know. But I think even going through this with you it's changed some of my philosophy in terms of the church and religion. Not for God. I've never been able to find a theologian that could tell me why.
Speaker 2:Jesus' first line of his first public message, first line, said Blessed are they that can realize their need. The King James says Poor in spirit. If you're Blessed, are they that can realize their need? For theirs is the kingdom of heaven. What is the kingdom of heaven? The kingdom of heaven is God's total answer for man's total need.
Speaker 2:And I've lived with that to say, the older I get, the more I realize my need. I have more needs now than I ever have. I mean, man, I get up in the morning I get, the more I realize my need. I have more needs now than I ever have. I mean, man, I get up in the morning and think what is that? Gosh, the knee went out over the night. You know I mean God what's happening? But also in my nervous system, in my emotions, in my thinking, you know it, it's I realized my need. And when I realized my need, then that that's when I get to go into the next gear, which is the kingdom, and and it. I'm here to tell you, if you've never tried it, it works and and I don't, I couldn't have got through your experience without the crutch. I mean, it was a crutch and I used it a lot and it worked, and you're the proof of it.
Speaker 1:Well, I was thinking earlier when we were talking about fatherhood and, again, god in higher power. Language is not foreign to any of us in this room who have been in any kind of 12-step or whatever, and we all have very. I mean I won't call anybody out, but there's guys in this room that I know we have very complicated relationship with church and God because of how it was used towards us growing up, and so it's a very complicated thing to try to navigate and detangle and whatever. I do think it's interesting that oftentimes in our 12-step rooms when we pray, we do serenity prayer a lot, but we also do the Lord's Prayer a lot too. It's just something that's part of our rhythm and our tradition and all those things about the relationship between father son and how important that is and how that very prayer that we pray every time was a prayer that Jesus gave us to teach us I want to teach you how to pray, and I've always thought it was interesting that he didn't say pray and say you know our creator or our most wonderful, magnificent God. He starts by saying and the Greek actually translates it to daddy, when we say our father, who art in heaven, it's even Jesus saying, hey, this daddy thing, this father deal, pay attention to that. And actually, when you relate to God, that is the kind of relationship I want you to relate to God with.
Speaker 1:Now it's problematic because we've all had earthly fathers who are all flawed, every single one of them. No one here has had a perfect one, um, and so it puts a complicated relationship between us and God. If we're supposed to relate to God as a dad, um, cause our dad might be stoic and we don't know how to receive compassion and affection, or our dad might be highly emotional, our dad might be an addict and doesn't know how to draw boundaries. I mean, we've got all these things, and so we then project that on our higher power, because that's the only thing we know how to compare it to. So I think it's really something we should pay attention to.
Speaker 1:Something I've had to pay attention to is okay, how has my relationship with you impacted how I see my higher power and how I relate? And then, how do I need to be open to receiving a different version of that based on my, my experience? So we've talked quite a bit. I'm curious what's coming up for you guys, what questions you have, comments, um, or even just what are you feeling Like? What do you got? What's going on? And I'm actually this time I'm going going to run this little mic around so you can hear it.
Speaker 5:Well, I'm how I would have, how I would have longed to have had such a conversation with my dad. This is really a gift.
Speaker 3:Thank you. I wanted to ask a question of you. You've said three things that have stuck with me really strongly, one of which was don't get you started on the church, or the church's response, let's say. The second thing was how much you were beyond prideful but loved hearing your son preach. And then a concern about what your a concern both for your son's future, but also a statement about every pastor should learn something about addiction, because it's out there and everybody needs some help. So my question to you is given all of that— Do you see a church in your son's future where that could be a piece of the loving message from the pulpit? Is that a possibility in the world you've lived through?
Speaker 2:Wow.
Speaker 1:We can go there if we want to go there my first response is the name of the church.
Speaker 2:Is that strange, or what? The name of the church is Mercy Road, and it would have to start from the ground up. It would have to start from the ground up, it would have to be totally different from anything we've ever known or seen. It would have to be to be right. I mean, the church is so far from what the early church started as it's so far that only God himself could fix it. I don't know what Can you help me out? I don't know where to. I don't, I don't know what can you help me out. I don't know where to kind of go from there, but I do, I do.
Speaker 2:I would love to see the church be what God intended it to be. And you know, I'll be honest with you, I'm at a place where I go to my brother-in-law's church just to encourage him. He started out in ministry under me many years ago. But when I'm in Stuart I don't go to church and from my background and legalism and everything that's really bad, I don't go. But I I don't, I can't find a place and I think that, um, I think, when the church is what it's supposed to be, you can take this group right and throw it right in the center of it, and it gives me cold chills when I say that, because that would make the difference. That would do it. I really appreciate your question. That is so awesome.
Speaker 1:Could I just chime in? I won't go off on a rant because I could, but I won't. I will say I have experienced some really beautiful spiritual communities, and so I want to be careful not to throw the baby out with the bathwater, and I'm happy to even mention some names. I've been involved with Red Rocks Church here in town. That has done a beautiful job with holding brokenness and pain and also the mercy of God in the same kind of in the same place. Free Church here in town is another one that I've been there several times. Fletch and I went there together. We had a really powerful experience when we went there.
Speaker 1:You know Fletch can tell you his own story, but we've got similarities in our backgrounds when it comes to religion and all that stuff, and so I think the key to it is it's about honesty. Like I don't to your question you asked him. I mean I really don't have a desire to do that anymore if it's not going to be, if it can't be honest to be, if it can't be honest and most churches, evangelical churches where it has grown to today is there's just a general lack of honesty and knowing what to do with brokenness, knowing what to do with addicts which, spoiler alert everyone there is. Everyone has an unhealthy scape. They go to. It's on a spectrum. Not all of them need to come to valiant for 90, 120 days, whatever, but all of them have something that they're going to go to that is potentially unhealthy for them if they're not careful. So, like I think we have to demystify this addict term and make it broader, like what is your unhealthy cope that you go to um? But I have found more church in these rooms and 12-step rooms in my brothers here at Valiant that I ever found in 40 years of being in the institutional church.
Speaker 1:Because of honesty and the scripture even says confess your sins to one another so that you may be healed there's such a lack of. This is where actually our Catholic brothers and sisters have got it more right than we have, but there's such a lack of confession. This is where actually our Catholic brothers and sisters have got it more right than we have, but there's such a lack of confession and honesty in most of our churches. So if I don't have a place to confess and be honest, how then do I experience healing? I think it's really interesting that it didn't say confess your sins to one another and then God would heal you. God delegated healing to us. He said confess your sins to one another and that is how you find healing. And we wonder why there's so many sick people still sitting in our churches when there's not forums like this to confess and to find healing.
Speaker 1:Like I get healing when I sit here with you guys and say, man, I really I really screwed up this week or I'm really struggling with this, or I had this temptation or whatever, and so I don don't want to. I'm not here to like throw shame on the, on the church. Um, there's a really beautiful book I actually shared it with you, tim. Um, I think I did, or I meant to called the critical journey. But it talks about seven stages in the in the faith and someone's faith cycle. And the church does the first three really well. They just don't know what to do when you hit the wall.
Speaker 1:A lot of our Catholic brothers and sisters call it the dark night of the soul when that happens and it does happen for most of us, if we're lucky. It happens because that's the only thing that gets us to a life of surrender and love. But they do the first three, great. But when the scriptures stop working for you and the small groups and the showing up on Sunday and all that stuff breaks down and checking the boxes don't work for you anymore, most churches. Their only solution is we'll go back to the beginning and just keep doing those three over and over again and not real sure how to walk with people through the darkness and the brokenness.
Speaker 1:So if you can find a community that is willing to wade out into the darkness and the brokenness with you, my church was incredible. I mean they were incredible in helping me get the help that I needed. So on one hand, the parts work, but part of me is eternally grateful for my church that got me the help I needed. They made it happen for me to come here. What's also true is my church didn't know how to show up relationally and spiritually for my family. It was like hey, go get help, but was literally asked to not contact anybody here ever again. So I mean that doesn't mind, you know F, I won't say it, cause this is going out and cyber internet, but mom's listening, um, but yeah, it's like. But I hold that tension. I wouldn't be sitting here today if it wasn't for my church in powerful ways and my family is carrying a lot of wounding because we felt exiled.
Speaker 2:Yeah, the love that we feel here. I mean I've enjoyed being. You know, I sit beside this guy over there. I just I felt there's just felt there's such a connection. This is what the gospel intended. It was about love. I felt it in that room. I just enjoyed being over there. I enjoyed being here. It's going on. I can feel it in my spirit. Man, I don't know if that's weirding anybody out, but I feel it.
Speaker 1:You know it's neat because I think it's these guys. And what I love about us too, as brothers is, hopefully, to whatever degree possible, we've stopped pretending with one another like we've stopped. We've stopped trying to present ourselves like we've. I'm going to tell you there's I won't tell you all the stories these are great, amazing men in this world. It's extremely successful, but our inner, you know, started falling apart. Well, this is a place where we can come and it's so safe for us to be human, and I think that's where the real love comes from.
Speaker 1:I don't have to perform for Pete. He loves me if I'm, you know, no matter what you know for Pete, he loves me if I'm, you know, no matter what you know. It's only an isolation where we start writing stories about what our brothers think of us, and that's when we get pissed with one another, like why didn't you call me? I didn't know you were struggling. I would have shown up for you. You know great stuff. Anybody else? More comments, thoughts, feelings, questions. This is good stuff. I don't even know what time it is. So are we past?
Speaker 2:Pete doesn't care.
Speaker 1:Chester's waiting for you, man.
Speaker 4:I just have a quick comment. Thank you for being here tonight. When you were just talking a second ago about the love that's in the room, you shared something. Pretty early on. Drew asked you kind of what pain this had caused you and you responded, blew my mind and it was.
Speaker 4:It kind of sent chills through me for you to say your pain was for Drew. It was just it was. I don't that's to be at that. To be able to be at that point in your spirituality and faith and all that kind of stuff is, uh, is amazing and that's and you hear that because as an alcoholic.
Speaker 4:You know one of the things to suffer from a lot, you know, especially when you're more in diet and kind of just doing the stare at the ceiling going oh my god, what's, what's, what's gonna happen, kind of pain.
Speaker 4:If I caused others, you know that's the others, that's very dreadful, not to say that we haven't caused pain, and certainly we've got to know that's part of the immense process in order for us to relieve ourselves of that. I'll always remember that reply that you gave to Drew about that. That was a gift. Yeah, absolutely 100%, Thank you. Thank you for sharing that.
Speaker 6:Yeah, joe, thanks for coming here tonight. Drew and I are of an age and by extrapolation I figure you're probably around the same age as my father, give or take 78?. Oh no, he's a bit behind you then, but not by much. I was just wondering. He is not recovery-informed. He is not aware of addiction. He's pastoring in a church right now himself, but I'm just curious, from speaking as a father of a man who's been through addiction, rehabilitation and his ongoing recovery, what would be a message that I could give to my father to help him recover with me.
Speaker 1:Fantastic question. Good luck with that. It's a great question.
Speaker 2:That's an allscape, by the way, if anyone has any feedback on that, feel free to jump in. I don't know that. I learned early in the ministry three words that were very important to me. I don't know, but in my spirit, man, I feel like for you, just, you evidently have a okay relationship with him, or okay, I would say, just begin loving him the very, very best you can and praying for Him and just see what the higher power could do with that, because sometimes we think we can fix things. You know, we all want to fix things, don't we? I mean, that makes us us, but sometimes it's just not, it's just not up to us. But I think the fact that you know I'm sure he's your dad, he cares about you too, but just to show him, just I just try to be as absolute supportive and loving as I possibly could and just see what happens. You know Anyone else is welcome to help.
Speaker 1:It's a risk, to be honest. I mean, I had to take that risk with you where it was. Hey, I got to. He may not understand any of this, he may not get any of this, and you've been like a sponge. You've been like, oh my God, like you know, and that may not be received that way. But, deneen, we were actually having a conversation earlier and he talked to this a little bit. I'm looking at you, Pete, because I might need some help recalling exactly what he said, but the point is, we may not have a chance to have this kind of conversation with our father, we may not have a father that responds this way or whatever, but the point is for us to be able to be okay, for us to say, hey, listen, this is what's going on, this is who I am, this is how I'm showing up. You may need to be honest and have some of those conversations, but what we're learning here at Valiant is, even if that conversation doesn't go well, we can still be okay and we can break cycles. We can say, hey, I may like.
Speaker 1:For me it's like I may not be able to get everything I need from my parents, but I sure as hell can learn from it and make sure that I'm not repeating the same patterns with my children or my brother or my family. It doesn't have to be father, son or you know, it's our, the people around us that we love. And it can be very lonely. Dave and Peter and I talked about this last group. It can be very lonely in recovery. When you emerge and the rest of the world is not living in recovery, it feels this way, but the rest of the world is not living in recovery and you're used to going deep with people now and having these intimate connections and the rest of the world just wants to hear fine, how you doing Fine. And I remember the first couple of conversations I had out of rehab. It was like I was going way too deep, way too quick, and they're just like whoa.
Speaker 1:I'm just asking how was your day? I was like well, I'm really feeling a lot of shame and they're like yo man, you're at Chipotle, what do you want to eat?
Speaker 1:But I think there's some loneliness. But we have each other, we have places to process, we don't have to isolate. So I think I would. I would hope that conversation would go really well and that your dad would want to know more, and especially knowing that he's a pastor. I mean there's a heart there to help people and to be for people and but even if it doesn't, it's like okay, I can be, okay, you know I can, I can learn from this and I have everything I need. So, yeah, anyone else? Before we wrap, I do.
Speaker 5:I hope I can say what I felt for a moment, but it's really difficult to, particularly in early recovery. It's really difficult to show up at the level of honesty and intimacy that we need. That we need. It takes real courage and I'm asked to be a person that I left behind a long time ago in my addiction and the opportunity is here, but it's not easy. I don't think I can get any further than that. But it's back to the honesty and I've been living in a state of denial in my addiction for so long that I really don't know what the truth is. It's become a mental issue. I can't differentiate between who I am as an addict and who I'm invited to become. That's very challenging, so just don't give up. God damn it All set.
Speaker 1:Thank you, mike, it's good stuff, guys.
Speaker 2:I just want to say this was worth the trip for me. I mean when he asked me to come, man, I'd crawl on my belly from Indianapolis for what Valiant has meant to our family. I mean I can't, there's a debt that I can't repay, but it's been just so good to be with you guys. I mean I really mean that with all my heart. This is, I hope. I think probably everyone in here appreciates the uniqueness of what's going on here. I think you do. I'm not even gonna encourage you to say that, but I mean everyone in here appreciates the uniqueness of what's going on here. I think you do. I'm not even going to encourage you to say that, but I mean it's here, you know, so it's neat.
Speaker 1:I just want to honor you as well. I mean, I think, in front of my brothers here, I just want to say I'm very blessed to have you as my dad and the way you've shown up for me, and so I wanted to have that out there too. That just honor who you are as as a man and as a human. Um, I feel very grateful, very glad, very humbled and blessed, uh, to have you as a dad. So thank you for for being here and for sharing. Can we just say thanks to dad one more time?
