(somber music) I was born in 1972. When my dad was in high school he was an All American football player. He got a full scholarship to SMU, he got homesick, hurt his knee. So he ended up coming home, getting married, and started working for the Texas highway department. He got hit by a semi-truck but he was such a big guy that he didn't break any bones in his body but he has pretty severe head damage and was in a coma for about eight weeks. When he came to from the coma he just had these really crazy fits of rage. Like, it took about 12 people to hold him down, leather strapped him down and I don't know how much longer he was in the hospital but it never went away. My mom said that "the guy that went in the hospital" "was different that the guy that I brought home". If a commercial was too long, in the middle of a t.v. show I was watching, he would throw a couch end over end. He never laid a finger on my mom but he would break things that were very important to her. And so she eventually left. Hey. (door creaks) Mama? Mama, where's Mama? She's gone Gone where? She run off, she aint comin' back. Just you and me now. (t.v. clicks) When will she be back? I told you she run off. She don't want me no more and she don't want you neither. Back then whoever left, it was, they were kinda to blame. Family around em kinda were like, you know, "we think the boy should stay in the hometown" "with the rest of the family" they still saw my dad as the stable option. I tend to believe she kinda got bullied into leaving us. (music intensifies) At this point my dad had never been abusive towards me so no one really had reason to think that was gonna happen but the second that she moved away something changed and it was a scary childhood to say the least. (intense music) What did you do? Are you bowin' up on me boy? (thumping)
(rustling) You hurt her didn't you?! You hurt her like you hurt me! (loud thud) Nothin', that's what I did! Nothin'! She didn't leave because of me. (door slams) Most of my life was living in fear that when it's so sporadic, you don't know what's gonna set him off. You become scared of everything. If he had a bad day, he'd take it out on me. If someone would cut him off in traffic he would take a swing at me. If my dad was embarrassed in public by someone we'd get home, he'd take it out on me. Anything would set him off and I was just his punching bag is what it felt like. (emotional piano music) Like, I'd made the honor roll or something like that they sent home a piece of paper that, I was so scared to have him sign anything, that I forged the honor roll thing to say yeah he saw it. Well my teachers, they told my dad said "can you believe he'd do that? It's a good thing" "but he just signed it anyway" "and we just wanted you to know" well he was embarrassed that I would sign it and beat me to a pulp. If he would spank me for doing something wrong the spankings became incredibly violent. I remember one night, the back of my neck to the back of my knees were like, a dark purple all the way down, every inch of my body. (door creaks loudly)
(belt jingles) And he saw what he did to me and and it's the first time I ever saw him cry. He ran out of the room. (door slams) (music intensifies) It was almost something he couldn't control. Part of me knew there would be about a 30 minute to an hour window then he would call me in there and like set me on his lap and tell me how sorry he was. He always did it. I knew that if I could get through the beating, that I would see some sort of affection from my dad and that was the only time I'd ever see it. I know of specific times to where I'd literally like, did things to get in trouble 'cause I knew the point would come to where you know he wold love on me and say "I'm so sorry" which was like, the greatest thing ever. I remember following my brother to a party and some guy walks through and says "hey" he had a bottle of scope mouthwash and said "I'll pay somebody $20 if you can drink the whole bottle". So of course I'm seventh grade I'm like it's mouthwash it can't kill you they wouldn't let you put it in your mouth so, might make you sick but I'll take $20. So I did it, so I drank the whole bottle of scope and passed out immediately. Found out it was Everclear and peppermint Schnapps. Shoulda killed me and so me and my two or three other buddies tried to walk home. As we're walking one of the guys dads happens to drive through town and drives right by us. Well he lets me sleep it off at his house and the next morning he's like "are you gonna tell your dad or do I need to?" We got to the house and I thought "this is gonna be the worst of them all". My dad said "do whatever, I don't care anymore" and when he said that he meant it. I could leave the house for four days and he would never look for me. I could do whatever I wanted to. At first it's kinda like hey that's kinda cool, I'm safe but then you're incredibly alone and it was devastating. Shannon, please stay. Why, afraid of the dark? Afraid of monsters? Just don't like being alone. (somber music) The things that I went through definitely were a springboard into the beginning of my relationship with Christ. I was so drawn to the gospel because of my situation. To hear someone say "He'll never leave you, He adores you". You're telling me that there's someone that approves of me the way that I am and that did all this stuff for me? Like, had me in mind? That's unheard of. There were multiple times where I'd come forward whether it's vacation, bible school or camp, man I'd get saved ever Sunday if they'd let me just 'cause I was just desperate for it. Even though I was drawn to it my response to it was "I've gotta do all this stuff to please God" "He's gonna walk out on me" "He's gonna be disappointed with me" and sometimes you start thinking "wait you know, God's not much different than my dad" it's like "oh wait, no He is" but my response is the same. Becomes very works based and if I'm good enough the good outweighs the bad and God's okay with me. My whole career up until five, six years ago was "I'm doing all of this stuff because surely now" "God's okay with me, surely this will count". I'd rather stand in front of 10,000 than one on one because one they can't talk back and I could stand there and tell them all the things, not that's wrong with them but how much God adores them but struggle with applying it to myself. It's really easy for me to tell you how much God loves you to avoid the issues that I deal with daily. And it's really easy to feel good about yourself while you're doing it. A dear friend of mine he came into my life and was like "hey man I don't know if you realize this" "but there's nothing you can do to make" "Christ love you any more than he does right now" "You've worked so hard at whatever you're trying" "to run from or gain, whatever it is" "what if he adores you now?" What if our true identity is I'm a child of the risen king who'll wrestle with flesh, I will win some and lose some but it can't change how Christ sees me because the cross was actually enough. What if it has nothing to do with what I do? What if my identity is not wrapped up in the things I do but what the cross has already done? It's just a crazy concept but I will tell you that all of a sudden, what we've called the good news for our whole life actually sounds like good news now. Because what happens is the mystery of sin begins to shrink because I think we spend too much time trying to please God instead of trust Him. When we truly trust that He's not going anywhere especially for me, that He still adores me on my worst day the worst days start to get further and further apart. (inspirational piano music) Man, I'm a dad of five kids now and what I didn't expect is how many fathers I meet now that may have daddy issues from the past but now they're kinda following suit in some ways and don't know how to kinda break the cycle. The way I deal with my kids, sometimes it reminds me of the way my dad would. I've never beat my kids, nothing like that, but the short fuse and just and little things getting to me and agitated. The hardest part for me is, to stop and say I was wrong and apologize. It's harder to be the gospel at our home more than any other place in the world because they see the good, the bad, the ugly, everything. For me it's just somehow swallowing my pride and realizing I was never meant to do this on my own. I've kinda learned what it means to hide the word in my heart and set my mind on things above and find myself hiding in the word. I rely on community so much because isolation is a struggle for me and just being able to confess this stuff to other dear friends of mine to other Godly men, let there be some type of healing to take place, if I ever stopped voicing the things I'm struggling with I'm in trouble 'cause I've been there. I go to this men's small group. Somebody asked about our relationships with our dads and I was like "oh, I totally got this" "I'm not gonna sound the part, no one can outdo me" and then this other guy's over here going "man, my dad is my best friend in the whole world" you know, good for you but for him, he's lives his life trying to meet that standard of an amazing dad. So either way we're both in counseling trying to figure out who we are under the shadow of our father, great or not so great. Then it all comes down to understanding who we are as individuals in Christ and not just trying to live up to, a lot of times, self imposed standard. There's always a moment where you gotta figure out who am I? What separates me from my dad? What do I embrace that my dad gave me? And so there's always a journey there's always room for growth. We'll get it wrong a lot of times, we'll get it right but I think the most beautiful thing is we can't screw this up. Like, I can screw things up, and I do it well, and all the time, but I can't screw this up. I mean, to actually live like that is incredibly liberating. (inspirational orchestral music)
