How Do I Believe God is Good When Life is Not? | Losing My Dad to Lou Gehrig’s Disease (ALS) – Ask Clay Anything

Audio Transcription

Having a positive attitude means having an optimistic and positive attitude when life is bad and not fair. Now, on today’s business coach show, we had somebody that’s very, very close to me that is the source of inspiration for today’s show. One of my dear friends just discovered that his young child has a massive tumor. And, uh, when I heard about this, um, I thought, you know, there’s got to be thousands upon thousands of people out there who are going through a challenging time just like my, my, my friend is now, I know when my son was born blind, I felt isolated and I wondered where I’m a. I was, I wasn’t a Christian at the time, you know, so I didn’t have a faith to, to the grounded me. I didn’t have a, a belief system. And I just thought, why does this happen? Uh, when, when my wife and I had a miscarriage, it was again, mentally devastating when my dad died of Lou Gehrig’s disease.

Um, I was grounded in faith at that time. And, and, uh, as, as bizarre as that sounds and as terrible as it seems, I really do believe that, uh, my dad just went out ahead of me. He got to go to heaven faster. He got the, uh, the, the speed pass, if you will. Uh, he had the proverbial exit ramp he was able to take earlier, uh, with, to a destination heaven. So for anybody out there who’s really going through a dark situation, I don’t want you to feel alone. I don’t want you to feel alone because I to know those, those feelings of helplessness and hopelessness when there’s nothing you can do when there’s no action item that can be taken to remedy the situation. There’s no best practice systems that you can just implement. Uh, I, I know that I’m not a pastor and a man qualified.

I’m not qualified to provide you with, with biblical truth and a justification for us to support all my business coach beliefs spiritually. However, a pastor Craig Rochelle, a multiple time thrive time show guest, uh, the pastor of the largest Protestant church in America, a pastor Craig Rochelle. He’s the pastor of life church. He wrote a book recently called hope in the dark, and this book is filled with the kind of encouragement that I think somebody out there needs. A, the book is called hope in the dark, believing God is good when life is not. However, I do believe that I can provide you with some encouragement because I can read what I believe to be the irrefutable word of God to you or for anybody out there who feels like you’re going through a crisis right now that that doesn’t have a quick neat, a proven super move that you can use.

It doesn’t have an action item that you can knock out. It’s not going to be with these things where you say, go to this pool. It’s not like that. It’s more of like, okay, we’ve got to do everything we can do. Yes, in the natural, but then we have to let the supernatural. We have to do everything we can do in the natural we have. We have to believe that the supernatural, that Christ Jesus has the power to heal and that’s what we have to do. Right? So Philippians chapter four, verses six through seven. Now, a fun fact for you, or a little fact for you is Philippians the book Philippians actually was the letter of Paul that he was writing to these people called the Philippians and the 11th book of the New Testament, Paul and Timothy first visited Philip, lie in Greece during Paul’s second missionary journey which occurred approximately between 49 and 51 had Paul went on to dive via decapitation.

That’s where your head is separated from your body, which on average is probably not that fun, and all of this happened simply because he wasn’t willing to renounce his faith. He just, he just would not do it. So this is like sacred text in Philippians chapter four, chapter four, verses six through seven. It reads, do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition with Thanksgiving, present your request to God and the peace of God which surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus all repeat. Philippians chapter four, verses six through seven reads, do not be anxious about anything but in every situation by prayer. And petition with Thanksgiving, present your request to God and the peace of God which surpasses which surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. And somebody out there might be saying, listen to your buddy.

I listened to this show for business coach advice. I don’t listen to this show for religious advice. And I totally respect that. I just want to make sure you’re getting my, my motive here. Um, we teach what we call the f six life. We want you to have success at areas of faith, family, finances, fitness, friendship and fun. We want you to have success in all areas of life. And it’s really, really, it was really, really hard for me. Maybe it’s not hard for you. Maybe you say, it’s not hard for me at all to me. Let’s fight. It’s, no, there’s not a problem at all. Uh, but when, when my wife had a miscarriage, it was hard on me. I didn’t show it to her. Even to this day, I’ve never really shown that it bothered me, but it did bother me because, you know, we have five kids.

And, uh, I think about how great they are and there’s one that didn’t make it right. Uh, it was really hard on me when my son was born blind. And you might be saying, well, I tell you this, you just got to tough it out. You know, maybe you’re one of those people that if your kid runs off the sidelines and it has like a broken hand, uh, you, you, you look at your child, you look at your 11 year old son and you say, we got to free. Could tape it, just tape it and get back out there, do it. Come on, let’s go. Maybe you’re that kind of person where you just put tape on all injuries. You know what I’m talking about? You’ve seen dad’s like this. No matter what the injury is a, your kid could come back from the theater.

Your kid could be tackled. He runs onto the sideline with a completely severed leg and you, you said you’re, you said your kid. We just got to put some tape on it and puts, rub some dirt in it because that’s what’s going to do with it. You put some dirt in there, you put some, uh, uh, uh, you know, put some duct tape on there, boom. You’ve made. Maybe that’s how you process things emotionally. Maybe you just say so. So here’s the deal. Your son was born blind. Just put some duct tape on it. That’s what I would do from a psychological perspective. Maybe you would say, well, you’ll see your wife just had a miscarriage. Why don’t you go ahead and just put some duct tape on it, but I don’t think a lot of people do life that way. And I know that when my dad had lou Gehrig’s disease, I had peace.

I have peace. I had peace beyond all understanding. I had John Lennon level piece. I had peace. Like I’m at a John Legend concert. I had peace. Like I’m a hippie hanging out in the park in San Francisco. I had peace like I had had some of those marijuana laced brownies a you can buy in Colorado, but I, but I don’t use marijuana. I don’t take medicinal marijuana. I don’t take any mind altering drugs or hallucinogenic things. I just was at peace. Peace. Why was I at peace? Because whenever I, I, I committed myself to believing in Christ. It was like a release. I got peace when, when, when, when, when the release happened, it was like when I decided to begin believing that I can just do my best and forget the rest because God has a plan. And a lot of times I don’t even understand the plant.

I say a lot of times I would say most of the time, when I say most of the timing, I mean all the time, I don’t understand. There are certain deals I’ve worked on over the years. Huge real estate deals, huge deals, uh, in the areas of what wedding photography, the Dj Company, uh, I mentioned real estate that the hair industry, I mean big things that have just right there and forever reason they didn’t happen. I was told they were going to happen, but they didn’t happen. I was told they were going to happen, but they didn’t happen. Thankfully I didn’t budget based on them happening. But it’s a thing where I, I’ve, I’ve been rejected over and over again, and I know you have to, but nothing feels worse than when you get an illness that you can’t deal with. And my hope and my prayer today sincerely, is to help somebody out there be able to just, uh, just do your best and forget the rest because I want you to have that peace that is beyond all understanding that I believe that I’ve only seen, I can only speak to that I’ve only seen, I’ve only been, I’ve only been able to experience since committing and believing in Jesus Christ.

Another verse to encourage you. Isaiah chapter 53, verses four through five, surely he took up our pain and poor are suffering, yet we considered him punished by God, stricken by him and afflicted, but he was pierced for our transgressions and he was crushed for our iniquities. The punishment that brought us peace on him. And by his words, we are healed. What does the word trends? Transgression mean? Transgression. A lot of times we hear words and we don’t know what they mean. And so we just move on Kinda mentally not considering the profundity of the word itself. Well, I transgression is an act that goes against a law rule or code. So Christ, when we say Christ was pierced for our transgressions, I want to make sure nobody understands what happened. This is a guy who at the age of 33, I’m 37, was forced to carry a massive cross on his back while being publicly mocked by everybody, right?

He’s wearing a crown of thorns to mock hit. His head is bleeding. His head is bleeding, right? He’s carrying a cross through the entire city. Everybody’s jeering him taunting. I mean, think about that. Mentally. Go there just for a second. What would that be like? Whether you’re Jesus, whether you believe in Jesus or not, whether you believe in Jesus or not, whether but pretend for a second. That was you. Just just for a second. Pretend that was you. And you aren’t going down a street in a city, in everybody’s mocking you. Every everybody’s mock you. They’re throwing things at you, they’re yelling things at you. They’re saying the worst things to you in your skull is being, your head is being pierced by a crown of thorns. You’re, you are carrying a massive cross on your back through the town and you are going through this and you’ve never committed a crime, but you’re doing this because your father in heaven thinks that this is the best move.

I just, I, I get the most religions except the existence of Christ. Most people accept that. He actually did show up on the planet. I don’t know about you, but I would definitely have tapped out. I’m like, Oh, here’s the deal. It’s cool. It’s cool. I mean, if someone said, hey, here’s the deal. If you’ll just renounce faith and, uh, you know, switch over to a mysticism. We’ll let you go. I would say. That sounds good. Let me, uh, let me think about it for two seconds. Okay, let’s do it. Because I wouldn’t want to be dragged. I wouldn’t want to be carrying a cross through a city while being ridiculed while wearing a crown of thorns. It’s piercing through your skin, bleeding profusely. Then I would not want to be whipped until the flesh was ripped away from my body. I would not want this just in. I would not want my flesh ripped away from my body.

I would not want to have my flesh ripped away from my body to die for people that are screwing up their lives. I wouldn’t want to die for somebody who’s screwing up their, their life. I mean, why can’t I just do my thing, right? I mean, I’ve pretty much demonstrated that throughout my career. Um, you know, I’m going to do what’s, what’s best for Camp Clark and chicken palace and I’m going to protect the family business coach brand and the name and we’re going to have success, but I wouldn’t want to die for the employees that I’ve fired over the years. I mean the employees who, who screwed me, who, who stole things from me, who’ve lied to me, who’ve competed directly with me, I would not want to die for these people. But that is what Jesus Christ did. And so just the power of him doing that. Oh, by the way, once it gets up to the top of the mountain, they decide to, hey, here’s good move.

Why don’t we nail your hands into the cross? I don’t know that I’d want to have my feet in my hands nailed into, across. So just the power of somebody being willing to die for your sins. Even even if you’re not a Christian, if let’s just pretend, let’s just say someone was willing to do that. Does it not at least move you in the least bit of way where you’d say, you know what? Okay, uh, maybe my man, Jesus Christ was delusional and wrong, but I, I respect that. Move in and that’s cut. And that’s, I mean that to me, I’m just sharing with you that the faith that I’ve wrestled with over the years, I now 100 percent irrefutably believe in Jesus Christ. He is my lord and Savior. But at the same time, there are many things in the book that don’t make a lot of sense to me.

You know, like, like noah, you know, noah, Noah in the Ark, you know, how you built the big arc. How does he build the Big Arc? Did he have power tools? Thea Bob Vila who was helping him, how did he do it? I don’t know. The Tower of Babel Tower of Babel Tower of Babel, the Tower of Babel. It seems, you know, tough for me to grasp, uh, the, the idea of Adam and eve and then Adam and eve, they had kids, right? And then their kids a mating with each other. I mean, it’d be weird if my kid’s cocreated with each other to create other people. I mean, there just to hold inbreeding thing freaks me out a little bit. There’s so many things in the Bible that I just don’t understand. I don’t get A. I don’t get, I don’t, I don’t get it, but I can’t get hung up on it. I cannot get hung up on. And maybe you want to get hung up on it.

Maybe you say, this is what I want to get hung up on. Okay. Well let me give you something else to get hung up on the firmament. Look that up. The from a mint, the firmament, was it the time according to a biblical scholars, it was a solid water dome that surrounded the earth. It was like the ozone was surrounded by water and to create the flood, they pierced the firmament, thus flooding the world. I was at a church service back in the day where pastor Willie, George was speaking and he started talking about the firmament d from Ahmet, F I, r m a, m e n t f I, R m, a m e t. and when he started talking about the waters above and the firmament, it blew my mind because, um, I don’t, I don’t understand the logic of it, but the point is faith is where you decide to believe in something even though it all doesn’t necessarily make sense.

So let me give you a Martin Luther King junior quote. Oh, nice. Martin Luther King Jr. Nice. ThaNk you for giving us a non biblical quote. Somebody lisTening right there says, I appreciate you giving me a quote. It’s not from somebody from the bible. That’s fine. Martin luther king jr states. Faith is taking the first step. Even when you don’t see the whole staircase, what faith is taking the first step, even when you don’t see the whole staircase. Oh, and I can relate to that. Starting my business. I could not see the whole staircase. Oh, I could relate to that. Starting epic photos.com. I could not see the whole staircase. Oh, I can relate to that. Starting the thrive time show podcast, which is now in the top 10 of all podcasts in the world. I could not see the first staircase because who am I? I’m just a man. Bear pig with very minimal skills.

But faith is taking the first step even when you don’t see the whole staircase. So I run into times like this where I have something in that that just needs to be done, but I don’t know what to do when I run into situations where, um, all I can do is just believe in god’s plan and god’s healing hand. Um, there’s, there’s a, there’s a prayer famous prayer that I often turn to called the serenity prayer. And it was written by a famous american theologian, uh, theologian and, and really has been popular for for 30 years. There was actually a time it was wildly popular in american culture. It’s called the serenity prayer. And it reads god me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things that I can and the wisdom to know the difference. Living one day at a time, enjoying one moment at a time, accepting hardships as the pathway to peace, taking as he did the sinful world as it is, not as I would have it, trusting that he will make all things right if I surrender to his will, that I may be reasonably happy in this life.

And supremely happy with him forever in the next. Well guys, I’m a former dj, right? I started my first company dj connection and uh, many years ago when I was running dj connection.com, I found out that my son was having vision problems. My son, it looked as though my son who’s, um, you know, at the time, not even a year old is completely blind. And when that happened, it occurred to me, man, I really am not scheduling enough time with my family, and I stumbled upon this quote from walt disney that really helped me. Walt diSney wrote, a man should never neglect his family for business. Now we want to make sure I’m clearing this up. I’m not advocating working 30 hours per week and taken up the governments of Greece and Spain. Philosophy on work. Life balances are ideal. However, I am advocating that that you and I would schedule family time with the same sense of urgency and priority with which we would schedule business activities.

You see, I would never miss you and I would never miss right a business appointment intentionally or unintentionally show up late to an appointment without calling. I mean, we would never intentionally not show up to a meeting, right without, without calling. Yet. I’m sad to say that in my own family, I constantly used to show up late for things or didn’t show up at all for family things. It took me personally, thrive nation, getting into a place of brokenness when my son was born blind for me to realize that I needed to start to schedule the time out for the things that truly matter most to me. And as most people who know me can attest, I’ve never really been a very, very, uh, a very religious person. And in fact, I have never, ever, I’ve never would have gone to church at all if it wasn’t for my wife vanessa.

Oh sure. I mean I’d gone to a church physically, but mentally and spiritually, I really hadn’t ever gone there. Even today when my wife starts bringing up scripture or anything related to the spiritual realm or something, somehow having a deeper meaning, the, you know, it kinda gives me the willies a little bit because I’m not really sure how it all works. I trust guys like pastor Brian Gibson to have sorted out for me. I do read the business coach bible. I listened to td jakes every morning, but into anytime we can get into something spiritual, it kinda. I kinda put it. My mind is like this getting a little woo woo. Weird was what I call it. It’s getting, it’s getting a little whoa, whoa. And you know what I mean when I say woo, there are people out there, I’ve seen them speak a lot of times.

I used to go to all these local chamber of commerce events. You’d have somebody who would be supposed to. They’re supposed to be teaching you sales, and they would say, well, the key to sales is transferring the emotions of how you feel to the other person. So it starts with you making sure that you feel a hundred percent confident in yourself and in your product. And then we’re gonna do is you’re gonna transfer your emotions to the other person and the whole time they’re talking, I’m thinking, woo, this is woo woo. This is woo woo. It just adds up. Yoda, yoda, and yoda. Yoda was famous for, for dropping these knowledge bombs were he would, he would say things that, uh, you know, some people would, would say, I don’t know whether this makes a lot of sympathy. You’d say trader chef that go up, everything you fear, you’re going, that’s cool.

Yoda. Meanwhile, my sister might get killed. I need to go to the cloud city and savor yoda would say fearless the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger, anger, beach to hate dates to saffron. Great. Go calm down. Yoda. Calm down. I, I get it. Meanwhile, my sister is going to be killed in the cloud city. I have got to leave your swamp town and I need to go save her. You had would say death is a natural part of life. We’re try to, for those around you who transform into the force more than them do not. Mr. Do not attached the attachment leads to jealousy. The shadow of great age. Uh, meanwhile I’m attached to my sister because I have a sister who is in the cloud city in case you missed the update. I got this guy by the name of lando calrissian.

It’s supposed to be taking care of her, but I’m pretty sure that he, lando calrissian is working with darth vader and I don’t know that I can, um, you know, feel confident in the idea that land was taken care of her. And I am attached to her [inaudible]. This just in. She’s my sister. Yoda would say, always passed on. He goes, I passed on when I’ve learned. Meanwhile, every employee that I’ve ever taught in the past, my systems has gone on to become my competitor. If you own a business, put your hand up right now. If you can relate to that right there because you know what I’m talking about. You know what I’m talking about when you teach somebody and you teach somebody everything you know, and then they come back and screw you with that knowledge. Oh man, I can tell you this. There are so many people, so many people that I have taught my systems and processes with that I wish I would have never even look them in the eye.

So whenever I hear somebody coming in with biblical truth or some profound knowledge bombs, a lot of time, I’m, a lot of times I, I tend to naturally classify that as a woo woo thing. Woo woo, woo, woo. Meanwhile, you’re over here in your reality distortion field where everything is koombaya kum ba yah my lord. Kumbaya. That’s great that you’re at camp singing kumbaya. Meanwhile, I’m the one financing the camp. Right? Right. Who can relate, who can relate to it? Okay, so a lot of times, again, I just want you to know the devil does not need an advocate, but as the devil’s advocate, a lot of times I have struggled and wrestled with faith. I have wrestled with faith so much. I just, oh man, I just have to agree that the bible is the irrefutable word of god and I’m just going 100 percent commit because I can tell you that from my personal experience when my dad was diagnosed with lou gehrig’s disease, I felt a peace that I did not feel when my son was born blind, when I was not a, uh, outspoken believer in christ.

And if you’re out there saying, man, you’re crazy. I dunno whether I agree with you or not, that’s cool because I’m not a pastor, but I would, I would encourage you to check out hope in the dark by pastor craig groeschel. Believing god is good when life is not. Because my main man, craig rochelle is a pastor of the largest church in America, but at the same time he’s a guy who’s going through stuff, his his daughter having massive health issues and he talks about it openly in the book and I just. I mean, this is an example. This is an excerpt from his book. He writes, but craig, when I see my baby girl wasting away in there in so much pain, how can I surrender to a god who allows this and on top of everything else that we’ve already been through? I want to trust, but I just don’t know how.

Again, I don’t. I don’t have all the answers. All I can say is that when I decided to fully commit myself to having a relationship and a belief and a faith in jesus christ as my lord and savior, I had a peace that passes all understanding a piece that was beyond anything I could possibly describe. When my dad died on September 5th and I didn’t have that piece previously when my son was born blind. But that being said, even to this day, anytime something’s. Anytime someone’s applying for a job and they say, hey, can you pray for me? I want to get this job. I have a hard time with that because I knew of a lot of people who are very, very successful billionaires and millionaires who don’t believe in god at all and we’re not even good people, but they implement the proven action items at work.

But I know yet I know that, that god is real. Uh, I’ve seen god be real to me and my only son, he opera, he was born on April 23rd of 2007. And on that day we named him aubrey napoleon hill clark. I wanted to name him rocky, a marvelous or, or napoleon hill, but my weirdo wife wouldn’t let me give him such a powerful name. So the logic that went into his name is as follows, a, the name aubrey was given to him in honor of my wife’s wonderful and inspirational grandfather who was a successful entrepreneur and an olympic swimmer back in the day. Uh, the name is napoleon hill. The name of napoleon hill to the middle name was given to him in honor of the, the author of think and grow rich. The book that I loved so much. So when we brought home from the hospital, vanessa and I were excited.

I mean, I’m, I’m as dad and I was excited that he was, he’d have, I’d maybe be raising like a potential pro athlete here, uh, after, you know, thoroughly inspecting his, his body. I appeared to me that he maybe had what it took to make it in the nba or nfl and he had kind of a stout little baby body. And uh, he showed an incredible work ethic. He just fought the entire time to get out of my wife’s womb. He decided not to just stay there, you know, so he could have just stayed there. So I thought to myself, this guy, as a fighter, he’s a stout business coach baby, this guy can be a pro athlete. I was pumped to be the dad of a boy. Now four months later it was brought to our attention by vanessa’s aunt Dr. Katherine Francis that auburn could not see very well.

And that he could potentially not see it all. This meant that my son was potentially blind and catherine, she’s a pediatrician, a pediatrician, and she knew that when she was hanging out with aubrey and interacting with him at my brother in law’s wedding in Utah, that [inaudible] just couldn’t see it. And she knew it if, however, it was a family event. And uh, as usual, I was not there. I was providing entertainment for another wedding on the same day at a country club in the dallas area. And I know it sounds terrible, but when my family would be at weddings, I would also be at weddings. I just was never at the weddings for my own family. I’d be at the weddings for other people’s weddings. And so when I first told, when I was, when I was first told that my wife could not see, I was actually in the middle of entertaining a room full of wedding guests.

And when my wife called me to tell me the news, I can barely hear it. Um, I kept ducking behind the dj booth so that none of the guests would see me. On my cell phone, this was back before the smartphone and when I answered the phone, I could immediately tell that that vanessa was, was crying, and I had probably been crying for some time, you know, at this point, because I had, she’d called me and told me she thought it might be blind. She called back to tell me that. So we’re, I’m teaching a wedding bind you. So I’m trying to hide behind the booth so no one will see what’s going on. And it was this crazy deal because I had a dj shadowing me, a guy who wanted to become a disc jockey for us. And uh, uh, I’ll call this guy longhaired chris because his name was chris and had long hair and he was shadowing me.

He wanted to become a dj for me. And so, uh, he, he looks at me and he says, hey, hey, what’s wrong dude? And I said, I think my son is blind. And he said what? And I just remember at that time, um, knowing that I had to queue up the next song, you know, so that the guests are, are thinking that like, man, this guy, this guy, this guy here, he this, this djs rock in this party, the, the guy next to me shadowing is thinking, man, this guy I’m with is like a crazy person here is finding out his son is blind and he’s still deejaying the show. These people here who are, uh, havIng the greatest time of their life at a wedding. They have no idea that the guy I’m shadowing is having like the worst day of his life, right? This wedding of this group of people, these hundreds of people there dancing their romance and they’re having a great time. He beverages are flowing.

People

aren’t having a great time. And my shadows thinking, dude, this must be like the worst day of his life is supposed to be the worst day of clay’s life. And the crowd is thinking, oh my gosh, this dj is like incrediBle, right? The bride and groom are thinking, this guy’s awesome. And my wife’s probably thinking, what is wrong with you? Why do you never carved out time for our family? So after I found out what was going on with with aubrey, I said, vanessa, I’m sorry, but I got to go to the wedding. And so I proceeded To just dj the crap out of that wedding reception. Everybody responds to adversity in their own unique way. For me, it just motivates me to work harder and kind of a weird way. I almost, I almost become like insanely motivated to make something even better when I am irritated.

So jam after jam, song after song, I kept the dance for pact and the energy in the room was super high. Meanwhile, I’m thinking internally is my son blind put song? Am I going to play next? Is my son blind? And then I have to open them. I have to have on the microphone to make announcements, ladies and gentlemen, family and friends. It is now tiMe to take this to the next level. How many people want to take this party from a level seven to level 10? And it was like, ooh, how many peopLe want to go to a level 10 whooped folks. This next song will be the elevator that takes us to a level did wu and. But yet after making those announcements, I’m still left with this feeling of like, I’m wondering, is my son blind? I mean, what about the nfl does, does the nba have any blind players?

Are blind coaches? Or maybe maybe there’s a blind coach in the nba. I mean many passionate business coach fans have argued a passionate losing fans have argued that the referee was, was, was in fact blind. And so maybe that’s something I can hang my hat on. And didn’t. Somebody actually came to the dj booth and they requested a song that was just. It just absolutely blew my mind. And they requested stevie wonder superstition and the irony and the non humor of that moment of having somebody come up and asK for stevie wonder. At the time when my son, I just found out my stomach, my son couldn’t see. That was too much for me. So I play the next song, go to the restroom, crying my eyes out. At this point, you know, and it Just, it, it’s one, one good, it wasn’t good. So when the, when the, after the wedding reception ended and everybody went home and the cheers subsided, um, I had to drive back from dallas to tulsa with a man and my car who had long hair.

This guy’s name was chris and so I’m driving back to tulsa and I’ve got four, maybe even five hours of driving to do and just thinking about, oh my gosh, my wife has to feel so alone right now. I Feel I don’t even know what to do. My son’s blind. And so when we get back to town, my wife flies in. I pick her up when we first see her, we have sort of an emotional exchange and I, and I’m a doer, you know. So I scheduled a meeting with the dean, mcgee I institute in Oklahoma city. Uh, we met with multiple doctors. We met with all these people and uh, every one of the optometrists and doctors, they all told us that, sorry, but your, your son just will never see. Then I get an email a few weeks later from one of our employees who’s on a honeymoon and he sends me a text, an email, let’s write down a text.

HE sends me an email that states that for whatever reason he feels like god told him to tell me that my son is going to see now I’m not the kind of person who believes in these kinds of things. I’m just not that kinda guy. I’m not the kinda guy who it’s too woo woo for me. And so I, you know, didn’t want to tell my wife. And so I didn’t for a day or two. And then vanessa kept praying for my son and praying for my son and I wasn’t a believer at the time. And then one day we were at the kitchen and vanessa says, hey, well, any highlights to your day? And I said, well, uh, nate emailed me from his honeymoon, sang that aubrey has the ability auburn’s going to see, he’s going to see but whatever. And vanessa, what do you mean?

Whatever he told you he was going to see. How does he know he’s going to see, what do you mean? And again, I don’t do that whole spiritual woo woo thing so that I think that was the glimmer of hope that my wife needed, but the entire time, even before nate’s email and after 18 nate’s email, she kept praying. She would pray all day, every day, walk around the house, praying. She would claim healing. she’d read bible verses, she would talk to god. It’s like they’re having like an interactive conversation except I couldn’t hear him responding and so I didn’t know it was going on and I actually got to a place where I told her, stop praying, stop it. You have to stop. You’re making me crazy. I need you to stop praying. You have to stop praying. I cannot handle it anymore. If you pray in my house, stop it.

And it got really emotional in the clark house. And it got to a place where I felt like at the very time that we needed to be getting closer, we were being pulled apart because, uh, we were fighting. She wasn’t fighting. I was fighting her. I wanted her to stop praying. I was tired of that. I just was so tired of it. I’m just tired of her pray and I said, hey, why don’t we go on a trip to Florida or something? Um, so we can just have three or four days to relax. So we’d go to sam’s club in route to Florida. We’re getting the last minute supplies, you know, a pound of twizzlers or whatever you get in bulk at sam’s, go into twizzlers to get to the necessities for a road trip. And so it’s havana. My daughter in the car, she’s like three or four at the time and then there’s opry, uh, my son is under the age of one and we’re at sam’s and we go to sam’s and we’ll go through the checkout line and I see this book cover with George Foreman on it.

And uh, for those of you who are not familiar, the George Foreman, George Foreman was perhaps the best, one of the best boxers of his time, but he was known as being a guy that didn’t smile much like at all. He was very intense. And uh, I just remember as a kid, you know, hearing that George Foreman was so mean and so intense, but then as an adult it was like he was a new person, he’s a different guy and he would smile all the time and I’m thinking like, what in the world? I mean, uh, what, what changed that guy? Why is he so different than what I thought? And here he is on a book cover smiling. And the book was called god in my corner, a spiritual memoir. And so I thought to myself, you know what, I’m gonna do. I’m gonna just pick up the book and uh, I don’t know, I don’t want to pick the book.

I hate spiritual books. So I said, vanessa, I got to pick up the book. And she says, well, pick up the book. And I said, I just, I dunno, I can’t pick up the book. And she said, no, no, you need to pick up the book if you want to get the book to get the book, you can afford the book, buy the book. I said, I know, but I don’t, I just know I just, I hate spiritual woo woo books. And she said, well, why are you, why do you want to buy the book that. So this is kind of weird thing. I don’t know. I’m having this debate with my wife and we’re already. The tensions are kind of intense, heightened at this point. And so I decided to go ahead and pick up the book. so I buy the book and I said, vanessa, could you read the book to me while we’re driving?

So vanessa starts reading this book to me while we’re driving and she’s reading out loud and as we’re driving I hear the story of george foreman’s nephew, uh, who was in a coma and george was not a christian at the time. And he prayed. He said, geOrge foreman, he said, god, if you’ll hear, if you will heal my nephew who’s in a coma, I will retire from boxing and I will serve you. And so, uh, he has the prayer. No one really knows. He said the prayer. Then he goes out and he tries to box in this heavyweight fight because he did the prayer like in the locker room and he’d been praying this prayer and he did one final prayer before he went out to fight and he’d just been praying and praying. And god, if you’ll heal my nephew, you know, I’ll know you’re real.

If you’ll heal my nephew that I know you’re real. And uh, if you get them out of thiS coma because dr. Say it’s not possible, I’ll retire and I’ll become a minister. Well, okay, so he goes out there to box a, you know, right before he goes out there, he gets a call and the locker room inches, a phone. What’s going on? This George Foreman, you know, I said, george, hey, your nephew just got out of that coma. He’s going really okay. but no one else knew that he made that, that uh, that a negotiation with god or he made that prayer or he. No one knew about it, right? so he goes out there to fight and he said he just didn’t have energy. It’s like he had mono or something. You just didn’t have the energy to fight, didn’t have the energy needed to win a heavyweight fight. And so he goes out there and just gets destroyed. I mean, he just gets a beaten up. He just, he gets, he loses and he doesn’t lose very much.

George, you know,

comes back in to locker room. Um, and if you read his book, explains the whole situation, but he retires from boxing. And so I thought, well, what the heck, if that guy can, can believe like that, I’m going to, I’m going to give her a whirl. So I prayed. I said, god, you know, if you can heal my, uh, my, my son, I will stop deejaying. I’ll stop dj connection and I’ll serve you in some capacity. I’ll teach people how to grow their companies. I’ll provide, I’ll provide time freedom. All, all change what I’m dOing, you know, if you could heal my son. And uh, so I prayed and uh, were there on the beach in Florida at the beach house. I’m in the beach house because I don’t do well with the sun or being outdoors or being by water. And I’m at the beach house, I’m reading a book called straight from the gut by Jack Welch.

And as I am reading the book, my son already grams the highlighter and makes eye contact with me for the first time in his life. So shortly thereafter we called it the family optometrist, dr groves to share with him that auburn could see. And he justifiably and probably because he’s a sane person, thought we were crazy. Uh, then we went as fast as possible. We drove home, uh, we met with dr groves. He confirmed our son could see after we’d been told by all of these optometrists that he could not see, we were told he could see that I booked a trip down to houston where I went down there and met George Foreman to tell him thank you for providing me the foundation and the inspiration I needed at the very bottom to believe in the all powerful healing word of god. It was what I needed.

And I wanted George Foreman to know I wanted to tell him to his face, George Foreman, you maybe don’t know me and I’m probably just a little speck of dust in your big world, but I just wanted you to know, sir, that you are the inspiration that caused me to believe that god could heal. And I told George Foreman, he said, can I hold your son? Can I get a photo with your son? It would be great if, if I could do that, and that my friend is how my son was healed. that’s how it happened. My wife had been praying without ceasing for, for months, after months, after months after months. I didn’t believe at all. In somehow in spite of my lack of faith, my lack of a positive attitude, my wife just kept praying. She just kept praying, kept praying. And George Foreman honored his commitment.

He stopped boxing. Um, and he started smiling. He started being nice to people, a man who had never really had big business coach endorsement deals all of a sudden got big endorsement deals. He got to deal with meineke. Uh, and George Foreman, I mean you’ve got a massive deal with meineke meineke. He got a massive deal with nike then obviously we all know about the grills that he’s now sent, sold 100 million grills, and he just said that he had been blessed abundantly since the time of that episode. And I’d lOve to say that every single story ins with a happily ever after, but I can’t do that. But what I can say is that god’s word is irrefutably true, and in god’s word, philippians four, chapter four, verses six through seven, he says, don’t be anxious about anything but every situation by prayer and petition with thanksgiving, present your request to god and the peace of god which surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and your minds in christ jesus.

And I don’t know if that helpS at all. Um, I could just say you’re not alone and I know you’re going through something right now and I’m so sorry and I am praying for you. And I wish I was better at praying. I wish I was just better at praying. I wish I had magical words to say. I wish I was probably more woo woo. I wished that I could just have that sort of childlike faith that my wife does. I’m and I’m working on myself, but I just don’t want you to feel alone through this, and if you’re out there and you feel like you’re alone and you, you’re just going, how could god possibly be real? If I’m going through this? What’s god’s plan? I need a healing hand. What is god’s plan? I can tell you I don’t. I don’t know. I don’t know, but I can tell you that the bible is filled with so many words of encouragement and I would just encourage you to marinate, to read, to prey on philippians chapter four, verses six through seven, or read that serenity prayer.

God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference. Living one day at a time, enjoying one moment at a time, accepting hardships as the pathway to peace, taking as he did the sinful words is the sinful world as it is not as I would have it. Trusting that he will make all things right if I surrender to his will, that I may be reasonably happy in this life and supremely happy with him forever in the next a friend. Please don’t lose your faith during this time. Don’t get into arguments with your spouse. Get closer during this time. God has a plan and a healing hand and thrive nation. I’d ask you for one favor whether you’re a believer or not. If you could just today one time, say one prayer for my friend who has a child who has a tumor that needs to be removed.

You could just say one prayer today. I don’t want to divulge his name and her name and make it a big social media thing, but if you could just one prayer. If you could just say, you know, if you could just put up a prayer and pray for the healing of a young girl, uh, under the age of three who has cancer, if you could just give me, give him, give me, give us one prayer. I know god hears those prayers and prayer changes things and where two or more gathered, great things can happen. So if you. If you get a chance today to will drive into work, say a prayer for this young child who has a tumor that needs to be removed because we all know is the thrive nation that god has the power to heal.