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Marc Calvert: Finding God in a Briar Bush · Get The Hell Out of Your Life with Ron Meyers

0:00
Marc Calvert: So, you know, I was a man that grew up without God.
0:04
Marc Calvert: Never believing in God determined anybody that did to be a fool.
0:07
Marc Calvert: Those decisions, or lack thereof, led me down a road where I began to try drugs for the very first time at age 16.
0:15
Marc Calvert: And then, through the course of those choices, began with my first felony charge at age 18 and started was incarcerated for the very first time at age 18.
0:26
Marc Calvert: The very first time that I was arrested I was sentenced to a year, and not a long time in the scope of a lifetime, but certainly a long time for the very first time being incarcerated.
0:35
Marc Calvert: It settled into that and one would think that it might wake you up.
0:40
Marc Calvert: But at that young age it was everybody's fault but mine.
0:43
Marc Calvert: I tended to blame everyone else.
0:45
Marc Calvert: Dl Moody, great evangelist, said that I never met a man that gave me more problems than myself and I certainly can agree with that, that repetition of reoffending due to probation and requirements to meet obligations due to byproducts of my behavior that I couldn't meet because my behavior refused to be modified.
1:12
Marc Calvert: And I spent most of my adult life in and out incarcerated.
1:16
Marc Calvert: You know drugs were always a part of my life in some way, but if you would have asked me at the time.
1:24
Marc Calvert: you know, throughout the course of those years of my life, I would have never, admitted that and would have always said it was, you know, recreational use or, you know, just a part of what we do to have fun and you know, always was able to maintain a job up and into the point where, you know I was arrested for either failing drug tests or not reporting and things of that nature.
1:44
Marc Calvert: And of course, along the way I've caught additional charges and never had healthy relationships.
1:49
Marc Calvert: But of course, as men that live without God, we serve only ourselves.
1:53
Marc Calvert: Very self-centered man, very egotistical, very prideful and I believe, when we look back at it and I've committed my life to helping people now in a way that I needed it desperately time look back at it and I've committed my life to helping people now in a way that I needed it desperately time.
2:07
Marc Calvert: But when we look at men, they're full of pride and ego and anger.
2:09
Marc Calvert: It's a lack of self-confidence and it's a sensational need to be accepted.
2:15
Marc Calvert: You know we look back and you know my parents divorced at age seven.
2:19
Marc Calvert: You know I did not grow up with my father.
2:22
Marc Calvert: You know, firmly in place in the time that I did have with him certainly wasn't anything that was grounded in God and so over time I just looked to, you know, other guys, typically older than me, and then you know, did what I could as the youngest in the group to stand out, you know, to garnish their attention and admiration and validate myself in the most unhealthy ways, garnet's their attention and admiration and validate myself in the most unhealthy ways.
2:46
Marc Calvert: But in my 30s I met someone that I fell in love with and didn't realize that methamphetamine was a part of her life, and then learned that and then slowly made a decision to do that with her, to continue this relationship with her not being fully aware of what I was getting into.
3:03
Marc Calvert: And then, thereafter that, my life slowly began to truly become out of control.
3:09
Marc Calvert: Incarceration occurred more and more and more, in violence as well, and just very horrible domestic situations would ensue.
3:17
Marc Calvert: And God got a hold of me, ron, almost seven years ago, and I was the year that I encountered Christ.
3:27
Marc Calvert: You know and understand that I was someone that did not believe in God and would talk anybody out of it if I felt like you did, but I was.
3:34
Marc Calvert: I had been to prison four times in that year In the state of Alabama where I lived.
3:41
Marc Calvert: It was if you violated your parole by not reporting or failing a drug test or not reporting address changes.
3:46
Marc Calvert: They would send you back to prison for 45 days.
3:49
Marc Calvert: You would have to sit in county a few months before you were taken to that intake facility to do those 45 days in prison, not jail, and I had done that four times in one year and things were just.
4:01
Marc Calvert: Every time I would come home they were getting worse and worse.
4:04
Marc Calvert: The last time I came home from that prison I learned some things that I wasn't able to handle.
4:09
Marc Calvert: I saw some things that I wish I wouldn't have and I didn't respond well at all.
4:13
Marc Calvert: And law enforcement was called out to the property.
4:15
Marc Calvert: They had been several times that week and I ran from them.
4:19
Marc Calvert: And then running from them, I was cutting through a trailer park.
4:23
Marc Calvert: There was a little girl's bicycle leaned up against a porch and in an attempt to get away from them faster, I stole this little girl's bike and I was pedaling it as hard as I could.
4:33
Marc Calvert: It was certainly too big to be on it and the handlebar snapped.
4:38
Marc Calvert: I went sliding into a bush and it was briars.
4:41
Marc Calvert: I was covered in cuts.
4:42
Marc Calvert: I was wearing clothes that didn't fit.
4:44
Marc Calvert: I was coming from somewhere that was no good for me and I had nowhere to go and I was hiding in that bush and I was covered in cuts and the police were going back and forth and they were looking for me and inside of that bush, ron, my watch beeped.
4:58
Marc Calvert: Man, I'm going to tell you that was the loudest beep.
5:03
Marc Calvert: And you know, looking back at it with hindsight and common sense and a clear mind, there was probably no way that they would have ever heard that beep because they were in their cars and their radios were probably going.
5:11
Marc Calvert: But I'm telling you right now, brother, in that bush, on that beep, my watch beeped.
5:16
Marc Calvert: You couldn't tell me that I wouldn't head back to prison again and I covered that watch with my hand because I didn't want the light to be on and anybody to see it.
5:26
Marc Calvert: I slowly peeled my hand back off that watch and made sure the light was off and I looked down and I realized that it beeped because it was midnight and it was my birthday and I was 40 years old and I just man for those of us that have lived that life, it's just man.
5:42
Marc Calvert: Sometimes you can blink and 10 years go by and I just was like man.
5:46
Marc Calvert: We're in my 30s, you know, I just man.
5:49
Marc Calvert: I broke, brother.
5:50
Marc Calvert: I broke in that bush, like you wouldn't believe, and I just was determined in that moment to not live like that anymore.
5:59
Marc Calvert: I didn't really realize or understand.
6:01
Marc Calvert: You know why and how I got there.
6:03
Marc Calvert: You know we read in the Bible and Paul says in Romans I know what I'm supposed to do and I don't do it.
6:09
Marc Calvert: I know what I'm not supposed to do and I keep doing it.
6:11
Marc Calvert: What is wrong with me?
6:13
Marc Calvert: Where is it?
6:13
Marc Calvert: Center I am, and of course I didn't understand that verse and nor knew anything about it at the time.
6:18
Marc Calvert: But certainly, knowing it now, I can absolutely relate.
6:21
Marc Calvert: You know, in that bush, ron, I just made a deal with myself to do everything that I could to be different, and for me at that time, you know, was just simply moving from one problem to another problem.
6:33
Marc Calvert: You know, I was, I was, I knew that I had some problems to face given my circumstances and situations that I was in at that moment, and so I was okay with it.
6:41
Marc Calvert: I just wanted to move from a problem to a problem.
6:43
Marc Calvert: I didn't want to be stuck in a problem, and so I was okay with that.
6:44
Marc Calvert: I just wanted to move from a problem to a problem.
6:45
Marc Calvert: I didn't want to be stuck in a problem, and so I waited there in that bush until six in the morning, until shift change.
6:52
Marc Calvert: And when I knew that those officers that were mad because they didn't find me were getting off shift, I climbed out of that bush and made my way over to a guy's house that I'd done some time with and knocked on his door and just began to make phone call after phone call.
7:04
Marc Calvert: I finally got somebody over there with a vehicle and a very, very, very long story not so long on the wings of angels that I did not believe in at the time made it over to Mississippi in a stolen truck.
7:16
Marc Calvert: I didn't steal it, the person that picked me up had, and they didn't belong to them.
7:20
Marc Calvert: But again, problem, but a different problem, and we had forward momentum and so coasted in my mother's driveway in South Mississippi at about 2 am.
7:30
Marc Calvert: I hadn't been home in quite some time and there, in that moment when I arrived, that's kind of where recovery started for me and, of course, did not believe in God.
7:40
Marc Calvert: Still, my dad and my mother you know, my mother and I were born in Alabama and my stepfather and her lived there most of their lives, but there was a time, about 10 years before that, where they had bought some property in Mississippi and moved over here.
7:54
Marc Calvert: Now, while my stepdad and my mom were in Mississippi.
7:57
Marc Calvert: God got a hold of my stepdad.
7:58
Marc Calvert: He got ordained.
8:00
Marc Calvert: He felt the call to ministry, to pastoral ministry.
8:03
Marc Calvert: He went to seminary in New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary and he had been pastoring a church and by the time that I arrived over there he was no longer the pastor of a church but he was a supply pastor and of course he knows.
8:16
Marc Calvert: When I arrived, you know mom was glad I was there.
8:19
Marc Calvert: My stepdad had some requirements of me and you know of course he began inviting me to church and I declined him every time.
8:26
Marc Calvert: But I did make good on the deal that I made myself to do anything I could to be different.
8:31
Marc Calvert: And what that looked like for me at the time was seeing a psychiatrist, a psychologist, you know, beginning to work out and eat good and go to NA meetings and AA meetings, and just if it was a resource that I believed would benefit me in some way, I was all for it and was very diligent in my effort to try and change.
8:50
Marc Calvert: And along the way, my father well, he's not my real dad, but he's my dad now.
8:56
Marc Calvert: I mean, this is quite a while ago, so he's I'm going to call him my dad, but he's my stepdad, but he's my dad.
9:01
Marc Calvert: And I'm going to call him my dad, but he's my stepdad, but he's my dad.
9:05
Marc Calvert: And so he began, you know, he never relented inviting me to church and I never relented in declining him.
9:11
Marc Calvert: And I remember very clearly one night he come home and he said man, there's a dinner that we're having tonight at this church and they're having a men's steak night and there's going to be a guest speaker and we'd really like you to come.
9:25
Marc Calvert: And you got to understand.
9:26
Marc Calvert: So, to put this kind of story in context, so when my dad went to seminary.
9:30
Marc Calvert: Him and some other guys would carpool over to New Orleans to take classes, and one of the guys that my dad rode with was a guy named Brian and while Brian was in seminary he ended up buying some buildings to begin a youth ministry in a very drug-indated trailer park over in the Wave 1 Mississippi area.
9:51
Marc Calvert: And my dad had told me that he bought those buildings for a dollar.
9:55
Marc Calvert: And I remember my dad telling me the story that when Brian said he was going to that God had laid it on his heart to go and make this attempt and he said oh, I got the dollar, but I want to go try and do it.
10:09
Marc Calvert: You know the guys laughed him up but Brian did get those you know buildings for a dollar and he set it up in this trailer park and so I knew who Brian was, just from my dad talking to me about him and passing, and so that was where my dad was going for this steak night.
10:20
Marc Calvert: He said I'm going to Brian's church.
10:21
Marc Calvert: You know, they've been ministering to kids.
10:23
Marc Calvert: They were trying to get the dads out, so they were going to cook steak and have a guest speaker and I said, yeah, I appreciate it, man, but I'm not going.
10:31
Marc Calvert: So that night my dad come home and he had a steak and he was like man, I got to tell you what happened tonight and I said what's up?
10:38
Marc Calvert: And he said, man, he'd been on drugs like you, he'd been to jail like you, he had tattoos like you and he wants to meet you.
10:51
Marc Calvert: He said I was telling him about you and he's got a 20-step faith-based outpatient program called Escape Addiction and he said he'd be willing to meet you.
10:55
Marc Calvert: And I said, oh, that sounds good, man, I appreciate it, I'm not going and at the time I just didn't want to have anything to do with anything like that.
11:04
Marc Calvert: I mean I was seeing a psychiatrist, psychologist, all these things.
11:08
Marc Calvert: But my dad gave me the card, his card, and on the strength of my dad's just perseverance and patience and kindness and all of those things that we now know to be the fruits of the Spirit, I took that card, I put it in my wallet to appease him and never thought anything of it.
11:25
Marc Calvert: And a few months later, you know, I'm doing what I deem to be good work.
11:29
Marc Calvert: My daughter calls and you know, I had a daughter when I was 19, you know, and along the way her mother, you know, perceived me to be the enemy rightfully so and began to build high walls around her.
11:41
Marc Calvert: And over time I lost touch with her and she was my firstborn.
11:47
Marc Calvert: It was something that had bothered me greatly.
11:49
Marc Calvert: You know, I'm, I'm, I'm over in Mississippi now I'm, I'm doing good, I'm, I'm clean and sober, I'm, you know, trying to figure out this thing called life.
11:58
Marc Calvert: And I get a phone call from her and, man Ron, I'm gonna tell you I was so happy no-transcript, and she hung up and I didn't know how to take that you know, sometimes, you know, in early recovery and in life, and even for people that are early in faith and young in faith.
12:42
Marc Calvert: you know, sometimes we keep those very real moments that we go through in this life, as we live in a fallen world, to ourself and fail to share those things because we don't want to lose the support of people around us that are beginning to believe in us again or beginning to see something new in us again, when you know in reality we need good people in our life that we can confess our sins to.
13:02
Marc Calvert: That, will you know, help, guide us spiritually and, you know, with wisdom and advice.
13:06
Marc Calvert: But so often, man, we keep those things to ourselves and I didn't know how to handle that.
13:10
Marc Calvert: I didn't, certainly didn't want to share it with anybody.
13:13
Marc Calvert: And I left my house.
13:14
Marc Calvert: I was driving down the road and I saw a guy walking down the road.
13:19
Marc Calvert: I picked him up and he wanted to go get high and at the time I wanted to go get high.
13:23
Marc Calvert: I didn't know how to deal with those emotions.
13:25
Marc Calvert: You know, I didn't.
13:31
Marc Calvert: You know drugs are band-aids that people put on themselves to deal with things that they truly need surgery for.
13:34
Marc Calvert: I mean, when you see somebody in addiction.
13:34
Marc Calvert: In my opinion, all it is is somebody's very unhealthy attempt at surviving some sort of trauma that they've dealt with in their life, and the addiction is just simply the byproduct of something far deeper.
13:46
Marc Calvert: It's the fruit of issues in their life that they haven't addressed the root of.
13:52
Marc Calvert: And I tell people all the time now, as a mental health professional, as a pastor, as someone that works in the prisons listen, man, if you're just trying to get clean, it's never going to work.
14:01
Marc Calvert: You've got to deal with the salvation in your life and the sin in your life, and if you can address salvation and sin, then addiction and sobriety and substances will all work itself out as a byproduct of that.
14:17
Marc Calvert: But I did not have Christ in my life at the time.
14:19
Marc Calvert: And here I got this guy in my car and we're pulling up to some you know trap house it's.
14:26
Marc Calvert: You know he's going to go in there and get something.
14:28
Marc Calvert: And he got out of my car and I'm sitting in his driveway and I'm just like man, what am I doing?
14:33
Marc Calvert: I can't, I can't do this.
14:35
Marc Calvert: And so I leave the guy there.
14:37
Marc Calvert: I go to a parking lot in Wiggins and I'm just crying man.
14:41
Marc Calvert: I mean I'm girl crying and I don't have anyone to share this with.
14:44
Marc Calvert: I mean I'm almost relapsed here and no one knows it.
14:48
Marc Calvert: Everybody thinks I'm doing good and uh, you know, I don't want to tell my parents.
14:53
Marc Calvert: I mean, they're proud of me, you know, and so I'm just like man, like what happened, and all I remember is he's got tattoos like you, he's been to jail like you and he was on drugs like you.
15:05
Marc Calvert: And I reached back in my wallet and I had that dude's card that my dad gave me and I reached out to him and, man, we clicked right away.
15:12
Marc Calvert: He invited me over.
15:14
Marc Calvert: I went to see him the next day.
15:16
Marc Calvert: You know he's a Christian, but he had lived experience and he had been through what I had been through and so, just you know, for those reasons, I agreed to see him and from the time I met him, man, he was, you know, talking to me about Jesus.
15:28
Marc Calvert: And I said man, look, dude, you know, quit talking to me about this guy in that book.
15:31
Marc Calvert: I want to change.
15:33
Marc Calvert: So I just need you.
15:34
Marc Calvert: You've obviously changed, so tell me how you did it and I'll do it because I want to do it.
15:39
Marc Calvert: So let's quit talking about this dude in the book and tell me how to get right.
15:42
Marc Calvert: And he asked me when I first got there, like you know, if this thing would work out the way I wanted it?
15:48
Marc Calvert: What would that look like to you?
15:50
Marc Calvert: And I said I just want to be different in every way.
15:53
Marc Calvert: And along the way he eventually kind of just busted me right in the head and he said look, man, you said you wanted to be different.
16:00
Marc Calvert: You said you wanted to change.
16:01
Marc Calvert: He said I'm offering you the greatest gift in the world.
16:04
Marc Calvert: He said it's free, but it's not cheap.
16:06
Marc Calvert: It's God's gift for you and to you, and you won't accept it.
16:09
Marc Calvert: But yet you want to do anything you can to fix your life, but you won't take that gift.
16:13
Marc Calvert: He said well, are you like a liar?
16:15
Marc Calvert: And I was like what?
16:16
Marc Calvert: No.
16:16
Marc Calvert: And so you know, jared at the time is his name, he.
16:19
Marc Calvert: He did a really good job ministering to me and he walked me down the Romans road and, um, you know, pointed things out in scripture and and and look, ron, if you would have asked me, you know, like back then, like what I believe in my cookie cutter, like kind of crap, answer at the time would always be like I believe in something, but I don't know what that something is, and you ain't never died before, so you don't know either.
16:41
Marc Calvert: But you know that that answer left the door open for this Jesus thing to be possible, because I mean, if I don't know, then it could be.
16:50
Marc Calvert: And this guy that I was meeting with every week over there, jared, and there was something different about him, like you know, he just had a light, like he, like you couldn't shake him but you couldn't make him mad.
17:03
Marc Calvert: You know, I would ask him questions that there was no good answer to and he would be like you know, I don't know.
17:06
Marc Calvert: That's a really good question.
17:07
Marc Calvert: Let me study some more, come back next week, we'll talk about it.
17:10
Marc Calvert: And I was like, well, he's good, I got to come back, you know.
17:14
Marc Calvert: But more and more, you know, we got closer to the cross.
17:19
Marc Calvert: And so I agreed there in that moment and I said well, can I make a deal with him?
17:24
Marc Calvert: And he said what kind of deal do you want to make with God?
17:28
Marc Calvert: And I said I don't know.
17:29
Marc Calvert: I said man, if I said I want, I want it to be real, you know, I said it would be, it would be nice.
17:35
Marc Calvert: But I said I just don't know.
17:36
Marc Calvert: And I said if I, if I'm like, look man, I said I'm genuine, I do want to change, and I said if this will, if this will help me, then I'm all for it.
17:44
Marc Calvert: I said, but I've been unsure all my life.
17:45
Marc Calvert: I said if I give myself to him and I'll do it genuinely and I'll do it for real, you know, so that I can see it, and then I can know.
17:55
Marc Calvert: And you know, like creation wasn't enough.
17:57
Marc Calvert: And Jared said he goes, I don't care what gets you there, man, just get there.
18:01
Marc Calvert: And so, you know, I prayed with him and he prayed with me.
18:06
Marc Calvert: And you know, you know, as a pastor now, you know I look back and I wasn't saved there, you know, because I was.
18:15
Marc Calvert: I was needing God to perform for me, you know, like he's done enough right, like what he's done is sufficient, it's enough, you know, and he don't need to do any more.
18:25
Marc Calvert: And I didn't believe because you know not, not not sincerely in that moment, because I was looking for something to convince me to believe.
18:37
Marc Calvert: But what I was, though, honestly, is I was genuine in a desire to want to know, and I do believe that I was genuinely on a journey to figure out and consider something that I had never considered before.
18:54
Marc Calvert: So that was a lot of progress for me in that moment, and I remember kind of leaving that office that day with my head on a swivel, like I was back in prison, like I'm looking around, like I don't want to miss this thing, like if there's some revelation I don't want to miss it, you know, and whatever that would look like.
19:10
Marc Calvert: And so I leave, I don't tell anybody about this, I don't share this with anyone and that night, my daughter, my youngest daughter I had a younger daughter and she was eight at the time and she was with me.
19:26
Marc Calvert: And she comes up to me and she says, hey, when are we leaving?
19:29
Marc Calvert: And I said leaving to go where?
19:30
Marc Calvert: And she said trick or treating.
19:32
Marc Calvert: And I said, oh my gosh, I didn't even realize it was Halloween.
19:35
Marc Calvert: And for me now, short of us doing something at church, I don't celebrate it.
19:40
Marc Calvert: But back then that was a big deal in our family's life and in my daughter's life, and so I had forgotten it was Halloween.
19:47
Marc Calvert: And I'm just like man, I can't figure out this thing called life.
19:50
Marc Calvert: I just keep failing.
19:51
Marc Calvert: So don't have a costume, don't have any money, grab an old ice cream bucket out from underneath the sink, put her in the car and just decide to take her trick-or-treating.
19:59
Marc Calvert: But now I'm in South Mississippi, in the DeSoto National Forest, I know no one here, I don't know where to take my daughter trick-or-treating, and so we stopped at a gas station and I seen some boys out at the filling station.
20:14
Marc Calvert: They was dressed in camo.
20:16
Marc Calvert: They probably just got back from the woods and I pulled up and I said, hey, young man.
20:19
Marc Calvert: I said, do you know anywhere I can take my daughter trick-or-treating?
20:22
Marc Calvert: And them boys leaned down in my car window and they were like oh yes, sir, you know you want to go down here, go to the red light, make a right, go to the stop sign, make a left, you'll see all the cars.
20:31
Marc Calvert: You'll see all the cars.
20:32
Marc Calvert: That's where you're going to want to be.
20:33
Marc Calvert: I said, all right, man, appreciate it.
20:35
Marc Calvert: And you know pretty clear instructions.
20:37
Marc Calvert: You know me and my daughter leave.
20:39
Marc Calvert: I think we're going to some rich neighborhood.
20:41
Marc Calvert: We follow the instructions, pull up ton of cars to church and Faithview, baptist and Social.
20:50
Marc Calvert: So they're doing trunk or treat.
20:52
Marc Calvert: I didn't even know churches did things on Halloween at that time in my life.
20:57
Marc Calvert: It was all outside.
20:58
Marc Calvert: You know we, we walk in and my daughter she's mad, she doesn't know, she doesn't want to do that.
21:02
Marc Calvert: Um, she wants to.
21:03
Marc Calvert: You know, traditionally go knock on doors and you know I'm in an area.
21:07
Marc Calvert: You know you might knock on a door.
21:09
Marc Calvert: You're going to get shot.
21:10
Marc Calvert: That probably wasn't the best idea.
21:11
Marc Calvert: So I'm going to go to this, you know I mean there's a ton of cars there.
21:15
Marc Calvert: So we walk in and there was a table and there was nobody at the table.
21:18
Marc Calvert: But we walk in and you know the way that we all know what trucker treats.
21:22
Marc Calvert: Like you got to participate in an event and you get some candy.
21:25
Marc Calvert: Well, my daughter wouldn't have none of that.
21:27
Marc Calvert: She's stomping her feet, pitching a fit.
21:28
Marc Calvert: You know she wants to leave.
21:30
Marc Calvert: I feel like a failure and so I'm finally, you know, ultimately relent to her wanting to leave.
21:36
Marc Calvert: And we're leaving and we're walking out of this event.
21:40
Marc Calvert: And now we walk past that same table, but this time there's a lady in it sitting at the table and she said she looked at my daughter who's carrying this ice cream bucket with nothing in it, and she said baby, you didn't get no candy.
21:50
Marc Calvert: And I said no, ma'am, you know we're new in town.
21:52
Marc Calvert: And I no, ma'am, you know we're new in town.
21:53
Marc Calvert: I didn't know this was a church, I'm sorry and she's uncomfortable.
21:57
Marc Calvert: And I said we're just going to go.
21:59
Marc Calvert: And she said well, baby, you can't leave without no candy.
22:03
Marc Calvert: She said let me see that bucket.
22:04
Marc Calvert: And my daughter handed her that bucket.
22:06
Marc Calvert: Ron and brother, when I tell you she filled it up, she filled it up.
22:12
Ron Meyers: She filled that bucket.
22:13
Marc Calvert: You know, I was so grateful.
22:14
Marc Calvert: I was picking the candy up off the floor and, man, listen, you know, when I asked God, you know, to forgive me of my sins and all those things that Jared told me to say in his office that day before, you know, nothing happened to me I certainly didn't feel any different.
22:28
Marc Calvert: You know, like I said, I just was, you know, a little heightened sense of awareness.
22:32
Marc Calvert: But, brother, on that Halloween night, in that church, outside, as I was kneeling down picking that candy up, it was the most clear, concise, crisp thought that popped in my head.
22:45
Marc Calvert: I'm bending down, I'm picking that candy up and I just heard like son, you don't have to go to anybody's house and ask for anything.
22:53
Marc Calvert: If you just come to my house, I'll give you everything and ask for anything.
22:57
Marc Calvert: If you just come to my house, I'll give you everything and you won't even have to ask.
23:00
Marc Calvert: I'm just like man, what, where did that come from?
23:01
Marc Calvert: And I'm just stuck on the ground, man, like having an awakening or something.
23:07
Marc Calvert: And my daughter notices and she's like are you okay?
23:14
Marc Calvert: I just looked up and I was like Grace, I think we came to the right house, wow, and right about that time, like this guy's come out the back of this church and they're playing guitars and they start singing Amazing Grace.
23:21
Marc Calvert: And that's my daughter's name is Grace, and you know I've always liked that song.
23:28
Marc Calvert: My granny, she used to sing it while she washed dishes in the kitchen before she passed, and you know, of course I had my daughter's name in it, but I never, I never, liked it for the right reasons.
23:38
Marc Calvert: And that night, and I heard that song for the first time once I was blind and now I see from the hour I first believed I was just like, okay, this might be real, you know.
23:49
Marc Calvert: And I was like man, okay.
23:51
Marc Calvert: So that happened and my daughter ended up staying and we hung out at the church.
23:57
Marc Calvert: And you know pretty good night for what it started out as, and I think that was like on a Thursday.
24:03
Marc Calvert: Well, the next that coming Sunday, my dad comes up to me and he says hey, mark, listen, you're going to go to church.
24:11
Marc Calvert: I don't want to hear no arguing.
24:12
Marc Calvert: He said Brian hurt his back and we've got to move some tables.
24:15
Marc Calvert: He said Brian hurt his back and we've got to move some tables.
24:22
Marc Calvert: He said I don't care if you come in.
24:22
Marc Calvert: Uh, you can sit out in the truck.
24:23
Marc Calvert: Uh, I don't care, but you're coming.
24:23
Marc Calvert: You know, and you got to understand, man, like I've been turning my dad down for a long time coming to church.
24:26
Marc Calvert: But he comes to me like look, you're going, bro.
24:28
Marc Calvert: You know no choice in this thing.
24:30
Marc Calvert: You know I've got to move.
24:31
Marc Calvert: And when he said, I said is that the church that you met Jared?
24:34
Marc Calvert: Cause, that's where this journey that I'm on, like nobody knew about what happened at Faithful Baptist, nobody knew what had happened there for their church, and with me I was like keeping all this to myself.
24:44
Marc Calvert: And then the next Sunday my dad, you know, basically mandated that I go to to Brian's church, and so I was like that's where you met Jared, right, and he's like yeah.
24:52
Marc Calvert: I was like yeah, man, let's go.
24:55
Marc Calvert: You know, I wanted to see that.
24:56
Marc Calvert: I wanted to know what that looked like.
24:58
Marc Calvert: This is where my dad met this guy.
25:00
Marc Calvert: You know, my dad looked real surprised when I was willing to go.
25:03
Marc Calvert: And so, anyway, we get to Brian's and Brian comes out and I introduce myself to him and he's like man.
25:08
Marc Calvert: He said, bro, we've been praying for you for a long time.
25:11
Marc Calvert: And I was like cool man, thank you.
25:12
Marc Calvert: And he's like come here, I want to show you something.
25:14
Marc Calvert: And so I'm like all right, so we go into this little church.
25:16
Marc Calvert: Now it's not a church like you and I maybe think, or the listeners are thinking of a church.
25:21
Marc Calvert: This is like a FEMA building.
25:22
Marc Calvert: You know what I mean.
25:23
Marc Calvert: This is like small buildings that he put together, that he had like aluminum, pulled up chairs, but it was a church.
25:28
Marc Calvert: You know what I'm saying.
25:31
Marc Calvert: And so he calls me up in there and he's got this very small office and you know we go in and on his wall he's got two frames and he's got a dollar and a frame and he's got a quarter and a frame and he goes man, I want to show you this.
25:45
Marc Calvert: He said do you know what those are?
25:47
Marc Calvert: And I said well, I know what that dollar is.
25:49
Marc Calvert: I think I said you know.
25:50
Marc Calvert: My dad told me and he bought this for like a dollar right.
25:53
Marc Calvert: And he's like, yeah, I did.
25:54
Marc Calvert: I said that's cool.
25:56
Marc Calvert: He said do you know what that quarter is?
25:57
Marc Calvert: I said no.
25:58
Marc Calvert: He said that quarter was the very first tithe that we ever had, the very first offering when we started this church.
26:05
Marc Calvert: And he said do you know who gave us that quarter?
26:06
Marc Calvert: I said no.
26:07
Marc Calvert: He said your daughter.
26:08
Marc Calvert: Wow, your daughter.
26:10
Marc Calvert: 10 years ago, while you were in prison, your dad brought your daughter here.
26:13
Marc Calvert: She put that quarter in the offering plate.
26:15
Marc Calvert: Now, ron, you run the numbers.
26:18
Marc Calvert: My daughter was the first person to sow in to this church that, a decade later, would be a building that my dad would meet a man to let me to the Lord and I was just like he goes, are you going to stay for service?
26:31
Marc Calvert: And I said yeah, yeah, bro, I think I will.
26:34
Marc Calvert: And he said do you have a Bible?
26:35
Marc Calvert: I said no, I'll have a.
26:37
Marc Calvert: Bible.
26:37
Marc Calvert: I never opened a Bible in my life.
26:39
Marc Calvert: And he rummaged through his drawers he found an old black King James Bible back in the back.
26:46
Marc Calvert: I mean, he literally, I kid you not, he had to dust it off and he hands it to me and he goes back outside to talk to my dad and I sit down in this old aluminum chair in this church by myself and I just open up this Bible.
27:00
Marc Calvert: And when I did, all these pieces of paper fell out onto the floor and I didn't know what they were.
27:05
Marc Calvert: I leaned over and was picking them all up.
27:08
Marc Calvert: They'd just been shoved in this Bible.
27:09
Marc Calvert: And when I started picking them up I realized they were prayer request cards and they were all in different handwriting.
27:15
Marc Calvert: The dates went back eight years and my name was on every single one of them.
27:21
Marc Calvert: Wow.
27:22
Marc Calvert: So God had a plan.
27:24
Marc Calvert: I surrendered and I'd been wrong my whole life.
27:28
Marc Calvert: Man.
27:28
Ron Meyers: Wow.
27:28
Ron Meyers: And today, what are you?
27:30
Marc Calvert: doing so since then.
27:34
Marc Calvert: I now pastor a church full-time.
27:36
Marc Calvert: I'm the lead pastor of the Church of Turning Points, which is a Southern Baptist church here in Wiggins, Mississippi.
27:43
Marc Calvert: I work full-time here at Stone County Regional Correctional Facility as a programs director and alcohol and drug instructor.
27:52
Marc Calvert: We have court programs that we offer in our community for CPS, family reunification.
27:59
Marc Calvert: We work with Drug Court, Drug Intervention Court.
28:02
Marc Calvert: I'm certified through the American Association of Christian Counseling and I work with CIT, the Crisis Intervention Team, Training and actually train law enforcement officers now to deal with mental health issues and substance abuse so that they can de-escalate and resolve situations when dealing with people like that.
28:20
Marc Calvert: I'm a presenter for the American Foundation of Suicide Prevention and now, by the grace of God, I'm on a full scholarship to the Kasky Church Excellence Center for New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary to get my master's degree.
28:33
Ron Meyers: Wow, so Jesus really radically changed your life.
28:36
Ron Meyers: Now you're giving back to the community and working within the prison system.
28:40
Ron Meyers: Your story is relatable to people that are right there in the correction facility, isn't it?
28:47
Marc Calvert: Yes, sir, there is a great awakening happening right here in our facility.
28:51
Marc Calvert: We do a lot here with these men.
28:52
Marc Calvert: It is a great harvest.
28:53
Marc Calvert: These men are free from distraction, they're free from obligations, they're free from requirements and the vast majority of them are seeking God's face in a way that our truly wish that we had in our local churches.
29:04
Ron Meyers: Now, if somebody, one of the prisoners, asked you I don't believe in Jesus, so you tell me who is Jesus to you?
29:13
Ron Meyers: And they were asking you that, what would you tell them?
29:16
Marc Calvert: Oh, I tell my story as often as I possibly can.
29:21
Ron Meyers: Yep, we all have a story.
29:22
Ron Meyers: I can simply say me too.
29:23
Ron Meyers: We all have a story, and that story wow resonates with someone that's done everything exactly almost like you did.
29:32
Ron Meyers: Wow, how powerful story, powerful story.
29:36
Ron Meyers: So are you happy today?
29:39
Marc Calvert: Oh yeah, I mean, as much as we're doing, we're not doing enough.
29:42
Marc Calvert: I think that there's always room to do more.
29:45
Marc Calvert: I think there's a great requirement on our responsibilities as Christians.
29:49
Marc Calvert: You know, when we raise our hand and profess to be believers.
29:56
Marc Calvert: In my opinion, that should require mission mindedness in a way that calls our comfort into question what about you personally?
30:00
Ron Meyers: How do you feel different now?
30:02
Ron Meyers: What's the typical when you get up in the morning in a day?
30:05
Ron Meyers: What's your mindset as you go out into this world, now that you know you're not alone anymore.
30:10
Marc Calvert: You have Jesus with you, oh, I mean, I think, the gratefulness, I think you know I would joke all the time and we say, man, there's a difference between when you're, when you're saved and when you're rescued.
30:20
Marc Calvert: You know, I mean there's a lot of good, god fearing, powerful men of God that were saved, you know, and they, they came to Christ at an early age and, again, god bless them never lived the life that some of us have and I think that's wonderful.
30:34
Marc Calvert: And you know, I think for me that's being saved.
30:36
Marc Calvert: I think I look at that like, hey, you know, somebody was fixing to walk off a cliff.
30:40
Marc Calvert: Somebody put their hand out and said, hey, don't walk off that cliff.
30:43
Marc Calvert: And there's some of us that walked off that cliff a long time ago.
30:46
Marc Calvert: We'd be standing in the ravine yelling help, somebody, help.
30:55
Marc Calvert: And when that rope finally comes down and you make it out of a place, you never thought you would listen, man, it's different.
30:57
Marc Calvert: And uh, you know when, when you live a life where you you had years without light switches and ceiling fans and refrigerators and you know unlock doors, I mean there's.
31:05
Marc Calvert: So you know, like Paul said, uh, you know, apostle Paul said, you know, apostle Paul said, I've lived the secret of life and, for example, I know how to live on everything or nothing, with plenty or with little, with on a full stomach or an empty.
31:16
Marc Calvert: And you know I look at what God's doing in these facilities and with people coming out of addictions and you know, honestly, you know people like us have been trained for mission work like no other.
31:29
Marc Calvert: We've been conditioned.
31:30
Marc Calvert: We know how to live with nothing or with something.
31:32
Marc Calvert: And when you can live on nothing and you have before, you are humble and you are grateful for the smallest things in this life that most often most people take for granted.
31:42
Marc Calvert: And you know you can't shake us.
31:44
Marc Calvert: You know I'm grateful every day that I get to wake up in a bed with a pillow let alone a bed with a pillow where God's in my life and the fact that he chose to use anyone like me to do anything for him, you know, keeps my heart broken and contrite and humble.
32:00
Marc Calvert: And you know every problem we have is just an opportunity to seek God.
32:04
Marc Calvert: You know, and if we're in a constant state of problems and we're in a constant need of God and Ron, that's a really good place to be.
32:10
Ron Meyers: Before we go, I would like you to pray for my listeners.
32:13
Ron Meyers: There's people out there right now that can relate to your story, but now they want some encouragement, and if you could encourage them and then pray for them, I would really appreciate that.
32:25
Marc Calvert: Yes, absolutely, let's do it.
32:26
Marc Calvert: Father, we just come to you, lord, on bending knee humble hearts, and we stand.
32:30
Marc Calvert: Lord in awe of your ways, in our life, lord, despite the opposition that we face in ourselves.
32:36
Marc Calvert: And so, father, for those that are listening, that have yet to seek you, god, I just pray that here, through this message, through this hour, in this moment, god, that they have just come to the end of themselves and just ask God for you to reveal yourself.
32:48
Marc Calvert: Lord, the Bible says that if we seek, we will find, if we ask, you will answer.
32:53
Marc Calvert: And if we knock, lord, the door will be open.
32:55
Marc Calvert: And so, father, I just pray that that invitation is offered to you, lord, here right now, lord, from those that are listening, and God, to understand that there is so much purpose in our pain.
33:05
Marc Calvert: There are so many times that so many of us go through things that we have no idea why these things would ever happen, not understanding that there is purpose in the misery, lord, that those are the things that breaks us, and brokenness, lord, is what you use to bring us back into yourself.
33:22
Marc Calvert: Father, we thank you for that bloodshed on that cross, lord, that reconciled us with you.
33:26
Marc Calvert: We thank you, lord, for the privilege to pray in this way through your efforts to lay down your life for sinners like us.
33:33
Marc Calvert: But, god, I just ask that these people that are listening now understand that the worst parts of them are the qualifications, lord, to reach the unreachable, and that they just simply surrender that life, pick up their cross no turning back and turn to you.
33:49
Marc Calvert: In Jesus' name, we pray Amen.