Summary: Born in Ecuador and raised in the US, Byron discusses the challenges he faced as an outsider, navigating language, church politics, and racism. His journey through addiction, approval-seeking, and discovering hope is revealed. Byron's marriage struggles, driven by a desire to make his wife happy, led him to a broken self-identity, resulting in self-medication and anxiety. Byron's story is a testament to the transformative power of God's love and grace, inspiring faith affirmation.

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TimeStamps:
0:00 - From Addiction to Freedom
6:30 - Understanding God and Insecurity
11:59 - Fitting In, Feeling Like an Outsider
15:59 - Navigating Challenges and Developing Resilience
21:46 - Experiences of Rebellion and Spiritual Growth
34:55 - Surviving Addiction and Finding Redemption
46:55 - Pursuing Love and Overcoming Doubt
50:22 - A Journey of Transparency and Forgiveness
1:02:18 - Struggles With Happiness, Marriage, and Self-Medication
1:09:15 - Struggling With Anxiety and Finding Hope
1:20:16 - Transformation and the Call to Ministry
1:29:31 - A Life Transformed by God's Love
1:37:00 - Finding Freedom in God Through Conversation

Keywords: Outsider, Language, Church politics, Racism,Addiction, Approval-seeking, Self-identity, Marriage struggles, Self-medication, Anxiety, Faith, Affirmation

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Speaker 1: 0:35

I started to put on my shoulders her happiness. So if she was happy, then I felt like I had accomplished something. If she was laughed, I had accomplished something. If she was sad, if she was depressed, if she was going through stuff, I had failed as a husband because I wasn't giving her what she needed right. And so then guess what I started to do. Then I started to keep a record of wrong with her. I started to hold onto my hurt again and that cup of guilt, shame, condemnation continued to get filled and filled. And so I started acting out online because I was like hey, love, You're like, this is how I can, this is how I'm self-medicating. If you hurt me, I'm sitting here hurt. I feel hurt. I'm feeling like I'm not measuring up as a husband, so I'm gonna go into this space to self-medicate.

Speaker 3: 1:27

Yo, welcome to the Debt to Life podcast. My name is Richard Young and today's episode is with my brother, byron, and I met Byron earlier this year. His story is incredible. It's about a dude who was caught up in addiction, about a dude who did not know his worth and his value and how God loved him through his wife and then eventually set him free from all these lies, the lies of that he had to self-medicate and the lie that sin was always gonna be a part of his life and man. This episode is obviously not for young ears, but it is gonna be a huge blessing for you to hear Byron share his story of him going from Debt to Life in Christ Jesus Without any further ado. Buckle up, strap in Love. Y'all appreciate y'all. Here's Byron. Byron Rivera. Where are you from, doc? What's your story? Who are you?

Speaker 1: 2:32

Man, this is the way I like to answer that question. I am an imported good from Quito, ecuador, that's where I am from. That's where I was born, and I was imported into this country when I was quite young man, quite young. How old were you when you got here? I was two years old Two, two.

Speaker 3: 2:52

So do you have a lot of pride for Ecuador?

Speaker 1: 2:55

Always, always and forever man Always and forever.

Speaker 3: 2:58

Do you have a good international soccer team? It's getting better.

Speaker 1: 3:02

It's getting better. There's a saying that in Spanish to English, roughly interpreted, would come along the lines of we played like never before and we lost as always Say it in Spanish I wanna hear how it flows in Spanish Este jugamos como nunca y perdimos como siempre.

Speaker 3: 3:27

I love it, dude. So tell me, man, where do you feel like your spiritual story starts, where your spiritual life, that story?

Speaker 1: 3:33

If we're gonna tell that story on the.

Speaker 3: 3:35

Dead to Life podcast. Where would that story begin? We have to tell that story, yeah.

Speaker 1: 3:38

We have to tell that story. Man Praise God. My that story in particular began actually when I was quite young man. My parents to this day are a pastoral couple who are passionate about the love of God and helping people meet Jesus, and that was our story. And so that story started quite young. I think one of the first memories I have of just my spiritual journey is just as I was really young, my mother in particular would encourage me to talk to that and I would, and I always, when I would talk to God, I would always have the sense of, I would always have a sense of his presence, and when I'm talking about quite young, I'm talking about five, six years old. I had a sense of his presence around me or listening, and I knew that he was there and I knew that he was listening and I knew that he cared about what I had to say, even at that early age. Yeah, so it started quite early, I would say, my spiritual walk.

Speaker 3: 4:37

Who was God to you as you're growing up? Cause, where'd you move to?

Speaker 1: 4:42

My family moved to Florida, and we actually moved to Florida because and I have to back up maybe a little bit because this is gonna play a role down the road but in the process of coming to the United States, my parents came to the United States because my sister was ill, she had something called Rett syndrome, and so they sent letters everywhere and the Adventist hospital in Florida was the one that responded and said hey, we will sponsor you, we'll help you guys out. So my parents came to the United States and when initially we had thought that we were gonna come all as a family, all five of us my sister, my brother, my parents and I and it turned out not to be the case my parents came with my sister and because my sister required a full-time caretaker and then someone else to work and be the breadwinner, and so my brother and I were left in Ecuador at a really young age, just with extended family who loved us very much and who cared of us, for us, really much. But that in me resulted in an insecure attachment. That attachment that I was developing, that attachment bond that I was developing with my parents, was ripped apart in that moment, and I was actually apart from them for about a year. So the reason we moved to Florida and then ended up in Orlando Florida was because of my sister and the need that the medical needs that she had. That's how my family ended up in Florida.

Speaker 3: 5:58

Okay, so you ended up in Florida.

Speaker 1: 6:01

Age two Age two, yes, age two.

Speaker 3: 6:05

And you're just growing up in the church. You're growing up with God-loving parents, god-fearing parents.

Speaker 1: 6:11

Yes.

Speaker 3: 6:12

What was that like? Who was God to you growing up?

Speaker 1: 6:16

God to me, growing up with someone who loved me and someone who wanted good for me. And as the years moved on and as I started to navigate kind of like how to live a home life with my parents and everything, I started to realize that when you behave well, things go well. So you do good, you are good, then things go well. So I started to think to myself oh okay, this is cool, so I do these things. And then things tend to go pretty well and I wanted them to go well again because I had this deep, insecure attachment. So I deeply wanted everything to go well with my parents, I wanted to connect with my parents. So I was doing things well and somehow that translated to my view of God to the point where I remember one time I got lost in a theme park one of my huge theme parks in Orlando, florida, and I had this sense at like, around six years old, to go to one of the people that were selling tickets at the very entrance of the park and I went and I told them I was lost and they put me in this room and I was sitting there, just at six years old, they get to myself I'm never gonna see my parents again, I'm never gonna see my brother again and I'm gonna be lost and I'm gonna be adopted by a family who probably does not keep the Sabbath, and so I'm gonna be lost. But think about that. Oh, that was going on in that moment. Oh, that was going on in that moment. But think about that because my parents never told me that my keeping the Sabbath was what would determine to whether or not I was saved or lost, or whether or not God loved me. But somehow I had internalized stuff around me to come up with those thoughts in that moment that I wouldn't be able to keep the Sabbath because I would be adopted by a non-Christian or not, to have a keeping family, and then I would be lost.

Speaker 3: 8:00

Mercy, yeah, it starts early man. When they showed up, you were like I can keep the Sabbath.

Speaker 1: 8:08

No, when they showed up, Honestly, when my dad like the door opened it was like in the movies, like the door opened and it was really bright outside so I could see the silhouette, but it was an unmistakable silhouette of my father so I just ran through myself into his arms and I hadn't cried until that moment. And then I finally let myself cry and he was just hugging me and he was like okay, we're good, Like glad we found him.

Speaker 3: 8:29

Oh man, so you had this impression of God that you got to do right to be in, or is that what I'm hearing?

Speaker 1: 8:39

Yeah, and I don't think that I, at that age especially, you don't really have the words to articulate it, but I think that there was this sense of hey, things are going, if you do these things, then you're going to get things right. Not that my parents would give me things, but things would be, things would go well within the family structure. And this was very much again, this was very much kind of stemming from this desire to really. It's a weird let me unpack something really quick. It's when someone has an insecure attachment, particularly an anxious, insecure attachment, there's this kind of paradox within side of them, where you have this strong desire to be loved and to be embraced and to be connected with and at the same time, you're insecure about the people around you. So I had this memory at around I don't know five years old, where my father forgot to say bye to me as he was walking out of the house. He was going to work and he walked out, the door closed and I had a meltdown. I was just screaming, crying. My response was very out of proportion to what had just happened. My father hears me, he comes back inside and he wants to come up and he's like hey, I'm so sorry, I forgot to give you a hug, goodbye. He tries to hug me and I push him away. And it was the craziest thing because I'm pushing him away as I desperately want his hug. I desperately wanted to receive his love in that moment. But I am pushing him away in that moment. And so there is this kind of push and pull inside of me to want to have people close and to be close to people, be close to my parents, but I would sometimes find myself doing things that would push people away at the same time. It's a very gnarly thing, it's a very interesting or dynamic or whatever, and so I think that somehow some of that got mixed into kind of how I understood the God concept right. Like I do some things, things go well. I don't do things, maybe don't go so well, yeah.

Speaker 3: 10:30

Man interesting inside at the same time, and you know all this now because of the kind of work you're in, but back then you just were like, helps, yeah.

Speaker 1: 10:40

Back then I had no language for it. I just knew that I would react and respond in ways that then people would look at me and be like what's wrong with you, Like why are you reacting this way? Because, again, my reactions were disproportioned to the things that were happening. I would feel slight, I would feel slighted, I'd feel hurt and I would walk around in that resentment and just, yeah, wallow in it and then hold it onto people. I don't want to say that was all like. I don't want to paint a picture like I didn't have good times in my childhood, because I did.

Speaker 3: 11:09

I had some fantastic ones, no man, no good times, all trash.

Speaker 1: 11:13

I had some beautiful moments in my childhood and I had some beautiful moments with God as a young person Because, again, I was encouraged to talk to God. But it was a very complex thing because I don't have the language, I didn't have the understanding of what was going on inside of me or why I was struggling in those ways.

Speaker 3: 11:30

As you're growing up. Describe that to me, what happened? Tell me the story.

Speaker 1: 11:33

The years start to pass. My father, we initially moved to this small town called Melbourne, melbourne, palm Bay they're right next to each other and a lot of sometimes at that time at least, I don't know how things are now people would use those names interchangeably. And then my father got transferred to a place called Orlando Florida or Orlando Florida. We were living in the greater Orlando area and that was a culture shock because I came from a really small school where everybody got along. It didn't matter what clothes you wore, everything. Everybody was friends. There was their typical childhood drama, but it wasn't a huge deal. And then I went to Orlando Florida where you would get teased and forked a lot of stuff. You made it make fun of for anything and everything. And if you were in PE and someone threw you a pass for a layup or threw a football at you and you didn't catch it, then man you were ridiculed and shamed and all those other stuff. So I actually part of that man. I had no desire to wanna play any sports. So, like man, playing sports is not fun. It's scary out here. It's scary. People yell at you, people get mad at you, people tease you for other stuff and I was like, no, I don't want any part of this. But yeah, so then I moved there and one of the things that I think I started to realize was that I felt as if I never fully quite fit in anywhere. I didn't feel like I fit in very well with my class, this new context of this new school, because these kids were all wearing name brand stuff and I was the Hispanic kid, that whose mom would literally sew patches on his knees, on the knees of his pants, so that he could keep wearing those pants. My mama was resourceful man.

Speaker 3: 13:18

And I was the kid that would take you know how about some mamas who are resourceful man?

Speaker 1: 13:22

Hey, praise God man praise God for my mama and you'd take your food to school and it was not quite other people's foods and so and there are all eating frijoles and they're all eating sandwiches or something, and they're all eating lunchables and I was like man, I want lunchables, I want the little Meanwhile a rosy frijoles 10 times better than any lunchable ever. For sure hands down man. But at that time you just you don't want to be different, you don't want to be other, you don't want to be someone other and I didn't feel like I quite fit in there. God was very gracious in providing some friends that I would hang out with. I hung out with the kids who would get all the good grades and I would never fail. But I wasn't as smart as they were man. Those kids were on another level I was just but they were nicer. But they were super nice. They embraced me, they loved on me and I was just hanging out with them and I was like all right, this is fun, this is cool. They don't yell at me if I'm-.

Speaker 3: 14:13

I can't hang out with the guys that catch the football because they're mean, can't, they're jerks man, they're jerks.

Speaker 1: 14:19

They've grown up to be some pretty solid human beings.

Speaker 3: 14:22

Yeah, for sure, shout out to those guys who could play ball To those guys.

Speaker 1: 14:26

Thanks, but at that time, man, yeah, at that time. So I'm there, I'm not quite feeling like a fit in. At church, I find some semblance of belonging and I'm within the context of speaking Spanish, being an immigrant home. There is pop culture, stuff that I just did not understand or get, and stuff that also further made me feel like an outsider.

Speaker 3: 14:49

Give me an example, like something that people are talking about. You have no idea. I got you.

Speaker 1: 14:53

I got oh, this is something that's so simple and just common knowledge. I did not know that the shorthand for William is Bill. I didn't understand that Right In the same way that some people might not know that the shorthand for Francisco is Paco. People might not know that in Spanish, but I didn't know that, conversely, in English. So one day and this was actually when I was like in high school I remember this moment where I was like I had no idea that Bill Clinton's name was actually William Clinton, and then the kids around me just laughed and were just wow, how dumb are you that you do not know this.

Speaker 3: 15:28

Like I was like oh man, I don't know. I remember my mom. She tells me the story that when she was growing up she thought she could start. She started thinking she could speak English and she was hearing everybody say cat and so she was like, oh that's cat Cause.

Speaker 2: 15:44

she thought cause cat, in Spanish is gato, so she was like oh, that's, they're saying cat.

Speaker 3: 15:50

And so she was just like look at that cat. And people were like what are you drunk? Like what are you talking about? And yeah, she did not have a mastery of the English language quite yet.

Speaker 1: 16:02

I can relate.

Speaker 3: 16:04

I can relate yeah, it's Bill dude, Bill, Bill Clinton.

Speaker 1: 16:08

Bill Clinton, man yeah.

Speaker 3: 16:10

So you're getting through school. What was the plan for life man?

Speaker 1: 16:16

The plan? I don't know that I had a plan for life, necessarily. At least, I don't know what I would have said. That's a very interesting question. I don't know that I would have said, but I know that by the time I got to high school I actually started to get pretty decent grades. And then middle school, high school, started to get pretty decent grades and I started to. I don't know. I'm so sorry, my mind is going somewhere. My plan for life is probably just to graduate, go to university and get a degree and do something, and I think somewhere in there I realized that I really like to talk to people and help, like to walk alongside people as they're struggling with stuff, and so I started to look into what types of jobs that might lend themselves to. But as I was hitting high school, I started to also become aware of certain injustices in different levels of the more meta spheres that I had in my life. So, for example, I started to realize that there were some church politics that were involved. I saw my father working night and day, putting in crazy hours as a pastor, as a Hispanic pastor. He had multiple churches almost throughout his whole time, I think. Actually I think the whole time. He's always had multiple churches and he's has multiple churches and he puts in so many hours and he does so many things and, no matter what he did, it was never good enough for the church folk. There's always something to complain about. And when you're a kid you don't notice these things because you start to grow up and you start to mature, you get adolescence, you start to realize these things.

Speaker 3: 17:46

Right, You're like oh, Hermano Sanchez is a hater.

Speaker 1: 17:53

Yeah but, not just like he's a hater, but that like he is going to the conference office to complain about your father and putting your father's job in jeopardy. Actually, there was a situation I found out stuff from way past where I started to find out that people when I was a kid had gone and this was actually on. My sister was still alive. They had gone and complained to the conference office and actually got my dad fired for a time, and about something that it had there had been just a moment to look into, things would have very easily confirmed the opposite of what was being reported. But my father lost his job and this was at a time when my parents and my sister was sick and during that time was when my sister passed away and so it was. I just started to hear and realize these things and so I started to have developed this resentment and this anger and hurt towards the church structure and church people and the church as a whole, and I started to realize the dynamics of racism in our country and in Florida and other parts of the country, and started to become aware of certain things and just realize how I was viewed as a brown man or as a brown young man, just the police pulling me into empty parking lots and being scared for my life. It was just stuff like that. So I started to internalize this just anger and walk around with a chip on my shoulder and just develop this anger. And you mix that with my unhealed heart of being separated from my parents at a very young age and I had no idea how that was messing with me, man, I was an angry young man. I was not. Yeah, I was angry. I was prone to anger and irritability and I just have it just started bubbling up to certain and manifesting in some way. I had friends and I got along with a lot of people, but I had moments, man, where I remember this. One time I got so mad at my brother, I chased him. I actually pulled a knife and I chased and I went at him with a knife. Yeah, and what were you going to?

Speaker 3: 19:46

do if you caught him?

Speaker 1: 19:48

I have no idea. I have no idea. But he was always faster than me and stronger than me, and so he beat me into his room and he slammed the door, he closed the door and he just called out from my parents. And I'm glad he was faster than me because I had no idea. In those moments when I was, in those moments I had, I was not thinking. When your emotions get to that level of intensity, your frontal lobe which is what helps you to think through things it shuts down. It's at a 20% capacity in those moments. That's where it goes down to. So in those moments you don't think. That's why you end up having people say I never meant to say that, I never meant to do that and yeah, I never meant to chase my brother with a knife, I never meant to have these bouts of losing my temper. And as I would lose my temper, it would speak about me. It would tell me something about me. It would tell me that I was this broken person who was subject and a slave to my anger and that I couldn't get past it, because it's not like I wanted to do these things, it's just like this is who I was, and people would sometimes start to label me or view me as this angry person. So I started to. It was a very interesting time because I love my parents and I always wanted to have a good relationship with my parents and I never wanted anything that I would do to ever blow back on my parents. I would do things by and closed doors so that my parents wouldn't get found out or they wouldn't get blamed or gossip from the church, wouldn't get back to them, and I also I think that was a lot of it and I also never wanted to get caught. But I actually genuinely love my parents. I remember the time that I went and I smoked weed with. This is bad, so this is me acting out, this is me rebelling. I wanted to smoke weed and so I finally got some and I was like yes. I'm going to smoke weed. This is going to be. How old were you? dude. I was like 14, 15. And I was like, yes, I'm going to smoke weed now and this is going to be cool because no one else is doing this. But I didn't know. I don't think anybody was doing it at my age in my class. Maybe they weren't, but it was not really talked about. At least I didn't know about it. But I was like, no, this is what I'm going to do. And I was so angry or mad at the church because of the stuff that I was realizing was happening within the church and I was like and I couldn't care less, but I didn't have. I had the weed, but I had nothing to roll it with. So I was like what am I going to roll with? And I went into my father's study and I grabbed one of his L and G white Spirit of Prophecy books and I took that off the shelf and I ripped the page off of that book and I rolled it and I was like I love the idea of sticking it to the church. I was like you guys like this woman so much. Right, check this out, watch me light up with her material. I don't remember I think it was her, but it was some aspect that was out of my father's library and I was doing that and then I was and I was did it work, did what. Yeah.

Speaker 3: 22:44

Were you able to roll it and if it stuck and everything?

Speaker 1: 22:46

and yes, and then I didn't just do that, I did that, and then I got high, and then I went to school and I'm high and I'm hungry now for a snack, so I'm going to disregard the health message and.

Speaker 3: 23:00

I'm going to eat some bacon so that everyone on.

Speaker 1: 23:05

No, I again, because I cared about my parents, that I wasn't trying to tell people what I was doing. I wanted things to stand to rest and this is the theme that is reoccurring throughout my life. The fact that I'm sitting here talking to you this and sharing this with you is huge for me, because I'm not the type to actually sit and talk about the stuff that I've done wrong, because of the image that I need to keep as a pastor, son, with the ministry that I'm involved with now. This is not what is typical for me. So I actually went to school. I went to school and there's actually a picture At least there's at least one picture of me high in the school yearbook.

Speaker 3: 23:42

No one else knew that I was high. Does anybody know this besides?

Speaker 1: 23:46

who knows that you were high that day in the school yearbook, my best friends at the time like I had two really close friends at the time they knew and they were trying to keep me from revealing myself by what I was doing. And my brother knew and he was just laughing at me because he's like what a door, what an idiot.

Speaker 3: 24:05

You can walk around doing this stuff? How old were you when your sister passed?

Speaker 1: 24:10

I was very young. I was like, oh, that's interesting, because that was actually a time in my life when I actually that's probably the first time in my life where I actually clearly heard the voice of God was when I was like six years old. My sister passed when I was about five. I probably heard the word of God, probably like the voice of God, when I was about six years old and I remember, because I was at five years old I didn't understand what it meant that she had passed away. And I didn't actually start to grieve her until I was about six years old, because that's when I actually started to realize this. Is it Like I'm never going to see her again. This is for the rest of my life. I'm going to have to live this life without her. And I was grieving her and I was one time sitting in the car and I was just grieving and God just it's not an audible voice, but it was just. He just communicated with me. I don't know, it's hard for me to describe, it's difficult for me to explain, but what he told me was you're going to get to see your sister faster than you think you are, sooner than you think you are. That's when you get to see her, everything's going to be okay. This is not it. You are going to get to see her again and that was the moment I've had those moments throughout my walk with God, where I've just been okay, like seeing him. I'm doing these things behind closed doors or in the secret or whatever, but I'm doing these things, but somehow I know that God is there and I know that he loves me somehow. But somehow that's also wrapped up in what? The kind of persona that I have, or in the kind of I don't know the things that I do. Yeah.

Speaker 3: 25:38

So you're in high school and you're an angry kid and you're sticking it to the man and sticking it to Ellen White. What happened after that? Bro Sticking it to the church man.

Speaker 1: 25:49

I thought I wanted to go to this place called Georgia Cumberland Academy.

Speaker 3: 25:53

God's chosen Academy, gca.

Speaker 1: 25:56

Oh my goodness, I haven't heard that in a while. Yeah, gca man, shout out to GCA. I've been.

Speaker 3: 26:02

Atlanta. That was the school, that that was the board of school.

Speaker 1: 26:05

You were in Atlanta, so AAA, yeah.

Speaker 3: 26:07

AAA and they were GCA and their rivals.

Speaker 1: 26:09

Oh, but GCA was always better, though. You know that right.

Speaker 3: 26:12

Man. This is a podcast about God.

Speaker 1: 26:14

You're going to edit this out, but hey, so I went to GCA and what was interesting is that there were things about me that I pride in myself in. I've always really looked up to my brother. I always loved him and I always knew that he had my back, no matter what being going through. That. That that moment or that experience of being ripped away from your parents really bonded us in a very particular way, a very meaningful way, and I always pride myself that he had my back. I had his back. I had really great friends and my parents were there in Florida and I thought I was, I thought I was finally getting into my own, like as far as I wasn't caring as much about who liked me, who didn't like me or whatever, and so I was feeling and as I'm going through this, I'm also acting out in these ways. And then I get to GCA and a lot of the stuff that I pride in myself in, like my friends, my, my independence, all these others got away because I'm now living in a dorm in a very culturally I was culture shock. It was very drastically different. I went to from Forrest Lake Academy, which was very diverse ethnically and racially, and then I get to Georgia Carmelin and it's not that I was actually I actually was talking in Spanish to some of the people around, some of the Spanish speaking students there at GCA, and I remember one of the seniors I was a sophomore but I was a hothead too I was like one of the sophomores and one of the seniors heard me speak in Spanish. He came up to me and was like you need to speak, you need to speak English because this is America. And I was not the type dude, I was never the type to keep my mouth shut. I was always had a mouth on me. So I was like look back. I was like what? So you speak the language of the land? Do you know any Navajo? Do you want to eat Cherokee? All right, then Don't talk to me. Then I had a chip on my shoulder. I had a chip on my shoulder and I had an attitude. So I went there and I was actually I hated it. I hated it because it was a drastically different culture. I was away from my brother, my cousins, who I was there to go to school with. They were in the girls dorm. I was in the guys dorm. I didn't have as much freedom as I had in Florida, so I was just on my own and I felt lonely. And what happened was that this forced me to seek God out and hear the voice of God and actually start to rehear the voice of God and say, oh okay, like he is there and I know he's there, but now I'm actually like tuning in more, tuning into him a lot more in that moment. And, yeah, and that year at GCA honestly was a reset in my spiritual walk and it reminded me of how good it is to have God in your life. And I started to. I made some lifelong friends out of there To this day, like one of my closest friends is from there and he and I. So, yeah, I went to GCA, I was really cool, but then I had a burden on my heart and I said you know what? This is great, like I want to help tell other people or help other people learn about God or reconnect with God, because I knew that as I went through stuff, I would think back to those situations that other people went through and I was like man, they've gone through stuff too and they're getting into this stuff too, or like making decisions as and that's not quite leading them to God. So I decided to go back to Forest Lake Academy for my junior and senior year. And, yeah, I went to back to Forest Lake Academy my junior and my senior year and during this time around, this time is when I started to, and that's a high school there in Orlando. Just so, In Orlando, I'm sorry, yeah, Forest Lake Academy, yes. And so I went back to Orlando and at that point I was reconciling some things or I was still dealing with some anger issues and some stuff. I remember that when I went back I was a junior and towards the end of my junior year I had one of the seniors that was inquired with me just talk to me and say, hey, like when I first met you, I didn't want to talk to you because you just looked angry. You just looked angry. I was like oh what. And again, it's not that I was always only angry. I had other moments, I had plenty of okay moments and good moments and happy moments, but there was this anger, there was this, still this emptiness inside of me that was there and at some point it started to get filled with. At some point it started to get filled with actually with sexual intimacy, because those lines started to get crossed and I never. I grew up and again I always thought, hey, you're not supposed to do these things. And if you do these things, yeah. I'm not supposed to do these things. And if you do these things, these things are only set apart for marriage. And as I started to engage in those things, I was like okay, and I think this happens to a lot of our young people, when they start to cross those lines, they think that the person they're crossing those lines with I have to marry this person now.

Speaker 3: 31:01

This is it. We have to get married now. Make two mistakes out of one mistake.

Speaker 1: 31:05

Yeah, I was like oh no, this is it, this has to work out, this has to work out. We have to stay together forever now. And clearly it doesn't. And you have these young minds that are opening these doors and unleashing this level of attachment with each other that shouldn't be developed at that stage or dead, because it just it really takes you into different places. And I actually that's when I don't think that's when, but I think that's where my struggles with lust started to really just take root, or maybe they were already rooted and they just started to manifest. Actually, probably because in, if you have this hurt inside, if you have this hurt and this anger inside and you start to engage in these things, it's somehow. There's a lie that this is somehow satisfying or addressing something. There's a lie that tells you somehow have intimacy when you don't actually have intimacy, and so you're drinking in this Kool-Aid that somehow something is being addressed or fixed or you're being connected to somebody in a way that is not quite how you think it is. And so I, once I started, once I got a taste for that man like that took over a lot of me and I to the point where actually, at some point I thought that I was addicted to. I thought I was addicted to sex. I was like this is it? Oh my gosh, this gives me so much, this is so fun and this gives me so much. But the crazy thing is, the more you do it, the more guilt, shame and condemnation grow inside of you. Right? And the more it happens, the more that grows inside of you. And then when you doesn't work out with this one person and it doesn't work out with this other person and you start caring about who, where it's happening and stuff like that, then it starts to really mess with you, because then you're like oh, I'm this dirty, broken person and this is just my identity right. And then yeah, and the more that became part of any relationship, the more that those relate, the worse that those relationships got. And I remember it got to the point one time where, man I was again, I thought I was addicted to this stuff and so I was on my way driving my parents were out of state, I think and I was driving on my way on the interstate going to a meetup and as I was on my way over there, I got caught off by another car and I was probably driving a minivan going like 85, maybe more than that, maybe more than that, but I was like I got caught off and so I was quickly adjusting to switch lanes. And then I had this other car come up on the opposite lane and go a lot faster and the car started to spin out. And as the car started to spin out, I thought to myself I was like I called out in Spanish, man, I was like you, already reverted to my mother tongue. I was like you was me. Are you that man? My God, help me or save me, or something like that. And in that moment I was thinking to myself this is it. My parents are going to come home and find another one of their children dead, and the car was spinning. I was driving a minivan. The car was spinning like doing donuts on an interstate, on I-4, and smoke is coming out of the car, smoke is coming out of the tires, and every time I'm spinning I'm getting closer and closer to the median and I cry out to God and I spend maybe two more times and then I end up perfectly parallel, parked on the shoulder, facing the correct direction.

Speaker 3: 34:48

What.

Speaker 1: 34:49

Was it night time? Was it daytime, Daytime, daytime. How did I not flip? How did I not hit? I had cars behind me. How did they not hit me? How did I not slam into the median and flip over? I was driving a minivan man. The physically I should have flipped. Something should have happened. I'm sitting in the car and my hands are shaking because I'm just realizing how close I just came to death and my phone rings. And I looked down at my phone and it was my brother and I said, oh no, maybe he saw me.

Speaker 3: 35:24

So then, I picked up the phone.

Speaker 1: 35:24

Oh would he see you, cause I thought he was driving. I thought he was driving his car and he was driving by and he saw me or something. So I picked up the phone and I'm like hello. And he's like where are you? I said what do you mean? Where am I? Yeah, where are you? And I told him. I was like I'm on the driveway, I'm driving. I was driving. I was like where are you at? He said I'm home. He's are you okay? I was like what are you? Why are you asking me these questions if you're home? And then he breaks in and he says Byron, I felt like you were dying in this moment. I felt you dying in this moment, what? And so I called you because I felt like you were dying and I told him. And then I told him what had just happened and it floored him and he said Byron, please come home. He said please come home. And I hung up the phone and I stayed there for maybe one more minute and then I did not go home. I kept going to where I was going because the whole inside of me needed, or told me, or the lie was that I, as much as I was scared, as much as I had just come close to death and God had saved my life somehow, I thought that this other thing was going to continue to fill me up and be the thing to give me help me be okay.

Speaker 3: 36:44

Mercy.

Speaker 1: 36:45

Yeah.

Speaker 3: 36:47

When you told that story in a testimony, you left out the other parts of the story. Well, parts of the story. Have you told that story as a testimony?

Speaker 1: 36:57

Not really. I have once or twice, but it's been. I don't think it's ever been an assortment, but no, what I haven't talked about was that at that time, like around as I was going through this time period, I thought that I was addicted, because I remember I'd get all this shame, guilt and condemnation and I would feel the weight of this stuff and then I would be sitting there talking to people and feeling like man, this is not right. And then the person that I had participated in this with one of these people just finally got fed up with me and just let basically stop feeling ashamed for either. Basically just let go of your shame or whatever and just enjoy this. If you're gonna be here, enjoy it, but if you're not gonna enjoy it, if you're just gonna be feeling guilt, shame and condemnation, just go away.

Speaker 3: 37:41

Why are you here, then Is it possible you tell me you're the guy? Is it possible that you were addicted? I think you might've been addicted by the definition I don't know man I'm talking about in a science sense, like you get ruts in your mind that lead to like when a certain thing happens, then you're like. Immediately the thought is, I'll medicate with this thing. Sure, yeah, that's what I mean. Yeah. Not like owning the identity and being like I'm an addict or something like that. You feel me.

Speaker 1: 38:17

Yeah, I can see that. I can see that that's fine man.

Speaker 3: 38:20

Yeah, no man, I'm ruining it for you. Like you were addicted man, you were cool. You were cool. No, that's fine. You almost lost your life and you went for it anyway, but it's all good, it's all good though it's all good Because that's a physically man.

Speaker 1: 38:31

That's not me, that's not who I am today. As I'm sitting here talking to you right now, right here, right now, that is not who I am, and I think at that time or later on, I used to identify with that so much that it actually messed with me because it made me believe. I think this is where my hesitation, or like where my desire to never like, identify myself like is that I think that I got to the point that we could fast forward to like later on, like I think that it put me in a place where I didn't think that I could ever break free of that. I thought that was my lot forever. This is it forever, and what it did for me is that it made me believe that, and so that's where I like, that's where I push hard back against that. I'm like no, that was.

Speaker 3: 39:15

Okay. I think this is important, though, and I sorry that we're hanging out in this area. If you used to be addicted to affirmation like you, could be addicted to so many things that aren't drugs, alcohol or pornography. You could be addicted to nostalgia, you could be addicted to affirmation, and if you were addicted to those things, you can also then not be addicted to those things. An addiction doesn't mean you're a lifelong, but if you're going for something for a payoff.

Speaker 1: 39:42

See, here's what I mean and here's why I hesitate to use that term, and I'll tell you a little bit about this though.

Speaker 3: 39:48

Within the field and you're the expert, so I'm gonna resort to you on that.

Speaker 1: 39:51

But no, that's fine, but within the field there's a general consensus or maybe let me not say the general consensus, but there's a big, significant group within the field that says if you're an addict, you're always gonna be an addict. This is going to be your identity forever.

Speaker 3: 40:06

Okay, I pushed back hard against that 100%, and that's why.

Speaker 1: 40:10

I don't want to say that because I don't want people to hear this, people that have walked through that and think to themselves like this is me, or this is going to be me forever, and that's why I hesitate to put that label on someone, because as I put that label on someone, even as I put it on myself, what some people might hear is this is gonna be me forever. Because what a lot of people within the field will say is this is you forever. You're never gonna get passes. Once an addict, always an addict, right.

Speaker 3: 40:34

Yeah, shame on them, bro. You need to hear the guy.

Speaker 1: 40:38

That's why, man, I have dude. I'll tell you, man, what sometimes, when I run some groups and I'll talk to some folks and I drop this on them, you'll see, their eyes are like what they're like, that's what I've been saying. I'm telling them like, yeah, I agree with you, I agree with you. Yeah.

Speaker 3: 40:53

Life's not going super awesome, but God saved your life, but God saved my life.

Speaker 1: 40:58

And here's something that I gotta throw in there too, because if someone's listening to this and they're thinking back to me, at these stages in my life, god is not. I'm still. I'm wrestling with, maybe like a dual identity. I am like Romans chapter seven for me is my lot, where I am preaching, I'm teaching, I'm doing Bible studies, but these things are showing up. And then I'll go through these periods of white knuckling and keeping away and staying away from this stuff, and then this stuff continues to show back up, like it continues to show back up in one way, shape or form. Right, it continues to show back up and I'm like man, and then I'll abstain from for a long time and then, hey, this is, and actually I remember this. One time I heard this one person very much. I heard somebody very much with my immaturity, with my just my own hurt. I hurt them very much and as a result of that hurt, they told me hey, you're not a good person. And it just. I was like maybe the first time that someone had actually articulated what I was afraid of, that I'm not a good person, or that I'm like this messed up human being that's just wrapped up in my anger and my addiction to sex and engaging in life. And so I heard that from this person and I was like, wow, someone actually put into words what I was afraid of. So this must be true. So then I stopped speaking, I stopped, my communication with God, went to zero and I was like, yep, this is me, this is me, this is who I am. And it wasn't until praise God for good friends. Man, I was like one of my best friends one time, was just fed up with watching me mope around and just be this way and he was like man, that's not it. And one time I was walking and we ran into the one of the chaplains and this is the first time I actually put into words what I was hiding for everybody. Hey, this is what happened, this is what I'm being told. And she was just listening to me and she was like why are you letting the devil beat you up? Like, why are you letting the devil beat you up? I was like, well, because I did these things, okay, did you confess those things? Yeah, do you want to do those things? No, does God forgive you? Yes, so why are you letting the devil beat you up? Move on. And that was like the restarting of me. Oh, I can move on from like that. I don't have to hold on to this. Like, I can move on, I don't have to hold on to this thing, right. So then it takes me out of this funk. It took me out of the hey, let's just accept that I'm always gonna be lost. I'm always gonna be this thing. And it put me more into the okay. Back to Romans, chapter seven. This is where I'm at now. This is who I am now. I'm walking around, I'm white knuckling, but I'm doing some stuff. But I'm also like preaching and teaching and sharing God with people, and I'm making sure that my parents never find out about the stuff that I'm doing inside. I'm making sure nobody at my churches are ever finding out about the stuff that I'm up to. I'm making sure that nobody knows any of this stuff. And I graduate from high school and I get into college and then, yeah, what happens in college man? So in my freshman year I meet this island queen Queen.

Speaker 3: 44:15

Is it better be Bernal, or else you're gonna have a. This is gonna be a weird podcast.

Speaker 1: 44:20

This island queen called Bernal at that time, bernal Taitugui, and I looked at her and I thought to myself there is no way that good girl would ever, god would ever. There's no way that God would ever make someone like her suffer. Being in a relationship with someone like me, someone who has struggled with the things that I've struggled with, and but I made a commitment with God. I said, god, instead of me trying to figure out my love life, how about you figure out my love life? I've tried and I failed and I've. All I've gotten is heartache and just spent emotions and all other stuff. So how about you do this for me? Instead, I said, all right, god, it's all you. I'm not gonna, I'm not even gonna, I'm not gonna pursue anybody, I'm not gonna anything. And then I started developing feelings for Bernal. And as I'm feeling developing these feelings for Bernal, I start to feel guilty about the feelings of developing for Bernal, because I was like there's no way that someone is broken or is messed up as me, could ever, god would ever give Bernal, who's such a sweet, amazing human being, give her this person to deal with, this person to put up with. There's no way. So I felt guilty and I remember one time I actually it got to the point where actually we went on a Christmas vacation and I took a long walk with God. I used to walk with God, man, just like literally take walks, or I would just pray and I told God I was like God. I don't think I have these feelings. I'm trying to give them to you and cause I don't want them to develop or to grow because, oh, I have a really awesome a childhood friend of mine who found out that I was interested in Bernal and said, oh Byron, oh, no Byron, she's a good girl.

Speaker 3: 46:02

He was your friend. With friends like that.

Speaker 1: 46:06

Who needs him. No, byron, she's a good girl. And also there was Bernal had a reputation. She had turned down a lot of guys, a bunch of guys she had turned down.

Speaker 3: 46:16

And so Props to you. Bernal the prop man, that is one of the things-. I'm trying not to Bernal though.

Speaker 1: 46:21

Shot out to my wife man.

Speaker 3: 46:24

Spoiler alert Spoiler alert, spoiler alert.

Speaker 1: 46:26

But so I prayed, and I prayed this prayer to God and God asked me this question. He said all right, byron, why do you think it's not gonna work out? Or no, he said what do you like about Bernal? What do you think is good about this? And I was like, and I went off for I don't know like 15 minutes and I was like this and this, and these are all the reasons why this is awesome. This is this. And then he, and then I was waiting for the followup because I was expecting God's next question to be like okay, what do you think it's not gonna work out? Or what do you think, whatever? And that second question never came. It's like all right, cool. I was like wait, you don't want me to get rid of these feelings. You're not gonna take these feelings away from me. So I was like all right. So after that walk with God is finally where I was like all right, so I started to actually, and then I came back from that walk and I actually sent Bernal email and she promptly decided to not respond to me at all.

Speaker 3: 47:13

Cause you sent her an email. Bro, come on, you gotta be more. Better than that, let me. Bernal was in Guam, there is no way to pop on.

Speaker 1: 47:20

Oh, okay, my bad, she was in the cafeteria or something. No, this was I'm sorry. Let me rephrase this this was over Christmas break.

Speaker 3: 47:27

This was over Christmas break. I bet I was gonna clown you no this was Christmas break.

Speaker 1: 47:32

She was on Guam. I was in Florida and I sent her this email and she never responded and I was like see. But I was like no, I didn't say see, I was like God. I was like, all right, god, if this is really who you have for me, if this is really it, then I'm gonna go all in. I'm gonna pursue Bernal. I was like I'm going full court press. Let's do this. I get back and I'm pursuing Bernal. And before this, what you should know maybe, is that Bernal and I were actually friends before this. We were on a lot of stuff together. I'm pursuing her and I'm doing those other stuff. And she stopped responding to my texts and she stopped answering my phone calls and she started to turn me down for things and I was like wait a minute, I'm putting all this effort in and the opposite of what I hope would happen is actually happening. Why is this? And I was actually got to the point where I was ready to give up. And then I was confiding in my cousin, Adele, and I was like, adele, I'm not gonna be that weird guy who can't take a hint. If the girl says no, it's no. And even though I haven't actually explicitly put myself out there. I'm pretty sure it's obvious that I like her and she's actually pulling away, so I think it's a no. So, adele, actually, unbeknownst to me, bernal had liked me from day one. From day one she'd liked me. She'd liked me all along. But Bernal said and later on, when we actually put our cards on the table, bernal told me why. She said I didn't want. I wanted to make sure that you were actually someone who really wanted a relationship and you just weren't just pursuing this just to pursue this, just because you wanted a relationship, like it had to be, you had to actually be committed to this and I was. And so my cousin told me. She said, byron, just keep doing what you're doing. I was like wait, what? Are you sure?

Speaker 3: 49:06

You know something I don't know. I don't want to be the creeper. And she said there's a chance.

Speaker 1: 49:12

So you tell me there's a chance. And my cousin was like Byron, I'm not gonna repeat it, just keep doing what you're doing, byron. And I was like, okay, so I kept doing what I was doing and finally it got to the point where things progressed and it got to the point where we actually had a breakfast in the cafeteria and I actually put all the cards on table. I said, hey, look, I like you and I want to pursue a relationship with you. And I was like we don't have to be in this relationship with you right now, but I want to, is that?

Speaker 3: 49:40

Bernal checking in. Yeah.

Speaker 1: 49:41

Bernal just peeked in and I was like I don't want to, but I want to pursue a relationship with you and I'm serious. And she said one of the most amazing things that anyone could have said to me at that moment. She said, byron, I've been single for I don't remember how long she'd been single. She's either two or three years. She says I've been single for two years and I could happily say single for another two years. I don't need to be in a relationship to be okay, or I don't need a relationship right now. I'm open to this and we can. Let's do this, but I just want you to know that I don't need this relationship and that, to me, was perfect because I said you got what I want. This is it man, this is her. This is my Rachel right here. This is the one that I'm gonna pursue, however many years it needs to be in order for this to work out. We start to date. I promptly. We only dated for four months and then I went to be a student missionary in Palau. She was at Southern, she finished up, she graduated and she went home to Guam and I went to finish up at Southern. This was like bro for the span of two years. We saw each other like three times over the span of two years and during this time I was, we were wrestling, asking God hey, do you want us to get married? And long story short, god, very, in some very supernatural ways, just affirmed us and said yes, I want you guys to get married. And so we're like, okay. And God opened a door for a Brinnell who was a pre-med health science major to be the assistant chaplain at Southern Adventist University during my senior year at Southern, and so we were actually getting to be in the same place at the same time and during this time, as Brinnell was the assistant chaplain, she was the one that was. Let me back up a little bit the stuff that was going on inside me. It wasn't healed, it wasn't taken away right, it was still there. I was still under the lie of Satan that somehow my ability to be okay was dependent on how other people treated me and what other people said about me. Like I was still under that impression. As I'm under these lies and I'm believing these lies, brinnell and I are two years apart, or two years, like very extreme, long distance, as extreme as it could be. And during this time period we're sending letters, we're doing a lot of other stuff, but towards the back end of these two years or at some point yeah, along those lines we get into this moment, into this place where we would set up these morning meetups and I would wake up either really early to meet up with her. And poor girl, she was sleeping because she was exhausted with work. And that would speak to my identity and my worth. I was like I'm worthless, I am broken, I am unworthy of whatever. So I'd feel unworthy and all those other stuff. So I would be like, and that would just stew there and it would take me to these not so great places where my mind started to go, yeah, to places to past experiences, right, and yeah, I started to go down these roads and it got to the point where I've always been 100% Brinnell and I have always been 100% transparent with each other about where we're at and what's going on. And I told her I was like, hey, when you don't and this is, by the way, those are either listening, this is not okay to say. Just, I just wanna acknowledge that this is not okay for someone to say. But at that time, what I told Brinnell is like you not being there for me in the morning, you not talking to me, you not giving me X, y or Z, as far as being there when I'm calling you or whatever makes me vulnerable to making mistakes.

Speaker 3: 53:14

Because that's called manipulation right there, that is called manipulation.

Speaker 1: 53:18

But when you're in deception, when you're walking in deception, you don't know that it's manipulation. You feel like, hey, it's, you got to put in and I'm gonna put in, and we're both gonna put in. You put in 50%, I'm gonna put in 50% and we're gonna complete each other to 100%. Right, that's the line. And man, what happened was that there was a moment where I reconnected with someone from my past and that reconnection with someone from my past led to conversations being had that never should be had if you were in a relationship with somebody especially if you care and love somebody. I was very open and honest with Bernal about that. I said, hey, there was, there was inappropriate conversations that took place with somebody and I think we should talk about it. And Bernal said, okay, not now, not yet. I said okay. And so then months passed, months passed, and then Bernal and then during this, during the months that passed, bernal got hired as assistant chaplain at Southern Adventist University. I was working in campus ministries. We're working on the same team together and we're there at the same time and this guest speaker comes in and he talks about sexuality. This is part of the sexual purity movement, right? But one of the things this brother gets up there and says is like hey, I challenge everybody to ask their boyfriend or their girlfriend when the last time they looked at porn, when was the last time that they masturbated, was the last time they did any of this other stuff? Because if you're gonna start a relationship, you're gonna be in a relationship. There shouldn't be secrets between you two. And the funny thing is, or the interesting thing is, as far as my behavior, since I was in a relationship with Bernal, I had been always very transparent about this is what happened. This is war rep, but Bernal hadn't wanted to talk about it and I was. Then they were like man, when are we gonna talk about it? And it was after that, vesper's at Southern Bernal and I were walking together and Bernal said okay, now let's talk. This is months later At this point, mind you, sorry, let me back up a little bit At this point that conversation with this other, that the communication with this other person had ceased, I had shot out to DDA because he was the brother who saw me construct the composite text and send a text and say, hey, we can't be communicating anymore. This is our communication needs to stop. This is no good. Granted at that point anyway. So that got sent. So this is months after that had stopped, but Bernal and I hadn't addressed this yet. But Bernal didn't just say, hey, let's have that conversation. Bernal says, hey, let's have that conversation and let's disclose and put all our secrets, all our skeletons out there, because I don't ever want there to be a secret between us and I never want to find out anything about you from somebody else. I want you to be the one to tell me. And I said, oh, because one of the biggest lies that I was walking around with was that if someone was to really know all of me that there's no way they could ever love me. There was no way that they could ever willingly be in a relationship with me and that they would not respect me or love me the same. So I said okay. So we set up a date and I went over to her place and it was one of the most painful conversations that I've ever had. I shared stuff with her that I've never shared with anybody else and I like, legitimately I was like on an emotional level I was just naked because I shared everything with her and I shared with her the stuff that happened and she finally got to ask all the questions she wanted to ask and it broke her heart, man, and she was crying and she was like I've never seen her cry like that. I've never seen her hurt that bad. And it wrecked me, because here is an awesome girl who just got done, telling me all the stuff, that all her stuff, and I'm sitting there comparing her stuff with my stuff and I'm like, man, I am so unworthy of this person, I'm so unworthy of this relationship. This is not. I shouldn't be with her. God is making a mistake by allowing me to be in a relationship with her and this girl. Man, she gave me one of the most amazing examples of the love of God and she, as I was wrecked, she held me and she hugged me and she told me that she forgave me and that she didn't forgive me but that she loved me. And I'll tell you what man. My wife has the love of God in her, and the reason that I know she has a love of God in her is because she did not treat me as my mistake. She never, ever, has treated me like my mistake. She has never treated me as the person who has done her. Yeah, never, she never has. And even after that moment where she heard and she saw all the parts of me that I was like man, if people knew these things about me, they would never yeah, they would never. They would never respect me the same they would need. Like, whatever time I would give a Bible study, whatever time I would get up on the pulpit, no one would ever respect anything that I have to say. And she respected me and she loved me. She didn't view me any less. That she never did. And that was like probably my first glimpse of the gospel. My parents loved me and my brother loved me. There was people that loved me, but I always that lie, that whisper that Satan gives you, is hey, but if your parents knew, or if your brother knew, or if these other people knew everything about you, you would, then your fears would be true and that you would never be lovable. And so I was like, wow. And then I was amazing, she forgave me. We were good, we got engaged, we got married, and when I asked her to marry me this is a long drawn out story, but one of the things that I did when I asked her to marry me is I knelt down and I washed her feet because I told her it was like hey, I want to serve you the way that Jesus served the church and served his disciples. This is how I want to live my life. I want to serve you. And I asked her to marry me and praise Jesus. She said yes, and she never, man, she never held those things. I have never had a conversation where she would go back and be like, hey, what about that one time? Or no, I'm doing this because you did this other thing over here and I don't trust you here. No, she, it was wild man, it was a wild thing, it was a God thing. That's what that was. It was a love of God thing that she had in her heart, man. So we got married and we went and we were missionary teachers in Korea, and while we were missionary teachers in Korea, certain things started to pop back up, man, because again, I had received that love from Bernal. But I, somehow my conception at that time of the way that God works is God gives you a brand new sheet of paper, so you make a mistake, here's a new one. And you fill. And then you go and you fill out this new, brand new slice of clean paper with a brand new lot with more sins. And then, aha, man, you messed up. Now you gotta go come in and ask for forgiveness. I feel bad about it, and then I'm gonna give you a new one. That was my perception. So when Bernal did this for me, when Bernal loved on me the way that she did, I was like, yes, I was amazing. I received the love that she had, but only to a certain point, because I was like, okay, now I'm giving this brand new piece of paper. There's this end of being where my sins are being tracked, and so, and because my sins are being tracked, then I'm now refilling the stuff. So basically, what happened is, when Bernal loved on me the way she did, my cup of shame and guilt was emptied, and then it started to get refilled. And when I was in Korea, one of the things that happened is that I had a very difficult time in Korea making friends, like to the point where I was like, why is this so hard to connect with people? Why is this so hard? Like I'm really putting myself out there, I'm trying to invite people over, I'm trying to set things up where we can meet up outside of work and stuff like that, and it's not really going anywhere. And so I started to get depressed and so I started to get depressed and so I started to self-medicate right, but I've disconnected from all the people that I would have maybe gone to or would have connected with to satisfy or address us before. And this is man, this is how you know. It's not about sex. Is that? It wasn't like I wasn't having sex? I'm married, right, but they're still the whole right, because sometimes one of the lies is like oh, when you get married, the whole is fixed. And no, it's not, because your marriage isn't one fills you. Jesus Christ is what fills you. This is starting to happen, and one of the things that I didn't even realize that I started to take on myself in this relationship was I started to put on my shoulders her happiness. So if she was happy, then I felt like I had accomplished something. If she would laugh, I had accomplished something. If she was sad, if she was depressed, if she was going through stuff, I had failed as a husband because I wasn't giving her what she needed right. And so then guess what I started to do? Then I started to keep a record of wrong with her. I started keeping a record of wrong. I started to hold onto my hurt again and that cup of guilt, chimp, condemnation continued to get filled and filled. And so I started acting out online. And I started acting out online because I was like, hey, fine, you're like, this is how I can, this is how I'm self-medicating If you hurt me, I'm sitting here hurt, I feel hurt. I'm feeling like I'm not measuring up as a husband. So then I'm going to, I'm going to go into this space to self-medicate and try to fulfill this in some type of way. So then I we go to. What do we do? We finish our year in Korea and I get accepted to grad school and we come to grad school. And while we are coming to grad school, during that first couple months of being in grad school, we find out that Bernal is pregnant and this is not planned. This is an unplanned pregnancy, right, this is an unplanned pregnancy and we're like, and I'm like, oh my gosh, I'm in grad school. Being a when to transition from not being parents to being parents is difficult, let alone when you are it's the first time, and when you are transitioning back into the United States and when you're in grad school and your finances are rough because your wife you're living in one of the most expensive cities in the world and your wife is working part-time and she's a breadwinner and all you're doing is taking loans and I couldn't get a job to help out. So I'm fairly stressed because, again, I got to be the one to solve everything, because my performance, what I do, is what determines my ability to be okay and part of my self-worth is very much attached to if you're okay or you're okay. We were not doing the best financially and we have a new baby and we're under slept and we're stressed and our marriage is rocky. Man, it is rocky. And as our marriage is rocky, I start to continue to self-medicate and just continue to go down this path and just being like, hey, this is how I'm surviving and Brinnell and I are not doing well. Man, our marriage is rough. We're not kind to each other. Let me not talk about my wife. I was not kind to my wife. I was extremely selfish. I had made all these wonderful promises about how amazing, all these amazing things that I was gonna do when I became a father, when I became a husband, and I was not doing any of those things. I was pretty selfish because, as I'm trying to do, and I'm seeing that she's unhappy or she's hurt or whatever, then I'm internalizing it and I'm blaming everything on me, like I've rubbed her over joy of all this other stuff. So then I'm guilty and so then I have to make myself feel better somehow. So I go to online for that fulfillment or like for that break, for that moment of respite. So then I'm going in there. And what were you studying in grad school? Oh, I was studying to be a mental health provider. I was studying to be a psychologist.

Speaker 3: 1:05:13

Okay.

Speaker 1: 1:05:14

This is what I'm wrestling with. This is what I'm dealing with. Our marriage isn't in the best place and it ebbs and it flows and somehow, some way, I'm still holding on to God, I'm still doing these things, I'm still living very much in the Romans chapter seven mindset, like this dual-mindedness right, like where I'm like oh, this is here, but I'm like I will white-knuckle it for a period of time and then we'll have an argument or I will just feel exhausted or stressed about whatever's going on, so that I'll go back to this right. And here's one of the things that started to show back up because, as God started to kill my heart and these other moments, I started to let go of the anger. I started to let go of anger and anger hadn't really been as much a part of my life, but all in all, I got to grad school, man anger started to show back up with a vengeance. Man Anger just started to show back up and I was like where, where? And I was experiencing some very unfortunate dynamics in grad school as well, with in certain situations, and I was like and that was very unfortunate and that added stress to my life and I was just like man, this is rough. I don't like this, and as I'm in grad school and as I'm going down this road, I've started to lose pieces. The way I think I used to describe it at time is I would lose good pieces of myself. In this grad school experience. I just little by little, things just started to crack and fall off and I wouldn't find them again. The ability to just forgive or to love better or to not be angry just started falling off and I was regressing, like when my walk with God. I was regressing. I had always, even before, as I was struggling with stuff, I would always be active or participating in church and I started to just say no, I want absolutely no participation in church. I want no responsibilities of church. I said no to everything and anything and I don't need that. I say no to me. I would try to discourage my wife from taking on any responsibility at church too, because I was like no, I don't want to do any of that stuff because, again, I'm a double minded person and I don't want to be a hypocrite. I don't want to be dealing with the stuff and also taking on these responsibilities at church. Time passes by, I graduate, I finish grad school and I get my degree and off doing stuff and life is getting better and I'm having moments because the stress of grad school is gone, so life starts to feel better. But as life starts to get better, man like I'm not, I'm still very much experiencing this stuff because I thought, look, grad school is better, these other things are better. Why am I still struggling with this stuff? My marriage is better now than it was before. Why am I still struggling with this stuff? And again I went through this thing where I was in that moment when I had borne my heart and told Bernal all the things that I had been struggling with, like the guilt shame cup had poured out but it started to get refilled. I started to fill up a new cup of guilt, shame and condemnation, right, and this cup started to get filled up and I was like man Bernal, forgive me that one time and these other stuff, but man like I'm carrying around these other stuff here now Again. So it's weird because on the outside life is better, but somehow I'm still struggling with this stuff and I'm having maybe extended, better extended periods of not acting out. But inevitably, man, I'll find we'll get into this one disagreement or I'll get stressed and I'll fall back into it and I can't seem to shake it. And it's embarrassing because I studied how to help people manage behavior and manage emotion and here I am stuck. I have a degree and I'm stuck. That's embarrassing, that's shameful For sure.

Speaker 3: 1:08:44

The enemy's gonna put that on you Any chance he gets.

Speaker 1: 1:08:46

Oh man, and it was thick man and I was working. I started working, I finished, I got my license, I was working as a psychologist and as I'm working as a psychologist, I got invited to be adjunct professor and I was like, oh man, this is pretty awesome, let's do it, let's be adjunct professor. And as I am adjunct professor, I start to struggle with anxiety again. I had felt anxiety before, but I have started to feel anxiety all over again. But it was one of the things that started to develop for me with anxiety was I would stress, eat, I would go, come home and my anxiety was through the roof and I would come home and you just got a bunch on. No, bunch on is too expensive and I would have been broke if I had gone to bunch on. No, I love bunch on, but bunch on is too expensive for doing what I was doing. Because I was eating, I would go to McDonald's, I go to Burger King, I go to Taco Bell, I would soothe with food and also I would medicate with online stuff too. So I would do that and I would medicate with online stuff and this is how I was managing that Tight and over the span of I think it was over the span of 10 weeks, I gained like 20 pounds.

Speaker 3: 1:10:02

Mercy, yeah, that's not a lot of weeks.

Speaker 1: 1:10:05

No, no, there's a change that happens metabolically when someone is experiencing consistently high levels of cortisol in their system, where it's harder for them to lose weight or engage in stuff like that, and so everything just fed into each other so the more, and I'm watching myself gain weight and I'm like, oh man, this is rough, this is bad, this is bad, and I'm leaving the other stuff and I'm stressed and I'm going through all this other stuff and I think at that time also, coincidently, imagine that this is also projecting into my marriage. And again I'm like holding a record of wrong. Just why can't she? Just I'm telling her all the things she needs to do for me to be okay If she would just did all this stuff.

Speaker 3: 1:10:46

right, you would have been happy. Right, I would have been happy.

Speaker 1: 1:10:49

I would have been perfect. My life would have been perfect. Why can't she just do the things that I'm telling her to do?

Speaker 2: 1:10:54

because it's all about me. It's all about me taking care of me.

Speaker 1: 1:10:59

It's not like she's got a full-time job and doing grad school and has three kids that they're raising here right. That's not it. It can't be that Chill.

Speaker 3: 1:11:08

Bro. So what happened, man? What was the plan to get out of this?

Speaker 1: 1:11:12

by the way, I thought that if enough time passed at some point no, no, I was going to say that I thought that if enough time passed at some point, it would just go away. But I think I'd given up on that. I thought that this was my lot. I thought that this was my lot forever, and I took solace in seeing that Paul was probably struggling with the same thing. So, when I would read Romans chapter 7, keep going to Romans chapter 7. When I would read Romans chapter 7, let me tell you, when I would read Romans chapter 7, I would say you know what? Paul was struggling with sexual sin. Because I'm struggling with sexual sin. Paul was struggling with sexual sin in Romans chapter 7. That's why this brother said what he said, because he, too, was struggling with sexual sin. That's why he was there, right? That's why he was there, man. So so what? So where are we? So yeah, but by the time I'm in this point, man, I don't think there's any way that this is going to be addressed on this side of heaven. I think this is my lot forever. And so then, what happens? So then I my cousin in 2020 had sent our cousin group chat. My cousin Aaron sent our group chat a podcast and it was Tyler's episode, and she just said hey, check it out. And one of the reasons this was very impactful for me is because Aaron is a very like Aaron. My cousin Aaron is not the type of person to push anything on anyone or she's very respectful and careful with those types of things. If Aaron is putting something out there which she doesn't do, this is pretty significant.

Speaker 3: 1:12:50

How did Aaron get a hold of this podcast? How would she have heard of it? I don't even know we were not. We still really don't advertise, so she probably.

Speaker 1: 1:12:59

I don't know this for a fact, but I think she probably heard from Paola, who is Eddie's sister. Oh, okay, this is probably how she, because Paola and her are friends, so that's probably how she found out about it and how she heard it. So on my way to my adjunct professor gig, I and I'll talk about this I have a full-time job as well. So, I'm sorry, I have two full-time. I have a full-time job and I have the side gig. And on my way there I listened to Tyler's episode and I remember thinking to myself man, this is this true? Like, is this possible? Because this is, if it's possible, I want it, but I don't know if it's possible. Like I don't know if it's possible for me. I don't know. I go on and I listen to, but it was weird because I was having these questions but at the same time I heard I was listening by the God praise God for his word, man, because I was listening to Tyler's episode and it was life-giving. I was, it was life-giving. I'm listening to his episode and it's life-giving. And it starts to give me hope. Right, I don't have all the answers, I'm still thinking through stuff, I'm still chewing on stuff, but it starts to give me hope. Like there might be hope, there might be hope here. I start to listen to it and then I find out, and I listen to Morgan's episode and then, after I listen to Morgan's episode, I hear about Jonathan through their communication. I find out that there's a wave one and at this point this was what's crazy man? So at this point I, when all the stuff with Eddie was happening, I heard about all that stuff because I went to Southern. So we all went to Southern. We were something like Eddie and I played on a volleyball team together. We played on a soccer team together. We weren't hanging out on the weekends but we were like we knew each other right and I would see him up front and we were both kind of leaders on campus. So we knew I knew who this, I knew who this brother was and I saw everybody got the text from the news about what happened to him and all his other stuff. And I remembered back and I remember him one time posting something like after everything was getting resolved and after his arrest and everything. I remember him posting something that said I am free, like I am free from sin and I am free from porno, or something along those lines. He made a post. This is when I still had social media and I saw that post and I was like and good for him, there's no way that's real for me. Like I don't know what he went through, but that's awesome for him. There's no way this is real for me. And then I remember that I at some point, man, like a while, like at some point, I saw like Floor and I saw like a video clip on YouTube where Floor was saying, like love, reality, and this is. She was just like talking about God and how amazing God's love is, and I was just like I went to Southern and Floor and I didn't really know each other, but I don't recall Floor ever being involved in anything and, if anything, I was involved with all the religious stuff on campus, or I was involved with a lot of the religious stuff on campus and I don't recall her being involved at all. So I was like, huh, she's sitting here testifying to God's love. By the way, at this point I had no idea that any of this stuff was connected. I was just these were just separate things, just so that I start to I go in and listen to Wave 1 and as I'm listening to Wave 1, man, I'm listening to it and I'm like and it's giving life for me. As I'm receiving this, it's giving me life and it's starting to create a change inside of me, but I don't have all the answers and I don't know if I believe everything that I'm hearing. But it was crazy because I'm listening to it and I don't know if I believe everything that I'm hearing. But at the same time, whatever I'm hearing is starting to change my life. It's starting to give me hope and to make me think maybe there is hope, maybe there's a way out of this.

Speaker 3: 1:16:41

Okay, we're going to take a real quick break right now and I'm going to introduce you to my friend Justin. Justin, how long have you been rocking with Good Gospel? Oh man, it's been five years now. Five years, and when you heard this message, did it make a change in your life? Tell me about that.

Speaker 2: 1:17:03

Absolutely, absolutely. I didn't understand my identity, my value, my worth. I didn't understand the character of God and his love and how good it was. And now I do Praise the.

Speaker 3: 1:17:17

Lord man. And yet, if you want to hear Justin's episode on the Dead to Life podcast, just scroll back a little bit and you might find we have a much longer conversation than the one we're having right now. Justin, you have decided to give from your hard earned finances to support this ministry and to keep this podcast going. Why are you doing that?

Speaker 2: 1:17:43

A real short answer. Such powerful transformation in my own life and I was going for so long thinking one way and somebody just needed to tell me the truth. And hearing these stories of transformation, I think it's a great way to share God's goodness and how he can actually make a meaningful transformation in someone's life.

Speaker 3: 1:18:06

Wow, that's powerful. And if you're listening and you would like to partner with us to donate to keep this podcast going because, like we always say, we're just convinced that we're never going to run out of episodes if we're able to keep preaching the gospel and if you would like to help us go to loverealityorg slash give and you can donate to the Dead to Life podcast and we would really appreciate it and it would go a long way to help us keep producing these episodes. That's loverealityorg slash give. Thank you, Justin. I appreciate you, my friend, Love you brother, Love you.

Speaker 1: 1:18:57

Right before the pandemic hit our church, pasadena, the San Theatrines church, got a new head pastor, this new senior pastor, and he was there and he would get up on the pulpit and he would preach a lot and he would preach a lot about being engaged and participating in other stuff. And I would hear him preach and, man, the Spirit of God used him and his messages. Because the Spirit of God used his messages to actually make me want to participate, not just, hey, I'll pinch hit a sermon here or there, I'll pinch hit a Sabbath school here or there. You'd actually maybe want to actually take on an actual role in church and that is not something that I had felt in like a decade at that point or almost a decade, and I was like, huh, this is cool, but I can't ever take a position because I have all these other things going on inside of me. And around that time my church started to look for an associate pastor. And I remember that one time I had gotten up and this was during the pandemic and I had preached outside because we were meeting outside, outdoors, so in the church parking lot. So I had gotten off the pulpit and Pastor Johnson came, shout out to Pastor Johnson. Pastor Johnson came up to me and he talked to me and he was like, hey, we're looking, we've been looking and looking for an associate pastor and here you are and I was like, huh, that's funny. No way, there's no way that I ever want to be a pastor, because my father's a pastor, and I see what that entails. I see the life of a pastor. It's hard, it's lonely and, honestly, there's been a lot of stuff that has sucked about it. So I was like no. And beyond. That's just the outer shell, but on the inside that the truth was. There's no way that I can be an associate pastor carrying this stuff with me. This is not for me, right? Pastor Johnson would not like no, this is. There's no way. The spirit of God is actually talking to me in this moment through Pastor Johnson, when he was so. Then I start to listen and I start to like chew on this stuff and I start to think through this stuff and kind of take it in, see where we're at and start to check things. And some stuff starts to click and connect and I'm like, okay, I get this, I get that, I agree with this. I don't know about this other stuff, as I'm listening to wave one, and then adventism and the light of freedom, and then way to, as I'm listening to this stuff and I'm like wrestling with it. So I start, but it but I'm wrestling with this stuff is starting to change my life. My life is starting to reflect my father and starting to show who it is, that who it is, that I actually am Right as I'm listening to it, as I'm wrestling with it. And then, but then I start to reach out to people and I'm like, hey, I'm thinking through on wrestling with this stuff. Hey, listen to it and let's dig into it together and let's break it apart and see what we think and see if we agree or what parts we agree with, what parts we don't agree with. Let's wrestle with it, let's figure this out. So then I would share with folks and some people would like get it and just not really listen to it. But the those in my circles because I have a couple of different circles of friends, those in my circle and my separate circles of friends who actually started listening to it and receiving this, their life started to get transformed. And I'm sitting there watching these brothers and I'm like, wow, there's something here, there's something here, something's happening here, something's changing here. Right, my life is starting to be transformed, but I'm still but I'm still wrestling with, but I'm still wrestling with this stuff about, like, where I am and who I am and the lies that tell me that I'm not who I actually am, which is a son of God. Right, and as I'm listening to this, I finally start to just receive it. I start to I've done enough reading, I've done enough listening and looking into scripture on my own and praying about it that I start to receive this message and I remember that one of the passages of scripture that really just one of the passages of scripture that really just hit home for me was Matthew, chapter three, verses 16 and 17. It is where Jesus gets baptized. Jesus gets to the Jordan and he gets baptized, and right after he gets baptized he comes out of the water. The spirit of God comes out in the form of dove and the voice of God comes down and says this is my beloved son, in whom I am well pleased. And it was wild, because what I had never quite caught before was the fact that at this point Jesus is being called a son and the only thing that he's done is he just got baptized. He has done none of his ministry. He's done none of his ministry, yet Absolutely none of his ministry is done. And he and somehow God is well pleased in him when he's on absolutely nothing, none of his ministry has been completed yet he's beloved and he, and him, god, is well pleased. And then, as I was listening to the stuff with of the gospel I started, I was hearing like that, when you believe in and believe in and faith, you walk from death into life and that Jesus is the first born among many. And as I'm listening to this, I was like, wait a minute, this is what God is saying about me. This is about me. He's saying this to me. I am his beloved and me he is well pleased, not because of what I've done, not because of the mistakes that I've done or the good stuff that are done, but just simply because I'm his kid. This is why he says this about me, and his posture of being well pleased is not something that changes. I used to approach God. I used to make my mistakes and then just stay away from God and wait for God to, in my mind, cool off or forget or just let enough time pass, because, because I was applying to God the same stuff that I had when I'm wronged, I need space. Give me space, let me cool off so that I'm no longer mad at you and then I can actually forgive you. That's how I was, and so somehow I projected that onto God and I approached God in that same manner. But when I started to understand his message, I was like wait a minute. No, he says that I am his beloved and in me he is well pleased. In me right here, right now, as I stand and as I sat this is mine today, man. That started to change and rock my world, man. And after that, once you start to once, the gospel starts to become a life to you eat scripture, man things just start to pop off and you start seeing up to thing. Up to thing starts to pop off. The spirit of God started to continue to move inside me and inside of my heart, but something was not, because whenever Brinell and I have made big decisions, brinell and I have always been on the same page. We've always been on the same page. God has always convicted her independently and me independently. He's convicted both of us. And then we've moved on with that confidence that God has convicted both of us of what their direction is. Whether we did that when we got married, we did that when we moved to Korea, we did that when we moved to California, we did that in all these places, at some point I had actually told my pastor, my senior pastor. I'd actually told him like, hey, I think I can help the church because I already have a full time job, I don't need health insurance, I don't need to get paid a full time salary. I think I can actually help the church. I actually have a theology degree because of my grad school trainings. I think I can help the church, I can help our young people, and I did that. But then, after I told my pastor this, he got COVID. And he and his wife had gone off. And they got COVID. They almost died. We all were praying for them. But as they were gone, the devil's lies started to build and grow again inside of my heart, inside of my mind. It started to tell me like hey, you're not worthy to be a pastor because you're still struggling, you're still actually Roman 7 is actually your reality. And because of that I was actually just getting to the point where I was getting ready to just tell. Next time I saw the pastor, I was like I'm going to tell him like hey, never mind, withdraw my name from this process, I'm unworthy, this is me, I'm just unworthy. Sorry, I can't do this. So, time pass, I started to receive this message. There's a transformation that starts to play place inside. But here's the thing, man, some people think that when you receive this message, that then you are free to go on sinning, that then you're free to go and continue to live in foolishness and in debauchery. Right? That's what some people think that this message is saying. But that's not what it's saying, because what the Spirit of God was convicting me to do with, the Spirit of God would not leave me alone about it, saying you need to talk to your wife, like you did those years ago. You need to tell your wife all the stuff that you've been building up, because you have a cup of guilt, shame and condemnation that's filled up again to the brim and you need to talk to her about it. You need to bring this up. And it was a Friday night and I had been stressed because I was walking around with all the stress of being an adjunct professor and all the anxiety and I'm fat and ugly and poor me and all this other stuff. So I'm walking around and then finally, bernal had just put the kids to bed and she came to see how I was doing and I was sitting here and I was like, hey, I'm stressed, and I start to talk and the Spirit of God just gets a hold of me and gets a grip on me and I start to just confess. I start to just confess and just to share and just to unload like, hey, this is what I've been struggling with, this is what I've been doing, this is how I've been self-medicating, this is what. This is the stuff that that's been here. I just start to tell her and all these things and just unload all these things. And as I start to say these things and start to share these things, and as I start to receive the love of my wife again, like she did all those years ago, I'm also starting to receive the love of God. And as I'm saying these things and confessing these things, god is freeing me of those things and God is healing my heart. And God is healing me and actually telling me something different. He's speaking a better word over my life than those sins and those lies had spoken over my life. And, man, we just had a moment where we just I said everything and my wife continues to be a woman of God and she just loved on me and forgave me and prayed with me, and we both prayed and we both cried because of how God was restoring and healing and breaking chains. And it was amazing. And then, two days before I had been ready to tell our senior pastor hey, take my name off the list, this was a Friday night. The next Sabbath morning I go to church and as I'm walking into the church lobby, I hadn't seen Pastor Johnson in months. And I see him in the lobby and I'm like oh, pastor Johnson. And he comes up to me and said, hey, preacher of righteousness. And then he comes up to me and says, hey, we have a board meeting tonight and we're going to vote on you for the associate pastor. And what he did not know in that moment is that if he and I had that conversation 24 hours before, I would have told him no, 48 hours before that I was going to tell him, hey, there's no way that me being this, me thinking I'm broken me, thinking that I am my sin, that I can take this position Right, there's no way that this is possible. But in that moment, because of what God had done the night before and what God had been doing, as I'm taking and drinking deeply of the well that is, the love of God and the gospel, I was free to tell Pastor confidently yes, pastor, looking forward to it. I walk into the sanctuary and, lo and behold, it was Communion Sabbath. And here's the thing we were not supposed to have Communion Sabbath that day. Communion Sabbath was supposed to be weeks before, but because Pastor had had COVID, we were waiting for him to come back. Communion Sabbath was that Sabbath. Communion Sabbath was that day. And we get in, we sit in their church and, man, I'm receiving the love of Jesus and I'm excited. I'm like man. This is it. I'm sitting here in newness of life. I am free from sin. This is amazing. Oh my goodness, I can't but. And we get to the part where people are going in to do the foot washing. And as I'm looking over to the foot washing stuff, I desperately wanted to go and participate in foot washing with my wife and my kids, but at the same time, I felt like I couldn't because I was like man. I'm going to make a scene of myself because I'm just going to fall apart and cry because of how amazing God is and how amazing he is to restore me and in my and actually speak, speak truth over my life and just love on me the way he has. I was like no, I can't. During the service, before we broke, for everyone to go and do the foot washing, my son, israel, he fell asleep in my arms. And when everybody goes to do the foot washing Bernal and my girls. They go to do the foot washing and I stay in the sanctuary and I'm just sitting there waiting for everyone to come through and I'm like, man, all right, it's okay. You know what, if we don't do the foot washing together, it's okay. And some time passes and everybody starts to come back and right as everyone's making their way back, my son, israel, wakes up. I was like, oh, bernal and the girls aren't back yet. So then I was like, okay. So then I go into the fellowship on. As I walk into the fellowship hall is Bernal and my two girls. They're the only ones in there. No one else is there and they still have clean water. They saw the water there and the towels there. So I go over there and I get to wash my wife's feet and my wife gets to wash my feet. And God is a God of detail man, because that meant so much to us, because of how I had proposed to her and how we had gotten married, what we had done when we got made to wash each other's feet. So it was a very personal thing that that we were washing each other's feet and that we were rejoicing in the mercy and the grace of God in that moment, as I am restored, as, once again, there was nothing between my wife and I that that needs to be brought to light, and as I am walking and walking this out, and we wash each other's feet, man, and we were crying. My kids were crying because we were crying, because they didn't know why we were crying. We were all just crying and washing each other's feet and just praising God and just basking in the goodness of God. And, yeah, and that night, the church board voted and I got voted in as the associate pastor. Man, something that I had never intended, something that I had never wanted for myself. Man, I got voted in as the associate pastor and God knows how he does things in his timelines man, because that day, man, I was walking around in a newness of life and in freedom, and that's what gave me the ability to tell pastor Johnson, without a shadow of a doubt yes, I can do this now because of my own ability, but because of who I serve, and he is the one that is going to be able to do this work and make it come through.

Speaker 3: 1:33:23

And since then it's just been growing up into him, huh.

Speaker 1: 1:33:26

It's just been growing up into him, man, it's been growing up into him. I've had my moments, man. This is something. This has been a journey. I've had my moments where I was like, OK, what does this look like? What happens is wait. Does this mean I'm never going to make mistakes, I'm never going to lose my cool, I'm never going to whatever right? And the truth is that, no, man, I have had my moments where I've lost my cool, said something or I had my eyes of lingered places they're shouldn't, and I've had those moments. But then what's been amazing is being able to walk through that or that process of going back to the secret place and going back to the feet of Jesus and going back to the love of God and who he is in me. And, as I've been, going back to who he is and continue to drink deeply of the well that is his love and the gospel of Jesus. Man, I'll tell you that my life today is very different than it was before. Man, maybe from other people's perspective, outside man, they can look at me and be like, oh wow, looks about the same or looks different. No, man, my life is different. I walk in newness of life. I don't walk around with guilt, shame, condemnation. I walk excited. I'm not holding a record of wrong. I'm not keeping a track record. I don't need my wife to like me. I don't need her to be happy. I don't need her to anything. Man, I am good, I am OK. I am OK.

Speaker 3: 1:34:41

Let's, let's jump in the DeLorean and we're going to go to Interstate 4. Oh my gosh, and we're going to hop in that minivan. Yeah. And you get to put your arm around this kid. Yeah. What do you tell this guy who has just had his life saved, or even before or after? Yeah, what would you tell this kid that is just searching and is stuck in his thing?

Speaker 1: 1:35:12

Yeah, man, oh, I would tell him that you are not your anger, you are not your hurt, you are not your failures, that you are whole and complete in Christ and that you are his beloved and in you he is well pleased and nothing that you can do can take you out of his love. Nothing that you can do will ever take away how pleased he is with you. Yeah, that's what I would tell him.

Speaker 3: 1:35:53

Man, man, you're a testimony to me, bro, and maybe more of this story will get told later, who's to say? But just the blessing that you've been in my life and what I think, what you and I have seen happen. Man, I'm not going to get choked up. It's your testimony, man. It's your blessing that there are people who have had lives changed, because you had your lives changed by God revealing his love to you. Praise God and so you receiving that has been a life changing thing for many people, so I thank you for your faithfulness to his faithfulness man and for sharing your story.

Speaker 1: 1:36:28

Praise God man, praise God Eighth. The crazy thing is man two that I used to hear the passages of Scripture that said his burden is easy and his yoke is light right, and I used to think that was a lie.

Speaker 3: 1:36:42

This yoke is easy and his burden is light.

Speaker 1: 1:36:44

Right, yeah, but I used to think that was a lie man. I used to hear that verse and I was like man, that's not my story, that's not me, there's no way that. I am a son of God, or there's maybe I'm, maybe I sometimes am, maybe I'm sometimes not man, but now, as I walk this, as I'm walking this out, as I'm living this out, brother, the burden is easy, burden is light. I'm getting it mixed up in my head right now, but, man, I'm telling you, I'm telling you that living this out is that is true. That passage is truth, man, it's truth and it's true in my life today. It's true in my life today.

Speaker 3: 1:37:19

Amen, brother, love you, dog. Your testimony to me, man.

Speaker 1: 1:37:23

Love you too, man Love you too.

Speaker 3: 1:37:32

Wow, that episode really touched me and even the conversation that we were having. Around addiction there's so many lies. If you have gotten into this place, if you've gotten in a rut in your mind where just an excitement from either alcohol, drugs, pornography, sex addiction is there to fill a hole but now you see, oh, jesus has actually freed me. If you're there and you want to grab onto this and you want what happened to Tyler, what happened to Byron, to be true for you, I want to offer this prayer. I want you to pray this out loud Father, I have been raised with you and I am going to seek the things where you are at the right hand of your father, our father. I'm going to set my mind on things above and not on earth, because I have died and my life is hidden with Christ in you, and when Christ appears, I will also appear with him in glory. Because of all this, I'm going to put the death, anything that's earthly in me sexual immorality and purity, passion, evil, desire and covenessness, which is idolatry, and I know on account of these, your wrath is coming and this is how I used to walk when I was living in them, but now I put it all away, I put it all to death and I'm standing here in you. I consecrate my life, my body, to righteousness and I will follow it, because I've seen your everlasting love and I receive it In Jesus' name, amen.

Death to Life podcast

#132 Shattered Reflections: Byron's Struggle with Anxiety, Marriage, and Recovery

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