Latest / Nightmare Success In and Out / Finding Hope and Transformation in the midst of Desperation: Wesley Keziah
Transcript
- 0:01What happens when your worst fear becomes your reality?
- 0:04Hi, I'm Brent Cassidy, welcome to the Nightmare Success In and
- 0:07Out podcast where we explore how to overcome your fears and
- 0:11nightmares to set yourself free. We're going to be exploring this
- 0:14topic with guys that was in Leavenworth with and others who
- 0:17survived their own right there. These stories can be inspiring,
- 0:22sometimes sad. There's some humor, and
- 0:25hopefully you can come away with a nugget of something that'll
- 0:28help you knock down some of the prisons you built up in your own
- 0:31mind. All right, Welcome back.
- 0:35Nightmare success. In-n-out listeners.
- 0:37We're back. That's where you come from.
- 0:39What happens when your worst fear becomes your reality?
- 0:41How do you adapt, survive, overcome, set yourself free?
- 0:44Hey, don't forget to hit that follow button.
- 0:47Subscribe, share, like comment. It helps us show guys.
- 0:51I've got a, I've got a great guest and I want to give a shout
- 0:54out to Jeremy Larson because he actually connected Wesley and me
- 1:00and I so appreciate that. Jeremy's done that a couple of
- 1:03times. He connected me to Damon W,
- 1:05which was a great connect, Great guest too.
- 1:09So my guest, Wesley, is it. I want to make sure I pronounce
- 1:14the name. Is it Kazaya Isaiah Kazaya?
- 1:17Because I well, I'm glad I asked because I always mess up the
- 1:20last name. Because I had Wesley Kazai.
- 1:22To figure it out too. All right, well, Wesley, I got
- 1:28to tell you his story and if you want to catch Wesley, he's got a
- 1:32great following on Tiktok and also on Instagram and Facebook
- 1:37and what all all those things he does, he's on there all the
- 1:39time. He's got a he's got an
- 1:41incredible following. He's got good stuff that he gets
- 1:43out there, but he's got an organization it's called Ground
- 1:4940. And the reason why I think it is
- 1:53so effective is, is that Wesley's story is so inspiring.
- 1:58His, his story of being arrested 82 times in the 82nd time in
- 2:05jail, he figures it out and he doesn't want 80 and, and his
- 2:09whole life changes And, and then he creates this wonderful
- 2:14organization that is helping men transition back into community
- 2:19from homelessness, addiction, incarceration.
- 2:21And it's got like a three-step way of getting them back into
- 2:25it's, it's, it's the farm. He's going to, I'm going to let
- 2:27him talk about all this, the farm, the ranch, the homes.
- 2:30And it's all stepping back into community in a way that doesn't
- 2:34push somebody too fast, gives them all the resources to get,
- 2:37you know, surround themselves in the community.
- 2:39It's, it's just really, really good stuff.
- 2:42I can't wait to jump into all this with Wesley.
- 2:45Before we do, I want to recognize our, our show sponsor,
- 2:48Auto Plaza Direct. You know, who likes spending a
- 2:50couple of weekends walking car lots looking for a car, Then you
- 2:53spend four or five hours at a dealership to buy a car.
- 2:55It's kind of like a root canal appointment.
- 2:57Well, there's a better way to take away all that pain and
- 2:59hassle getting a car. It's called Auto Plaza Direct.
- 3:02They are your personal car concierge.
- 3:05Just tell them the car you want, what you can pay, and they'll go
- 3:08find that car for you. They'll negotiate your best
- 3:11price. They also offer you warranties
- 3:13and financing. It's all full service.
- 3:15Go to autoplazadirect.com to get started with your personal car
- 3:18concierge. The new hassle freeway, the car
- 3:21buying experience you deserve. Auto Plaza direct.
- 3:23Tell them Brent from Nightmare Success sent you.
- 3:25Wesley, welcome in, my man. Thank you so much for making
- 3:28time to be here. I know you're a busy man.
- 3:31It's all right. It's all right.
- 3:33It's always a good time to talk about the Lord, you know.
- 3:35Well, I mean, and everything that you're doing, Wesley, is
- 3:39all about you having this, you know, conversion that happened
- 3:45to you. But I want to take us back in
- 3:46time. What was what was life like for
- 3:50you as a kid growing up? Yeah, being Wesley.
- 3:55I yeah, I got to be a I got to be real honest with you.
- 3:58It wasn't easy believism for me to believe in the Lord when you
- 4:02come from a upbringing that I come from.
- 4:06My father was an alcoholic. His father had a gambling
- 4:09addiction. And by the time I was five years
- 4:12old, being the youngest child of three, my parents just could, I
- 4:17could not, they could not maintain their marriage anymore.
- 4:20My father could barely maintain sobriety at all.
- 4:24So when I was 5, they separated. And the strange thing about my
- 4:30father's house going there every other weekend, it was it was my
- 4:32safe place. And I don't say this to shame
- 4:35anybody or to blame anybody, but I began to be molested in my
- 4:40home from a very young age, from from five years old until I was
- 4:45about 13. And you know, we grow up in the
- 4:48South. You grow up in the Bible Belt.
- 4:49You hear about Jesus. You hear about the way Jesus
- 4:52loves you. You hear about the church being
- 4:55the place to go with all these problems.
- 4:58But I I started to recognize at a very early age that my kind of
- 5:03problems weren't well spoken about in the church.
- 5:06He just kind of kept those covered up.
- 5:08The problem when you start sweeping those kind of problems
- 5:11under the rug, eventually the rug's going to catch on fire.
- 5:16Anybody know about this, Wesley? We just live in there with this
- 5:19all alone. I live with this alone for the
- 5:22most part, and anytime I tried to speak on it, you know,
- 5:26Southern families don't really like things to be promoted.
- 5:29So we we kept it under the rug. When I was 10 years old, I was
- 5:36sat down on my uncle's couch and I was told that the the place of
- 5:40refuge, my father's house would no longer be an option for me
- 5:44because he would have to be registered as a sex offender for
- 5:46things that he did. So at 10 years old, my safe
- 5:50place was at a House of a registered sex offender and it
- 5:54was taken away from me. And we had, you know, we had
- 5:57supervised visitations, but he stayed so inebriated during
- 6:00those visitations that we wouldn't go for months at a time
- 6:04because the the supervisor thought it was unsafe for us to
- 6:08go down there. When I turned 13 years old, I
- 6:12got really angry, depressed and started to act out.
- 6:17And my mom, which is a good Mama, let me, let me back up.
- 6:20My Mama was a good Mama. She was a terrible father.
- 6:24She, she was. And I think that's, I think
- 6:27that's the generation we're in right now where Mamas have to
- 6:30step into a role that is not their mom, not their job.
- 6:33It's not their role to be daddy. And, and kids don't know how to
- 6:37interact with a mom who's standing in the wrong position.
- 6:40And it caused a lot of hate and frustration in our relationship.
- 6:45It it damaged it. Wesley was on the sex offender
- 6:48thing. Was it?
- 6:49Was it the uncle that was a registered sex offender?
- 6:51Or it was my dad. Your dad was a registered.
- 6:53OK. Yeah, that's so.
- 6:55That is so deep and and I don't even know how a kid gets his
- 7:00mind around that. You don't at that age, at any
- 7:03age, but at that age. Particularly it was, it was
- 7:07crazy because it was one conversation, hey, you can't go
- 7:10to your dad's house anymore. It was very detailed to a 10
- 7:13year old. My brother was three years older
- 7:15to the day and my sister was three years older than him.
- 7:19So we're sitting down. I was 10, he was 13.
- 7:23She was probably 16 or 17 at the time.
- 7:26And we were just like, yeah, this is what your dad did.
- 7:28This is what he's charged for. This is what the convictions
- 7:32going to look like. And you can't go back down there
- 7:34right now. And that lasted that that
- 7:36separation lasted for a whole year.
- 7:39And then supervised visitations, you know, were given back to us.
- 7:43And I, for three years, never got an opportunity to sit down
- 7:48and talk to anybody about what really happened till I turned
- 7:5213. And my mom ends up kicking me
- 7:55out. You know, I'm smoking pot when
- 7:56I'm thirteen years old. I'm I'm becoming everything
- 7:59about my dad that I hate everything.
- 8:02I mean, he's still my dad, so I loved him as my dad.
- 8:04But there was a lot about this man that I hated his addiction,
- 8:08I hated his uninvolvement, I hated and I stepped back into
- 8:16becoming him at a very a young. Age.
- 8:18Was school any refuge for you at all or not?
- 8:21Man, so when I got kicked out of my dad's, my mom's house, I
- 8:25moved into my dad's house, I switched schools.
- 8:27You go to a public school system and your father's a registered
- 8:31sex offender. The.
- 8:33The murmurs and the gossip and the avoidance from other kids.
- 8:39Like I was like I had done. Something.
- 8:41Yeah, like you had leprosy. Yeah, I, I was a black sheep,
- 8:44not only in my family, but in any arena that I stepped in.
- 8:48And I only seemed to make relationships with other black
- 8:51sheep just a very difficult life.
- 8:55By the time I was 16, I, I tried crack cocaine, cocaine.
- 9:01By the time I was 18, it was methamphetamines and I had
- 9:05dropped out of school. By the time I was 19, I had a
- 9:08kid on the way and had started I being heroin.
- 9:12I maintained for a while in my addiction where people didn't
- 9:16really know the extent of what I was doing.
- 9:18Everybody knew I was. I was probably crossing too many
- 9:21lines. And you know, for the most part,
- 9:24I wasn't completely shunned, but there was still some separation
- 9:27between me and my family. This is probably like your great
- 9:31escape of it was getting into that world.
- 9:35Mana. Drugs and and getting away from
- 9:38what you were having to deal with in the real world.
- 9:42A lot of people when they share their testimony of addiction,
- 9:45they say, you know, I hated getting high.
- 9:47That's not true. You hate the after effects, you
- 9:50you hate the results of it. But in that time in my life, it
- 9:54was the only thing that was there for me.
- 9:57My addiction would seem like it would never go anywhere.
- 10:00And you know, you start going to NA and a a when you're really
- 10:03young and they start telling you, you know, once an addict,
- 10:06always an addict, you just got to figure out how to deal with
- 10:08it. And I believe that.
- 10:10I believe that. And when you start to believe
- 10:12that, that really does take all the hope out of the room.
- 10:16By the time I was 21 had another kid on the way, 22 had my
- 10:19daughter on the way. Full blown heroin addict and the
- 10:22neglectful. Did you?
- 10:27Did you? Feel like Wesley at that point
- 10:29as you were because I, I think I, I was reading where you when
- 10:33you got to marijuana, you actually how you one of the
- 10:36things it was laced with cocaine and that kind of brought you
- 10:39even further in even not even really thinking about how that
- 10:43was the next step. But did you think at 2122 when
- 10:47you were having kids and all this was going on around you,
- 10:49was it like I'm deep into off the rails?
- 10:55Or did you think that you were somehow keeping it together?
- 10:58Honestly, I, I, my perception in the way that I gauged my life
- 11:03was always looked at my father and I said, at least I'm not
- 11:05passed out, at least I'm not drunk, at least I'm not a sex
- 11:09offender, at least I'm not doing this.
- 11:11And I honestly thought I'm going to do OK, I'm going to be OK
- 11:15through this. And even in my addiction in the
- 11:18early, you know, 21222324, I thought I still had some kind of
- 11:23grip on reality. You know, I'd started getting
- 11:27arrested when I was 19 years old for credit card fraud and just
- 11:31stupid little things. What was that like for you that
- 11:33you know that that that event of, you know, the moment you get
- 11:37arrested the first time as a kid, you get brought in, you get
- 11:43processed through. Was that scary to you or was it
- 11:46just kind of like you were just living it?
- 11:48I was scared to death and and it it didn't happen.
- 11:52It was not an outer body experience.
- 11:54I was first person to everything I did and everything I felt
- 11:57because, you know, you hear the stories of jail, you hear the
- 11:59stories of prison and you get there and you're looking at
- 12:03other men who were now about to become inmates and you're in the
- 12:08same room with them. And worst case scenario goes
- 12:11through your mind. What if I go in this place and I
- 12:13don't come out? You know, your first time in
- 12:14jail, you don't know any better. So the first time I go in, I'll
- 12:17tell you, it's a it's kind of a humorous story, but it's really
- 12:20not funny if you if you think about it.
- 12:22The first time I go in there, they took us to process them.
- 12:26And the officer asked us, does anybody feel like hurting
- 12:29themselves? And I was like, yeah, you know,
- 12:32I've battled with depression my whole life.
- 12:33Yeah. I really, I really could see
- 12:35myself doing something at this point in my life that this is
- 12:38where I'm at because it's not where I wanted to be.
- 12:41I think a lot of times people look at addicts and be like,
- 12:43well, they're getting what they want.
- 12:44That's not true. That's not true at all.
- 12:47So I told this man that I was feeling a little suicidal and he
- 12:51left me sitting on the bench and processing.
- 12:54And I thought, well, this is weird.
- 12:55They dressed 13 other guys out. They take them beyond processing
- 13:00into segregation. And he comes back and gets me.
- 13:02And I assumed that he was. I don't know why I thought this.
- 13:05I thought he's going to Take Me Home, let me go.
- 13:07Just because it's over. I don't know what that's why I
- 13:09thought for, but that's not what happened.
- 13:12They put me in an outfit and they call it a turtle suit.
- 13:15And basically it's a safety outfit that you can't RIP or
- 13:18tear or hurt yourself with in any way.
- 13:21And they put me in a little 8 by 8 room with no toilet.
- 13:25There's a hole in the floor and the officers, you know, they
- 13:29were responsible for flushing the the toilet and I and I ate
- 13:33food out of a Styrofoam plate for seven days.
- 13:37When they put me in there, I asked the officer, how long do I
- 13:39stay? They said until you talk to a
- 13:41therapist, you have to stay in here.
- 13:43I said, OK, cool, I'm ready to talk to one.
- 13:45They said, well, they only come on Thursday.
- 13:47I said even better, today's Thursday.
- 13:49And he said, no, you just missed them.
- 13:52So I had to wait in this in. 8 by 8 room.
- 13:56For a. Week it's like a closet it.
- 13:58Was crazy. The guy comes in, I'm not going
- 14:01to mention his name because I know him now and we have a
- 14:04conversation. He says how do you feel?
- 14:06I said, I'll be honest with you, I probably wouldn't have really
- 14:09hurt myself the first day, but after being in after.
- 14:13Being in here for this amount of time, I feel crazy.
- 14:15I do feel crazy. Do you know what they did?
- 14:18They put me back in the. Room.
- 14:19Oh man. No counsel, no therapy, no
- 14:23anything, no encouragement. Put me back in the room.
- 14:25They brought me back the next week.
- 14:28Sat down with the same guy and I knew better.
- 14:30I learned my lesson. He said how do you feel?
- 14:31I said I feel great. I was worse now than when I went
- 14:35in, but I had to lie about my position emotionally.
- 14:39Psychologically, I was. I was damaged from that room.
- 14:46But I learned real quick to not tell people how you really feel.
- 14:50Because when you start telling people how you really feel and
- 14:53they recognize they can't help you, they just put you away the
- 14:57quickest. Way they put you in a closet for
- 14:59days. So that the first time I went
- 15:02in, I spent two weeks in suicide watch and then I did, I did
- 15:06three months, 90 days in jail, very first time I'd ever went to
- 15:09jail and the very first month scared to death.
- 15:13But after that, I got really comfortable at being an inmate.
- 15:17I got really comfortable being in the jail.
- 15:20I recognized they couldn't eat me in there and I would
- 15:22eventually get out. And that comfort became very
- 15:27dangerous for me because the threat of going to jail no
- 15:31longer scared me. My addiction was waiting for me
- 15:35When I got out that first time, I went right back to getting
- 15:37high. Life started moving like it
- 15:40does. And at least once a month, maybe
- 15:43twice a month, I would get locked up.
- 15:45I'd go to jail. I'd find a way to bond out and,
- 15:48and what they do in the loss in the in the court systems,
- 15:51because a legal system is so far behind with addiction, it is
- 15:55that they just put everything together.
- 15:56They'll keep putting you off. You'll get a court date.
- 15:58It'll be a year out. And what they would do is
- 16:01consolidate all of my charges. And I wasn't Pablo Escobar.
- 16:05I wasn't doing anything like you were an addict.
- 16:08Serious. Yeah, I was an addict.
- 16:09So I was doing small criminal activities from larceny to petty
- 16:13larceny to misdemeanor larceny to felony larceny.
- 16:17And they would just put them all together and just wait.
- 16:19And I would get probation and I'd be back on the street in no
- 16:22time in 2000. What was your home life like
- 16:26with that? Going in and out, man, I have
- 16:28kids. What was?
- 16:29What was? That I, I, I walked out on them
- 16:31when my daughter was born. She was born with a lot of
- 16:36medical issues and had to stay in the hospital.
- 16:40And I went and saw her twice. And while she was in there, you
- 16:44know, I did the easy thing. I just blamed myself and went
- 16:48and got even darker in this pit. Instead of standing up and being
- 16:52a man and and and being beside my daughter while she was going
- 16:56through all these things, I just kind of walked away, ended up
- 17:01going to jail before she got out.
- 17:03And when she got out, I had met a woman named Kristen who's my
- 17:06wife now, and I convinced her that I wasn't as bad as the
- 17:11rumors. I was on probation.
- 17:14I needed an address. I would live with my dad every
- 17:18now and then but I convinced Kristen to let me use her
- 17:21address for my probation and in convincing Kristen to let me use
- 17:26her address I I moved into her house without really asking.
- 17:30She she was a waitress and while she was at work one day I just
- 17:33put all my stuff in her house. I said I just need to make it
- 17:35look real and by looking real I just started staying in her
- 17:38house. She found out how how carnal my
- 17:44mom really was really quickly. We lasted about 3 months before
- 17:48she she ran away. She moved from North Carolina to
- 17:51South Carolina and didn't tell me where she was, but I guess
- 17:55there was just something about me that she was drawn to.
- 17:57She wasn't an addict that I finally I called her one day,
- 18:01she had unblocked my number and she's like, hey, just come down
- 18:05here. Maybe a different scenery will
- 18:07do good for you. And that's that's just not the
- 18:09case. Wherever I went, there I was.
- 18:12I went from just occasional methamphetamine mixing with a
- 18:17heroin to heroin and methamphetamine every single
- 18:20day. We lasted about another three
- 18:23months down at the beach. She asked me to leave.
- 18:26I moved back down to Monroe, moved in with my dad.
- 18:29The day I moved in, he passed away the next morning from
- 18:34overdose from benzodiapans and alcohol.
- 18:37So I found my dad dead. I called.
- 18:40You found him. It was.
- 18:42It was a terrible day. It's a terrible day for me.
- 18:45As much as I hated the man, there's a lot of conversations
- 18:49we didn't get to have. Yeah.
- 18:53And I felt, you know, I felt a little responsible because, you
- 18:55know, I was introducing them to the drugs that he had no
- 18:59knowledge of. He was an alcoholic before I
- 19:01came along. And after I came along, pills
- 19:04and whatever else I can get my hands on, he would, he would, he
- 19:09would practice these things with me.
- 19:12I called Kristen and I said I need, I need somebody solid down
- 19:16here to stand beside me. So she came, she came down to
- 19:18Monroe and, and right before she went to go leave me again, my
- 19:22brother got in a car accident and lost his life.
- 19:26And I said, can you stay a little bit longer?
- 19:28And she did. And a lot of my family blamed
- 19:31her for my addiction. They didn't know any better.
- 19:33They didn't, they didn't know that she was not in active
- 19:37addiction because she was willing to live this lifestyle
- 19:39with me. I ended up going to prison a
- 19:43couple months after my brother died for an armed robbery.
- 19:45I didn't do, but they had me with a plea deal that I
- 19:49couldn't, I couldn't turn it down because they had me on so
- 19:51many other. Things.
- 19:52So many other things. Yep.
- 19:53So I ended up going to prison. I didn't talk to my family for
- 19:56the first two years. Nobody would.
- 19:59Nobody would interact with me. I would love to tell you that.
- 20:02What was? Your sentence, Wesley What?
- 20:04It was 28 to three years for an armed robbery and it was just
- 20:09same thing. You go in there and you're like,
- 20:12OK, this is prison. This is different than the
- 20:13county. Yeah.
- 20:15And you just got this fear. So you go in there and you start
- 20:17acting a little reckless just to make sure that you you don't
- 20:22look vulnerable. Right.
- 20:24And it just connections and relationships in there and
- 20:29access to things I should have never had access to.
- 20:32And I just say it this way. You can't stay no cleaner in
- 20:35there. Then you can stay out here.
- 20:37Not if you're not, if you're looking for it.
- 20:39No, no, it's everywhere. And I, I, I could not do 30 days
- 20:44sober. The whole time I was in prison
- 20:47the last eight months, I was locked up.
- 20:50I called my Mama, she answered. She started coming to see me.
- 20:54And then I called Kristen's phone one day and she had put
- 20:56minutes on it and she knew I was getting out and she knew I was a
- 21:00little crazy, I guess, or a little jealous.
- 21:04But she answered it and she said, I know you're getting out
- 21:06and I know we're going to talk eventually.
- 21:08Might as well start it now. So we started talking and I had
- 21:11convinced her that I had stayed sober the whole time I was
- 21:15locked up. I get out in 2013, we start a
- 21:19relationship, she ends up getting pregnant five months
- 21:24after I'm out of jail. I'm I'm back out there in my
- 21:27addiction and I, I am probably worse now than I had ever been.
- 21:32And she, she draws the line. She said, I I'm pregnant, I'm
- 21:36going to have this child and I'm not going to deal with you like
- 21:40this. So you need to figure it out.
- 21:42And two days later I got locked up 2014.
- 21:45I got locked up and nobody would bond me out.
- 21:49It was a, it was a scary feeling because my bond was only $1000.
- 21:54So 120 bucks get a bondsman and, and you'll get out and you go
- 21:58into a jail and you're detoxing off heroin and you're, you're
- 22:02good at it. I mean, I had become a
- 22:04professional withdrawal. I knew what it, you knew how to
- 22:07withdraw. I did.
- 22:08And this time was different. It's usually 5-6 days and your
- 22:13body will start to recover. Well, that was not the case this
- 22:16time. I didn't know anything about
- 22:18fentanyl. I didn't I wasn't looking for
- 22:20fentanyl, wasn't pursuing fentanyl 2014.
- 22:24It was kind of unheard of. But here I am in the jail and
- 22:28they're they drug test me and I got fentanyl in my system and
- 22:32the withdrawals were completely different than the heroin
- 22:35withdrawals. Just regular opiate withdrawals.
- 22:376-7 days I couldn't stand up. 8-9 days I had lost 11 pounds.
- 22:42Wow. I couldn't eat anything. 10 and
- 22:4511 days. The officers were having to come
- 22:47into the medical block and shower me and change me and
- 22:51change my bed clothes. 11 and 13 on 13th day they called a
- 22:55specialist in there and they were like, something's not
- 22:57right. And the specialist, he, you
- 23:00know, he suggested get him some protein, get him some things
- 23:03that are not on y'all's y'all's menu and see if his body can
- 23:07hold it. And it did.
- 23:08It worked. Day 14, I had, you know, they
- 23:11were giving me protein shakes and trays and I was able to eat
- 23:15it. And about a month after that,
- 23:17they let me go back to segregation.
- 23:18I got some weight up. I went from 130 to 150 lbs.
- 23:23And they put me back in segregation and they put me in a
- 23:26room with a Bible thumper, like in the jail.
- 23:29Yeah, everybody's got jailhouse religion.
- 23:31His name was Ed. I'll never forget it.
- 23:33Big guy, You know, I'm £150. This guy's I'm 6 foot one.
- 23:37This guy's 6 foot 5. Super friendly guy, but I did
- 23:42not want to challenge him on a lot of stuff just because I was
- 23:46still weak and uni and I was just very respectful.
- 23:50I said, Mr. Ed, you don't talk to me about Jesus and I won't
- 23:54disrespect your area. And he said deal.
- 23:57But he didn't keep his end of the deal.
- 24:01He, he started to question me and ask me things and, and and
- 24:04try to persuade me about this gospel.
- 24:07And I just finally, I got down one day and I said, look, buddy,
- 24:10I've watched men profess Christ in this place.
- 24:12I've watched people chase down religion in this place and they
- 24:16get they get out and they get locked right back up.
- 24:19I said I can do that on my own. And he said, you need to go into
- 24:22the life skills program. It's on the other side of the
- 24:24jail. I've never heard about this
- 24:25thing. You get locked up as many times
- 24:27as I had you think you thought? Maybe you've seen it all.
- 24:30I hadn't, he said. There's a life skills program on
- 24:32the other side of the jail where they teach you life skills.
- 24:35I said, how do I get in there? He said, I'll help you.
- 24:38They got TV in there. It's a open dorm.
- 24:40And I was like, really? So he signs me up and an hour
- 24:45later I'm getting called out to go over to the life skills
- 24:48program. You know, it's the next day.
- 24:50The next day I'm getting caught out to go to life skills
- 24:51program. They take me over there.
- 24:54And, you know, he left some of the truth out about what this
- 24:57life skills program was. And I walk in there and sure
- 25:01enough, there's ATV on the wall. There's board games.
- 25:03It's an open dorm and I found out real quickly, but it was
- 25:07Christ centered and I looked over at the CEO and I said I
- 25:11think there's a mistake, man. I don't want to be in some
- 25:14Christian rehab program. And the officer said, well, our
- 25:18shift's about to end. You're going to have to wait
- 25:19till Monday to get back to segregation to start all the all
- 25:23this process over to get back in the B block.
- 25:26So I'm fine with that. Something happened over the
- 25:28weekend. You start watching get 13 other
- 25:32guys in a jail who were weeping over their sin.
- 25:35Not over there, not over their position, but they're actually
- 25:38grieving over sin. And you start to question
- 25:42everything in life because, you know, in the South, you just
- 25:46want to be safe so you don't go to hell.
- 25:48But in these men's hearts, they found out that they were the
- 25:53offense and that only God could set them free.
- 25:57A man named Jack Kernan came in Monday.
- 25:59I'll never forget it. He was very rough around the
- 26:02edges. He was from up north, Oh,
- 26:04Yankee. And he was very harsh to me.
- 26:09And he shared the gospel in a way I'd never heard.
- 26:11It's usually it's good news, good news, good news.
- 26:14And he did not do that. And I said, man, I have enough
- 26:18knowledge about the Bible to know that you're supposed to be
- 26:21sharing some good news. And he said, brother, if you
- 26:23don't understand the bad news, there is no good news.
- 26:26He says, you're an addict, you're a failure, You're a
- 26:29deadbeat father, You're a convict, and this is the life
- 26:32you've chosen. And I'm like, that's terrible.
- 26:35That doesn't sound good. He want to hear the good stuff.
- 26:38He said here's the beauty, you don't have to leave this place
- 26:41the same way that you came about the power of the gospel and the
- 26:44power of the Holy Spirit. You can be different.
- 26:45I said, that's beautiful. I want that.
- 26:47I want to be different. I don't want to go back.
- 26:49I said, here's the problem for you Sir, I'm going to die a
- 26:52heroin addict. He said, Who told you that?
- 26:54I said every program I've ever been in says once an addict,
- 26:57always an addict. He said, but what does the word
- 26:59of God say? I said, I have no idea.
- 27:01He says in Psalm one O 3, it says he forgives all my sin and
- 27:06heals all my diseases. I said, OK, He said, it doesn't
- 27:09matter if you think it's a disease or a choice, the
- 27:12answer's Jesus. And he said when the new comes
- 27:15in, the old is gone. I said, you need to break that
- 27:18down for me. He says you don't have to be an
- 27:20addict anymore. You now have this opportunity in
- 27:23the name of Jesus to choose. And I said, are you going to
- 27:27show me how to walk this out when I get out of jail?
- 27:29He said you have my word. So seven week program, I'm in
- 27:35there. I'm petitioning to the Lord, I'm
- 27:37reading scripture, I'm trying to figure this thing out and I
- 27:40start praying to God. I said, if you let me finish
- 27:42this program before I go to prison because I thought I was
- 27:44going to prison for another three years.
- 27:46I said, Lord, I'll do anything you tell me to do.
- 27:50About 5 1/2 weeks into the program, they take me to court,
- 27:53Superior Court, and I'm downstairs and I see Miss Chris
- 27:57Christian, Christine Thunderburg, and I say she's a
- 28:01officer there. I said, can you talk to the
- 28:03judge for me? And he said what?
- 28:05She said, what do you want to talk about?
- 28:06I said, can you ask him if he'll let me stay in the jail?
- 28:10I'll plead guilty today and we can get this thing wrapped up.
- 28:13So she goes upstairs, she gets the judge, she talks to him.
- 28:16Judge Chris Bragg, I'll never forget it.
- 28:19Then she comes back downstairs. She says the judge will see you.
- 28:22So we go upstairs. I'm in the courtroom.
- 28:23There's not a lot of people in there.
- 28:25And the judge says you have anything to say?
- 28:28I said, yeah, I'd like to stay in the jail and finish this
- 28:30program, seven week program. I'm about 5 1/2 weeks in.
- 28:33He said, are you sober? I said I am sober.
- 28:37He said, are you, you have a high school reading level.
- 28:40I said yes, Sir, I have a high school reading level.
- 28:42He said, Are you sure you're sober?
- 28:45I said, yes, Sir. He said, what are you going to
- 28:47say when I tell you I'm going to let you go home today on
- 28:51probation? And I'll be honest with you, my
- 28:53flesh was like, you better take this deal before they realize
- 28:57they made a mistake. And the Lord weighed me down
- 29:01with every prayer that I had petitioned to him about me
- 29:04asking him to let me finish this program.
- 29:06And I just looked at the judge and I said, if you let me finish
- 29:09this program, you'll never see me in this jailhouse again.
- 29:11And he said, why you want to finish so bad?
- 29:14I said I dropped out of high school, I walked out of my kids
- 29:19life. I've quit everything that was
- 29:21ever difficult and I've never finished one thing that I've
- 29:25tried to start and he he said when does it when does it end?
- 29:29I said the the the following Friday we have graduation.
- 29:34So he popped his gavel and he said I'll let you leave 12:00 PM
- 29:39on Friday. And I groaned a little bit and
- 29:41he said what's wrong? I said they got a pizza party at
- 29:44at 3:00. He he let me stay till 5:00 the
- 29:50following Friday and I get back to jail and, you know,
- 29:54everybody's looking at me kind of crazy and I'm like.
- 29:56I'm sure the judges had to have spinning too.
- 29:59Oh, it was. It was wild.
- 30:00Like who does that? Who want to stay a little
- 30:02longer? And I'm going to go to the pizza
- 30:04party. I couldn't believe that I had
- 30:06said it. It was not me.
- 30:08I promise you, me, me would have walked right out them doors and
- 30:13me would probably be dead right now.
- 30:15But it's so like gripping, riveting for you to say all
- 30:20these things that you hadn't finished and you saw this as the
- 30:24beginning of something that you wanted to finish.
- 30:27And it meant that much to you that that that's so I mean, that
- 30:32kind of takes it kind of gives you chills that you you felt
- 30:34that at that moment in that time, you know?
- 30:39Let let me let me be real honest too, because I don't want
- 30:42somebody to think I'm some hyper St.
- 30:44I really didn't know where I was going to go if I were to get out
- 30:48of jail. I thought I was going to prison.
- 30:50So when you look at it through that perception, you're like,
- 30:52oh, I can understand that. Or if they were going to let me
- 30:55out, nobody wanted to talk to me, right.
- 30:58So, so I mean, I, it does make for a good story that Wesley
- 31:01stated. Yeah, I.
- 31:02Mean it does make for. A good story.
- 31:03What were my other options really at the time?
- 31:06What were my other options? But the Lord was faithful to my
- 31:11prayers to give me the opportunity.
- 31:12And I don't say that to discount why I stayed.
- 31:15I just want, I don't want anybody.
- 31:17Well, you know, you had no other options, and that's true.
- 31:20But now I was saved. You know, you're in the South
- 31:22and it's prosperity gospel. So I'm in the jail.
- 31:25I'm like, Lord, give me a good job, Lord.
- 31:28Give me a big house, Lord, fix all my relationships.
- 31:31That was my prayer. Yeah.
- 31:33And everybody's like blessings, blessings, blessings.
- 31:35And the only thing that they can account blessings for are
- 31:37physical things. So that was all the knowledge I
- 31:39had. So I get out of jail and none of
- 31:42those blessings came, by the way.
- 31:44Like, I did not have a house. I did not have a car.
- 31:47My family wouldn't talk to me. I had a list of things I
- 31:49couldn't do and places I could not go.
- 31:52And I'm, I'm frustrated. And I find myself living in the
- 31:55homeless shelter and I go from communal living to communal
- 31:59living. And I remember I'm in the back
- 32:02of the shelter. They had one in Monroe.
- 32:04That's not they have a new one now.
- 32:05I was not at the new one. I was at the old one.
- 32:08And the reason they built a new one was because the old it was
- 32:11really bad. I love the place.
- 32:13Don't get me wrong. I'm not discounting it.
- 32:15I support the shelter and I will always support the shelter.
- 32:20But that one was just not in the greatest of shape.
- 32:23So I remember sitting in the back crying to the Lord, like I
- 32:27thought you were going to fix my life.
- 32:29And in that moment, audibly or not, he responded with your life
- 32:32was never the issue. It was your heart.
- 32:34Let me fix that first. And I just it gave me a it gave
- 32:39me a piece I couldn't explain. I said, all right, Lord, I'm
- 32:41going to trust you. And within three months, he's
- 32:45prompting me to start a halfway house from the shelter.
- 32:48I didn't have a House of my own. I was like, this is crazy.
- 32:52I'm in arrears on child support. I all my money went to all my
- 32:58jail calls. All your court calls, everything
- 33:01you had. I had nothing.
- 33:02And I'm like, Lord, you got the wrong one.
- 33:05Like why don't you find somebody who's got a house or give me a
- 33:07house? And he's like, I'm not going to
- 33:08do either. I'm going to watch you and I'm
- 33:11going to lead you through this. And one thing led to another.
- 33:14Well, what's the let's before we get into that, because I want us
- 33:17to step through that. I want because I, I think that
- 33:21your story is so incredible, but I don't I want us to get the
- 33:24full beat of it before we do. I want to recognize that
- 33:27nightmare success podcast is sponsored by the white collar
- 33:30support group, the world's first support group devoted to people
- 33:33navigating the white collar criminal justice system.
- 33:35I'm a member of the white collar support group and I tell you
- 33:37that it's a bunch of people who help each other through the
- 33:40criminal justice journey for free.
- 33:42Whether you're just starting your journey or you've made it
- 33:44through to the the other side, this is a great space for you.
- 33:47You can join us on Zoom Monday, 7:00 PM Eastern Time, 4:00 PM
- 33:50Pacific. For information, go to
- 33:51prisoners.org. That's prisoners.org.
- 33:53Start here. And for those that want to,
- 33:55there's a white collar conference October 19th.
- 33:59And it's if you want to sign up, it's at the white
- 34:03collarconference.com October 19th.
- 34:06So Wesley, you know, and, and you know, white collar
- 34:10conference is about community, what you were being told in your
- 34:14mind and and the Lord's telling you, you're going to create this
- 34:18community and you had nothing. So what I mean what what?
- 34:24What do you do next? Oh, brother, you lose your mind.
- 34:27You lose your mind. I'll be honest with you.
- 34:30I know the Lord was prompting me to do these things.
- 34:32And I had no, I had, I had no resources.
- 34:35And I was like, there's no way this is impossible.
- 34:40And he would He would remind me that my position altogether was
- 34:45impossible. I shouldn't be sober.
- 34:47I shouldn't be alive. I shouldn't be out of jail.
- 34:49All those are impossibilities. And then I start, I start
- 34:53feeling overwhelmed with this pressure to do something that I
- 34:57knew I couldn't do. And it felt like a relapse was
- 35:00coming. And because of the pressure,
- 35:03yeah, my mom had to help me get a car.
- 35:05It was a Honda. It was a straight drive.
- 35:08The ignition didn't work, so I had to roll.
- 35:10Started everywhere and I'm driving down the road one day
- 35:13and I felt, I felt the IT felt like what the symptoms of a
- 35:18relapse felt like. I was anxious, I was afraid, I
- 35:21was angry and it was a depression that came over me and
- 35:24I pulled over it in the driveway and I called my mentor Jack,
- 35:28same guy from jail. And I said, bro, I can't, I
- 35:30can't do this anymore. I feel like I'm about to relapse
- 35:33and he's like, what you're going through is normal.
- 35:36And I'm like, might be normal for you, but for me, I know how
- 35:39to alleviate this. And he said he, he's
- 35:42Pentecostal. So he said, there's a ram in the
- 35:45thicket. And I'm like, I don't know what
- 35:46that means, Sir. Like you, you've given me no
- 35:50answers but a Riddle. So I was a new believer.
- 35:54I screamed at him a little bit and threw my phone in the
- 35:56floorboard. And then I got my Bible.
- 35:58And I said, Lord, you're going to have to show me something.
- 36:01I opened the book of Psalms and it says if the Lord doesn't
- 36:05build the house, the laborers are in vain.
- 36:08And I was like, I don't understand this.
- 36:11So I threw my Bible in the floor and where I had pulled over had
- 36:15a circle Dr. behind the house. You go down a hill, you come
- 36:19back up and I was like, good, I can roll start my car from here.
- 36:22So I rolled down the back, popped the clutch, got the car
- 36:25to crank up and at the bottom of the hill I looked over and there
- 36:28was a for ripped sign behind the trash can.
- 36:32And I was like, Lord, if this is you, you're going to show me.
- 36:35So I turned my car off. Car off, of course, at the
- 36:37bottom of a hill, and now I'm going to have to figure out how
- 36:41to get started. I'm frustrated.
- 36:44I called the number, the guy's name's Kent, and I'm like, hey,
- 36:47man, I see you got it for rent, son.
- 36:49He said, yeah, if you'll recognize it's behind the house
- 36:52because the house isn't for rent yet.
- 36:54But I'm about to stop by. He stops by and I give him the
- 36:58spiel. I tell him about how many times
- 37:00I've been arrested. I tell him about my heroin
- 37:03addiction. I tell him that I'm broke and
- 37:05I'm living in the shelter. But then I tell him, I think the
- 37:08Lord wants me to have your house.
- 37:10And he laughs at me and I'm like, buddy, I haven't been
- 37:14saved long enough for you to just laugh at me.
- 37:16I'm just telling you where I'm at.
- 37:18And he says, good news is, is I believe in the Lord too.
- 37:22And I'm like, oh, this is awesome.
- 37:24And he says, and I know enough about the Lord to know that if
- 37:27he wants you to have this house, he's going to give you the money
- 37:29to do it. And I'm like, I'm like, well, he
- 37:33has it. And we talk, you know, we talked
- 37:35for about 20 minutes. And at the end of talking, he
- 37:38looks at me. He goes, you know what, I like
- 37:41you, man. I'm going to give you a chance
- 37:43to do something, do something different.
- 37:45And he throws the keys at me and he says, we'll, we'll figure
- 37:48this out later. And I would love to tell you
- 37:51that, you know, that house, that that first house was a great
- 37:55success. It wasn't.
- 37:59I took guys out of the shelter. I stayed living at the shelter
- 38:01and put these guys in the house over there and tried to disciple
- 38:05them and minister to them and be a financial advisor and a
- 38:09nurturer and a disciplinary. And it was exhausting all the
- 38:13way exhausting. And after about a year of
- 38:17operating, I mean, it was doing good.
- 38:19The guys were killing it, man. They were all in landscaping or
- 38:23some kind of outside job where the weather dictated their their
- 38:27paycheck and it began to rain and they could not go to work.
- 38:32And if they couldn't go to work, we couldn't pay the bills.
- 38:36So I started going around asking churches, can you help me out
- 38:39with a little bit? You know, I'm a year out of
- 38:41jail. I'm a year sober.
- 38:43My reputation was building up a little bit.
- 38:46And every church that I went to said get a 5O1C3 and we'll
- 38:51support you. I said I have no idea what that
- 38:53is. They said if you get a 5O1C3
- 38:57we'll give you some financial support.
- 38:59So I went and sought it out and the money that it costed to get
- 39:03A5O1C3, I would have had to borrow money from churches to do
- 39:06that. Sure it's not.
- 39:07It's not cheap to do that. It's not so I I was doing
- 39:10overhead fire safety. I was a foreman.
- 39:12I was making pretty good money, the Lord said. 5O1C3 for
- 39:15everybody that's listening out there in the Cayman Islands,
- 39:17it's it's a non profit and it gives ability for people to give
- 39:20money and and have a tax write off to do it.
- 39:23Yeah, I'm not. I mean, yeah, that's basically
- 39:26in a nutshell what it is. I had no idea what it was at the
- 39:29time. I I go back to these churches
- 39:33and said I have an idea, I'll work overtime, You keep your
- 39:37money, why don't you just come help me disciple these men?
- 39:41And I got the same exact response you get you A5O1C3 and
- 39:46we'll come out there and disciple those men.
- 39:48And I knew then even not having a lot of knowledge of A5O1C3,
- 39:53that that was unnecessary for them to make disciples who make
- 39:57disciples. So I got a little angry at, at,
- 40:00at the bride of Christ, not just one individual, but a whole
- 40:04bunch of them, because they all gave me the same answer and had
- 40:07to shut the house down. And I was, I was angry, I was
- 40:11questioning God. I said I know you sent me to do
- 40:14this. And I went and worked out of
- 40:16town in Columbia with a man who did 11 years and eight months
- 40:19for murder he didn't do. And this man taught me how to
- 40:22pray. He taught me how to walk in
- 40:24patience, and he taught me how to trust the Lord.
- 40:27Fast forward, I come back to Monroe, NC, and there's a guy
- 40:30named Christopher Guffey. He's got halfway houses in
- 40:33Charlotte. They're called Ground 40 halfway
- 40:35houses. And we kind of link armor.
- 40:38One thing leads to another. I tell him we need to do a
- 40:41program instead of just transitional houses.
- 40:43He's like, you might need to do a program, but I don't need to.
- 40:46And he gives me the 501 C three. It wasn't, I mean, it wasn't
- 40:50that overnight, but it was. Pretty.
- 40:52It's pretty amazing. When you told me that over the
- 40:54phone, Leslie, I was like, man, how does that happen?
- 40:58It doesn't. It's just, it's just incredible
- 41:01because it was exactly what you needed to get to the next step.
- 41:04It was crazy. He gives me this 5O1C3 and
- 41:07there's properties that he's renting and he says you can do
- 41:09what you want to with him. I said we're going to turn this
- 41:12into a program and the first few years was trial and error, the
- 41:16next few years was trial and error.
- 41:18And the Lord has been so kind to forgive our mistakes and bless
- 41:22our efforts. You know, it's 2024 now, and
- 41:26we've got 8 operational properties.
- 41:30The first 3 stages of our program are absolutely free.
- 41:34We take the men in out of prison, out of recovery, out of
- 41:37addiction, out of homelessness, out of high school.
- 41:40And we bring them to the three different phases, which I'm
- 41:44going to tell you something different here just a second
- 41:46because we've already restructured again for another
- 41:48phase since we talked. The first phase is 40 days and
- 41:52they come here for free and for 40 days they are fasting from
- 41:55the world, fasting from their family, getting their mind
- 41:59right, making sure that that the withdrawal symptoms and the
- 42:02detox symptoms are, you know, they're all clear.
- 42:06And then we move them to the next phase, which is our ranch
- 42:09property, 2 1/2 months where we do corporate community service.
- 42:15And I'm not talking about where we take our men out and it's a
- 42:17work camp. I'm talking about we go out and
- 42:19we do by donation only help to the widows, to the orphans, to
- 42:24the senior citizens, to local churches.
- 42:27And we're like, how can we help for free?
- 42:29Because you turn a selfish heart into a servant's heart.
- 42:32You got a whole other thing coming.
- 42:34They, they move past that property to our new phase, the
- 42:37Restoration House. They do 2 1/2 months there where
- 42:40it's smaller group community service where you have two or
- 42:44three guys now instead of the whole group.
- 42:46And they're learning how to walk back beside of the world and
- 42:51face their triggers, face all of these things that can cause
- 42:54temptation. And then we get to assess them
- 42:57and say, hey man, how are you dealing with these things?
- 42:59After that phase, then we have our transitional houses.
- 43:02They're a year to a year and a half because we, this is not a
- 43:05forever home. And our goal is to, that's the
- 43:08only part of the program where it costs a fee for the men.
- 43:11They have to pay for their responsibilities of a
- 43:13transitional house. They got a job, they got a car.
- 43:15We provide, we provide everything they need of their
- 43:18transportation, laundry detergent, food.
- 43:21And they pay $120.00 a month, a week to cover every part of
- 43:25that. And that $120.00 a week then
- 43:27goes back into the early stages to help the next group of men
- 43:31come in for free. Wow.
- 43:33We do one fundraiser a year. We don't even put it on a a very
- 43:37close family of ours whose son went to the program puts on the
- 43:41on the fundraiser and we don't. I'm just going to tell you, we
- 43:44don't go around having to ask for money.
- 43:46The Lord takes care of almost. Everything such a powerful work
- 43:49that you guys do too. I mean, I, I think the community
- 43:53wouldn't have to see a lot to understand that it is a lot.
- 43:56And, and you know, Wesley, it's, it's so, you know, I, I, I'm so
- 44:01lucky to be able to sit in this chair and hear people like you
- 44:05that do what you do. And it's, you know, there's
- 44:07different pockets all over the country.
- 44:09But you know, the work that has to go into this is, is big.
- 44:16But I think, I think what happens is, you know, you have
- 44:21walked all these steps. So when you sit down with these
- 44:24guys, it's not that you're some clinical guy that read it in a
- 44:28book and now we're going to try to figure it out.
- 44:31You've been in every one of those steps and lived it.
- 44:34And that's what I think pulls the glue into this deal is is
- 44:38and and I got to tell you when you see that video that that
- 44:41you're in and you're you got the music and and the and you walk
- 44:46out to your family and the IT since chills up your spine of
- 44:50what that ground 40 feeling is. And it's it's you're just you,
- 44:57you found your place and your passion.
- 44:59And as far as how, where you're at now, is it something that
- 45:05you're going to take bigger or is it just something you're just
- 45:09going to get better and better at from where you're at, you
- 45:12know? We have visions, right?
- 45:16And, and for lack of vision, my people perish.
- 45:19For lack of knowledge, my people perish.
- 45:20And these things come into play with it.
- 45:23And there's the desire to go bigger, and there's a I lose
- 45:36you. No, I got you.
- 45:37I. Got you.
- 45:38OK, there's a there is a desire to go bigger.
- 45:42There is because the need is so great, right?
- 45:46And then there's another desire and I'm going to say this and
- 45:49this is as kind as I can say it. There really is no secret sauce
- 45:54to ground 40. Like we, we read the Bible, we
- 45:58put it into practice. We walk beside of these men, we
- 46:01disciple these men. We look at Scripture and we
- 46:04apply it to our lives. Every believer has the same
- 46:09exact handbook and every believer has the same spirit
- 46:14inside of them to do the same exact thing that we're doing.
- 46:18I'll be honest with you. There are 6200 congregations in
- 46:22the state of North Carolina alone.
- 46:25If every single Christian congregation would take one man
- 46:30and one man only and the whole congregation pour into this guy
- 46:34and their family, then you would have 6200 men who could then be
- 46:40that arm of the church. That they would have a guy in
- 46:44their church that has a similar testimony, who has the same walk
- 46:47of life and has an understanding.
- 46:49And churches could quit saying, hey, let's send these people to
- 46:52other programs and they can say bring them to us.
- 46:54We have the answer. His name is Jesus.
- 46:56It's always been Jesus. So it is kind of a catch 22.
- 47:00I know that there's a need and we're probably going to go
- 47:05bigger just because the need is great.
- 47:07And our our list right now we got 69 guys on our waiting list
- 47:11and they come in every 40 days, but it's a 40 day waiting list.
- 47:16So it's. It's, it's, it's so I, I, I went
- 47:20deep into your, your stuff, Wesley and I, I just, I just
- 47:26think it's so great. I think everything that you're
- 47:28doing is, is inspiring. And you can tell that these guys
- 47:33that they recover from this, that live it, are so
- 47:37appreciative and, and can get their lives in a way that they
- 47:40want it. And it's got to, it's got to
- 47:44make you feel. It's got to fill you up because
- 47:46of what, what you've gone through.
- 47:47I mean, you've gone through the whole thing, man, and now you're
- 47:50giving back in a way that is everything you know is
- 47:55everything you are. We're we're quick to forget
- 47:58where we came from and the world is so kind of put men in front
- 48:00of me every single day that remind me, hey, this is where
- 48:04you were. And it also gives me hope that
- 48:07when I'm talking to them, I know he can do it for you.
- 48:09I know he can do it. Well, and, and what you just
- 48:12said, hope is such a big deal. I mean, hope, you know, there's
- 48:18one of my, the second guy I interviewed three seasons ago,
- 48:21he said don't ever take away hope from someone because that
- 48:24might be all they have. That's right.
- 48:26And, and if you can inspire hope in people that they can make it
- 48:30to the next step, that can do so much.
- 48:33If they just believe, you know, that, that that's, that's them,
- 48:37that they're part of that and they can be that.
- 48:40And that's, you know, what your program is built around.
- 48:42It's community and and to be in our community, once you've gone
- 48:47through trauma, that community can lift you up and and take you
- 48:51places you didn't think you could go.
- 48:53But I I think it's amazing what you you were literally in a
- 48:57place where you didn't know where you were going to go next.
- 49:00Wesley and he got this ground forty thing.
- 49:02The guy says, well, I don't know if I'm going to do that, but you
- 49:05can do it. And here's the five O 1C3.
- 49:07In a way it is it's it's it's great and I love it.
- 49:12And if if, if you think about where you are now, what do you
- 49:18think's your greatest take away for the listeners out there of
- 49:21the journey you're on and been through, man?
- 49:25Oh my goodness, the greatest take away.
- 49:28You know, I think in Hebrews it says it's impossible to please
- 49:30the Lord without faith. And I will tell you one thing
- 49:34for sure, I'm good at a lot of stuff.
- 49:36Let me just be as humble as I can.
- 49:38If, if there's something out there physically, I can figure
- 49:41out how to do it. This was something that I could
- 49:44not have done. I could not have done this.
- 49:47I don't have the I don't have the willpower.
- 49:49I don't have the understanding. Trusting, trusting in the Lord,
- 49:55in The Impossibles has has brought us to where we are.
- 49:58You know, I got my wife. Yes, I got my kid.
- 50:01You. Haven't talked about that.
- 50:02Your kids, man. All back in play.
- 50:05I have a beautiful wife who is, who's straight up with me.
- 50:12She went through the fire with me.
- 50:14We've experienced a lot of loss, I'm sure with that, both of us
- 50:18suffer with some kind of guilt of of how we're still here,
- 50:22survival's guilt. But she constantly ministers to
- 50:26me. She constantly encourages me and
- 50:28all the wives to the men. Our staff's wives are above
- 50:35anything you've ever known because our wives walk through
- 50:38this with us. And when these guys come in with
- 50:40their new wives, our wives don't just encourage us, they
- 50:43encourage these other wives. They can tell them some hard
- 50:46truths. So it's, it's to see my kids
- 50:50that you know, I dropped my, I dropped my 11 year old off
- 50:52today, first day of 6th grade. And he's not ashamed for me to
- 50:59walk beside him. And my 19 year old who who lived
- 51:03through some of this, he's not ashamed of me, not ashamed of my
- 51:07testimony, he's not ashamed of the gospel that set me free.
- 51:11And it's just, it's really incredible to know that I was
- 51:16really willing to give up and throw all of this away because I
- 51:20just could not see that this would be possible.
- 51:25And it can happen. I mean, it can happen.
- 51:27It happened. And it's, it's, it's a testament
- 51:32to, to believing that it can't happen.
- 51:35And, and, and you're helping all these guys, Wesley, it's, it's,
- 51:38it's, it's quite the story. And I'm so happy that you were
- 51:42able to make time to be on the show, 'cause this, this is a
- 51:45story. I mean, you are, you talk about
- 51:46a nightmare success story. You live through the nightmare,
- 51:49you walk through your fears. You got to the place that is
- 51:53your freedom and that's your success.
- 51:55And, and the, the freedom is, is knowing there you can walk your
- 51:59kids into school, you can feel good about yourself, feel good
- 52:02about what you're doing and feel good about how you're helping
- 52:05people and how you're creating a community for people.
- 52:07It's very, very, very encouraging.
- 52:10If people want to get a hold of you and they want to donate, do
- 52:14they go to ground40.org? Can they do that there?
- 52:16They can't. They can go to ground40.org if
- 52:19they need to call us for help. It's 704-883-5185.
- 52:25We're on Facebook. I we're on Instagram.
- 52:28I'm personally on Facebook. Wesley Gazi, I'm on Instagram.
- 52:31Wesley Gazi. I'm on TikTok.
- 52:34I think it's Reverend Wesley Gazi on.
- 52:36There it is on TikTok, Yeah. Man, I'll tell you, we got 7
- 52:39guys in our program right now from TikTok and, and really I
- 52:44just want to encourage people with the gospel of Jesus Christ.
- 52:46Man. I didn't get on there one day to
- 52:48get a platformer to get a name. From I know you got a lot of
- 52:50followers and that, that's, that's one of the things about,
- 52:53you know, the, the TikTok can, can help a lot of people, you
- 52:56know, because you can find your community there and, and it can
- 53:00connect. And I, I see that a lot where
- 53:03people find places that they didn't think they'd be able to
- 53:06find on a social platform. It's a free.
- 53:08Platform. Wow, it's a crazy day, right?
- 53:10Exactly exactly for those out to hey, if me being grateful that I
- 53:16I get to use Homestead financial set up here with my podcast
- 53:20room. If anybody's got home mortgage
- 53:23needs out there, go to Greg FDF. He is your guy.
- 53:26My my book nightmare success. Check it out.
- 53:29It's on Amazon and Barnes and Noble and I've gotten a good
- 53:33amount of reviews lately from Apple.
- 53:35It helps the show so much appreciated.
- 53:38If you got time to do that, please do.
- 53:39I just got 2 two weeks ago. New, new website out there is
- 53:42brentcassidy.com. It's, I spell it wrong.
- 53:45It's with a Ty, not a DY as I used to say when I was writing
- 53:51my emails back and forth from Leavenworth.
- 53:52Stay strong. I'll do the same.
- 53:54Wesley, I so appreciate what you're doing, who you are, what
- 53:58you're going to continue to do. Thanks so much for being on
- 54:01today. Thank you so much brother.
- 54:04Nightmare success in and out.